HINTS ON WORKING THE BEES 75 
through the queen excluder. This may be 
done by rolling the quilt back for about an 
inch along the whole length of one side, on 
a bright, sunny day. The drones will soon 
find the opening and take flight. 
If, after supering, the weather should be 
unfavourable for the bees to gather food, 
artificial feeding will have to be resorted to. 
Should the scheme be carried out early in 
the year and the queen be prolific, it may 
be found necessary to repeat it to prevent 
swarming. 
It is necessary to remember that inasmuch 
as the rearing of young queens and the 
consequent swarming is not carried on under 
this method, it is a necessity that the hives 
should be ve-queened every two years. 
Queen Rearing.—It is better to retain one 
hive for queen-rearing purposes and_ this 
should contain the very best queen available 
so as to secure a good strain of workers. 
The drones, too, should be selected by 
allowing no drone cells in any but the best 
hives. 
For the small bee-keeper who cannot spare 
much time among his bees, and who only 
requires half a dozen queens in a year, I 
would recommend that queen-rearing should 
