146 ' SWARMING AND HIVING. 



suitable habitation ; and even when they are on the way io 

 their new home, the Queen being heavy with eggs, and un- 

 accustomed to fly, is sometimes from weariness, compelled to 

 alight, and her colony clusters around her. Queens, under 

 such circumstances, sometimes seem unwilling to entrust 

 themselves again to their wings, and the poor bees attempt 

 to lay the foundations of their colony, on fence-rails, hay- 

 stacks, or other most unsuitable places. 



I have been informed by Mr. Henry M. ZoUickoffer of 

 Philadelphia, a very intelligent and reliable observer, that he 

 knew a swarm to settle on a willow tree in that city, in a lot 

 owned by the Pennsylvania Hospital ; it remained there for 

 some time, and the boys pelted it with stones, to get posses- 

 sion of its comb and honey. 



Mr. Wagner says, that he once knew a swarm of bees to 

 lodge under the lowermost limb of an isolated oak tree, in a 

 corn field. It was not discovered until the corn was har- 

 vested, in September. Those who found it, mistook it for a 

 recent swarm, and in brushing ii down to hive it, broke away 

 three pieces of comb, each about eight inches square! 



The absolute necessity for scouts or explorers, is evident 

 from all the facts in the case, unless we admit that bees have 

 the faculty of flying in an air-line to a hollow tree, or some 

 suitable abode which they have never seen, though they 

 cannot find their hive, if, in their absence, it is moved only a 

 few rods from its former position. 



These obvious considerations are abundantly confirmed, 

 by the repeated instances in which a few bees have been 

 noticed, prying very inquisitively into a hole in a hollow tree 

 or the cornice of a building, and have been followed before 

 long, by a whole colony. The importance of these remarks 

 will be more obvious, when I come to discuss the proper 

 mode of hiving bees. 



