ARTIFICIAL SWARMING. 217 



ficient numbers, I sometimes close their hive, or cover it 

 with a sheet, so that the returning bees can find no other 

 place to enter. My object is not to obtain a large number of 

 bees. For reasons previously assigned, I do not want 

 enough to build new comb, but only enough to adhere to 

 the removed comb, and raise a new queen from its brood, 

 or develop the sealed one which has been given them. A 

 short time after one nucleus has in this way, been formed, 

 another may be made by moving the old hive again, and so 

 a third or fourth, if so many are wanted. This plan requires 

 considerable skill and experience, to secure the right number 

 of bees, without getting too many. 



If bees are to be made to enter a new hive, by removing 

 the old one from its stand, it will always be very desirable 

 not only to have the new one contain a piece of comb, but 

 a considerable number of bees clustered on that comb. I 

 repeatedly found that my bees, after entering the hive, refus- 

 ed to have anything to do with the brood comb, and for a 

 long time, I was unable to conjecture the cause ; until I 

 ascertained that they were dissatisfied with its deserted ap- 

 pearance, and that, by taking the precaution to have it well 

 covered with bees, I seldom failed to reconcile them to this 

 system of forced colonization. I can usually tell, in less 

 than two minutes, whether the operation will succeed or not. 

 If the returning bees intend to accept of their new home, 

 they will, however much agitated at first, soon begin to join 

 the cluster on the comb ; while if they are dissatisfied, they 

 will abandon the hive, and nearly all the bees that were 

 originally on the comb, will leave with them. They seem 

 capricious in this matter, and are sometimes so very self- 

 willed, that they refuse to have anything to do with the brood 

 comb, when no good reason can be seen for their being so 

 rebellious. 



19 



