HOW TO KEEP BEES. 27 



push out from between the rings of the abdomen and are taken and 

 worked into comb, which is soon occupied with eggs, pollen and 

 honey. 



Bees of most all ages go out with the swarm and the queen joins 

 the throng usually when the swarm is about half out. If the queen 

 fails to go with the swarm they will return to the parent hive. /If 

 only a small part of the bees go out as a swarm, another swarm may 

 follow when the young queens begin to hatch, or it may be delayed 

 until the surviving young queen flies to mate. 



Young queens mate about ten days after leaving the cell, though 

 from adverse weather or scarcity of drones, it may be deferred for 

 two or three weeks. As soon as mated the queen returns to the hive 

 and within a day or two begins laying. 



Young queens sometimes mate several times before they begin to 

 lay, but after they commence to lay they never mate again. If a 

 queen fails to mate she will ultimately begin to lay, but her eggs will 

 produce only drones. These may be placed in worker comb, but 

 as soon as the bees cap the brood the raised bullet-like cappings 

 betray the sex of the contained young. Such a queen should be 

 replaced with a good one. 



The average time of incubation of the eggs is three days, though it 

 varies with the temperature. From the egg a minute white grub 

 (larva) is hatched, and this is supplied with and lies in a milky white 

 food prepared by the nurses from pollen and honey. It is fed thus 

 for six days by which time it has grown until it fills the cell and it is 

 then capped over and spins its cocoon and metamorphoses, turning 

 from a grub into a bee as does the caterpillar into a butterfly. 



The worker takes twelve days to make the change and the drone 

 fifteen. 



The "queen larva" receives a more abundant supply of the pre- 

 pared food and takes only six days to change from grub to perfect 

 bee. It is currently said that larvae intended for queens receive a 

 different food from that given to the worker larvae, but there are 



