LOSS OP QUEENS. 223 



again, at periods of two or three days ; if none are 

 found by the sixteenth day, the probability is that 

 the queen has been lost. The remedy is, to either 

 supply them with an embryo queen, if you have a 

 queen nursery, when one can be had ; but when none 

 can be obtained, take out a frame of comb from a 

 hive that has a fertile queen, see that there are plenty 

 of eggs in it, and exchange it for an empty comb in 

 the hive which you suspect has lost its queen. From 

 these eggs they will rear queens ; but the same diffi- 

 culty will exist as in the first case of their getting 

 lost. The plan I have suggested for strengthening 

 artificial swarms, i. e. exchanging the combs that are 

 destitute of eggs and brood for those that are supplied 

 with both, is one of the best for safety and utility. 

 Such examinations and exchanges can only be made 

 successfully in movable comb hives ; yet in common 

 box hives, by inverting them and smoking the bees 

 off, and cutting or breaking out some of the combs, 

 its condition can be ascertained, and combs contain- 

 ing eggs inserted. When this is done, the eggs 

 should be placed in a central position in the hive, as 

 the colony is likely to be reduced in numbers and 

 unable to maintain sufficient heat to develop the 

 young queens, if otherwise situated. 



The superiority of the new movable comb hive 

 over all other plans is clearly manifested in this par- 

 ticular, as there are more bees lost annually by first 

 losing their queens than would pay the difference in 

 the cost of the hive, with the patent right included. 

 In this hive the bee-keeper can, with very little care, 



