jUe-hceping in Victoria. liO 



the frames of the two colonies, thus thoroughh mixing the bees. They will 

 have settled down by next morning, and will work peaceably together ; the 

 combs intended for the brood nest and the queen are then put in the lower 

 chamber, the other combs in the super above a queen-excluder. 



The old queen may be remox'ed the day before uniting, which should not 

 be attempted till the young queen has been laying for some days, as much 

 stinging and balling of the queen may take place if uniting is done before 

 or too soon after the young queen commenced laying. 



The united stock is in the best condition for storing surplus honey, the 

 brood combs have been renewed, and the queen being of the same season's 

 raising, there will be no further swarming. 



IX.— Honey. 



Honejr is the nectar of flowers which has iinclergone chemical 

 changes during and after the gathering by the bees. 



It is composed principally of two sugars, dextrose and levulose, and 

 water. Several other sugars are also usually present, as well as 

 formic acid, tannic acid, albumen, and the essential perfumes of the 

 blossoms from which the nectar was gathered. It is the presence of 

 these essential oils which produces such a great variation in the aroma 

 and jflavour of different honeys. All honey is liable, sooner or later, 

 to candy, or granulate ; it becomes first cloudy and gradually' partially 

 or wholly, solid. 



Of the two principal sugars composing honey, dextrose is a 

 crystallizing and levulose a relatively non-crystallizing sugar, and 

 the preponderance of the one or the other governs the rapidity and 

 degree of crystallization ; while the variation of the greater quantity 

 of one or the other is due to the flora from which the nectar was 

 gathered by the bees. There are, however, some other minor factors 

 which hasten or retard granulation. These are temperature, amount 

 of water, pollen grains, and air bubbles. Honey does not as a rule 

 granulate till the approach of cool weather, and that gathered during 

 cool weather granulates sooner and firmer than honey produced in 

 midsummer. Any honey, however, will granulate sooner under 

 frequent changes of temperature than when kept at a uniform degree, 

 high or low. 



The amount of water present in honey varies according to the 

 source of the nectar, the humidity of the atmosphere at time of 

 gathering, and the length of time it remained in the hives. In 

 Victorian honey it ranges fi'om 12 to 20 per cent., the average 

 density being 15 to 17 per cent. AA^hen exposed to the atmosphere, the 

 percentage of water will adjust itself to the humidity of the air; 

 thus honey from the dry districts of the State, unless kept hermeti- 

 cally sealed, absorbs water from the air in the city sale-rooms and 

 becomes quite thin on the surface during moist weather. As water 

 is necessary to crystallization, the thinner honeys naturally granulate 

 more readily than the dense honeys from dry districts. Some of the 

 latter remain liquid for one or two years. Particularly is this the 

 ■ case with yellow box and red box honey, which, if it could be 

 obtained entirely free from admixtures of other kinds, would probably 

 remain liquid indefinitely. 



