QUEEN NURSERIES. 278 



cages, covered with wire (^lotli on eacli side and inserted in 

 a frame. Each cage has two holes at the top, one for a 

 sponge saturated with honey, the other to rotcive the queen- 

 cell. The frame is inserted in a strong colony, not neces- 

 sarily queenless, since these joung queens are caged, and 

 have feed at hand when they hatch. 



The hatching of queens in nurseries properly belongs to 

 the trade of the queen-breeder. The honey producer, who 

 raises queens for himself only, does not need fresh queens 

 every day. Besides, the introducing of these young virgin 

 queens to nuclei, previous to impregnation, is quite difficult 

 and uncertain. (541.) 



531. Before we pass to the subject of introducing queens, 

 we cannot refrain from noticing the rapid progress of the 

 business of queen rearing in the last 20 years. The intro- 

 duction of brighter races has greatly increased the spread- 

 ing of Apiarian science, and many facts which, years ago, 

 were known only to the few, now belong to the public do- 

 main. 



532. In breeding the new races, let the novice remem- 

 ber that the qualities he should seek to improve are, first, 

 prolificness and honey production ; second, peaceableness ; 

 third, beauty. 



Since their introduction into this country, the Italians 

 have been bred too much for color, at the expense of their 

 other qualities. We have seen queens, that had been so in- 

 bred for color, that their mating with a black drone hardly 

 showed the hybridization of their progeny. 



This in-and-in breeding, for color, has even produced white- 

 eyed drones, stone blind, a degeneracy which would tend to 

 the extinction of the race. 

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