106 



Texas Depaetment op Ageicultuee. 



or in an upper story of a strong colony having a queen-excluding zinc 

 between it and the brood chamber, where they will be completed. 

 Care must be used to remove the cells before any queen emerges, as 

 the first one hatched will destroy all the rest of the cells. 

 • A still further improvement is that of using queen cell cups pressed 

 by a machine upon flanged, cylindrical wooden cell cup blocks, which 

 are attached to cell bars lq such a way that they can be easily re- 

 moved and interchanged. The cell cups are "grafted," as trans- 

 ferring the larvae to them is termed, and placed ui the cell building 

 colonies in the manner already described, and when the cells are 

 completed they are used as desired. The nuclei used are of different 

 sizes, ranging from a few combs in the standard hives to very small 

 boxes containing little combs and only a mere handful of bees. 

 It is impossible to go into details concerning other various employ- 



|fq!^?P^W^^^!PP«!f«lWiWfr" 



A fine lot of perfect queen cells. 



ments and advantages here, however. Further information can be 

 obtained out of books pertaining to the subject of queen rearing. 



IMPEOVINQ BEES. 



There are hundreds of beekeepers who pay very little attention to 

 the improvement of their stock, and the result is that their bees are 

 not up to the average in prolificness and honey-gathering qualities. 

 A few dollars spent in purchasing queens of any pure race is one 

 of the best paying investments a beekeeper can make. Suppose the 

 average yield of honey obtained by common stock is $2.00 per col- 

 ony and that, by spending a few dollars for only a half dozen 

 untested queens from a reliable breeder, from which to rear young 

 queens to replace the inferior ones in the colonies, the result would 

 be the improvement in the stock would add only 50 cents in the way 

 of increased, yield per colony — in other words, instead of each colony 

 yielding $2.00, the yield would be $2,50 — the gain in one year would 



