118 FIFTY YEARS AMONG THE BEES 



tinue the colony, a queen-cell, or a virgin queen just hatched 

 may be given, for it is not easy to get them 'to accept a laying 

 queen. 



DRONB-LAYINGt QUEENS. 



Drone-brood in worker-cells may be present with no lay- 

 ing workers — the work of a drone-laying or failing queen. The 

 brood in that case, however, will not be so scattering as ia Fig. 

 59. Such a colony is more amenable to treatment, and can be 

 well utilized by uniting with a weak colony having a laying 

 queen. 



BREAKING UP FAULTY COLONIES. 



When fruit blossoms are about ready to burst forth, and 

 bees are carrying pollen whenever it is warm enough, I do not 

 expect to lose any more colonies except those that are queenless 

 or have faulty queens. But I do expect to have the satisfaction 

 of breaking up every colony that does not have a good queen, 

 for when I find a colony that is queenless or one whose queen 

 is more or less a drone-layer, it is no longer any satisfaction to 

 me to nurse it and coax it along for the sake of saying I have 

 not lost that colony. The real satisfaction is in having it out of 

 the way. Time was when it seemed a nice thing in case of 

 finding a strong colony without a queen to give it young brood 

 and let it rear a queen ; but much observation has shown that a 

 queen reared thus early is only an aggravation nine times out 

 of ten. So when a colony is found that is not queen-right, it is 

 remorselessly broken up, and distributed amongst other colo- 

 nies, or united with a weak colony having a good queen. The 

 breaking-up of such colonies does not make the number less 

 in the long run, for by fall the number can be made greater 

 than if no breaking-up had taken place. 



BECOKD ENTRIES. 



While care is taken to omit no entry in the book that will 

 be of future importance, there is really not such a great deal 

 of writing done, as will be readily understood when it is remem- 

 bered that only one page is allotted to three colonies, allowing 



