SECONDARY SWARMS. 227 
nymphs. In about a week, one of them hatches; and the 
question must be decided whether or not, any more colo- 
nies shall be formed that season. If the hive is well filled 
with bees, and the season is in all respects promising, it is 
generally decided in the affirmative; although, under such 
circumstances, some very strong colonies refuse to swarm 
more than once. 
If the bees of the parent-colony decide to prevent the first 
hatched queen from killing the others, a strong guard is 
kept over their cells, and as often as she approaches them 
with murderous intent, she is bitten, or given to understand 
by other most uncourtier-like demonstrations, that even a 
queen cannot, in all things, do just as she pleases. 
446. About a week after first swarming, should the 
Apiarist place his ear against the hive, in the morning or 
evening, when the bees are still, if the queens are ‘‘piping,’’ 
he will readily recognize their peculiar sounds (115). The 
young queens are all mature, at the latest, in sixteen days 
from the departure of the first swarm, even if it left as 
soon as the royal cells were begun. 
The second swarm usually issues on the first or second 
day after piping is heard; though the bees sometimes delay 
coming out until the fifth day, in consequence of an unfa- 
vorable state of the weather. Occasionally, the weather is 
so very unfavorable, that they permit the oldest queen 
to kill the others, and refuse to swarm again. This is a 
rare occurrence, as young queens are not so particular 
about the weather as old ones, and sometimes venture out, 
not merely when it is cloudy, but when rain is falling. On 
this account, if a very close watch is not kept, they are 
often lost. As piping ordinarily commences about a week 
after first-swarming, the second swarm usually issues eight 
or nine days after the first ; although it has been known to 
issue as early as the third, and as late as the seventeenth ; 
but such cases are very rare. 
