226 AUSTRALASIAN 



fifty minutes with the aid of chloroform. His method is to 

 fit three pieces of sponge pretty tightly into the nozzle of a 

 smoker ; on the middle piece he pours a teaspoonful of chloro- 

 form ; he then puffs the fumes for a quarter of a minute into 

 each hive which has been previously prepared by being made 

 queenless. In about two minutes he returns to the first one 

 and gives it a few more puffs, and so on through the whole, at 

 the same time letting the queens run in ; and if it be in the 

 middle of the day he puffs them a third time after about two 

 minutes more, in order to catch the bees that are coming in. 

 He says : " I have during the past season taken the worst 

 cases of fertile workers and the most difficult queenless colonies 

 that I ever had to deal with, and I never missed yet." I 

 believe this statement refers more particularly to mated queens, 

 but I suppose the plan would work equally well with virgins. 



"SHIPPING" QUEENS. 



I make use of this term "shipping" because it is now so 

 generally adopted that scarcely any other word would be under- 

 stood to convey the meaning intended, although it is by no 

 means necessarily connected with the idea of conveyance by 

 ship or by water. It is the term which Americans apply to all 

 manner of '' sending off " queens, bees, honey or other com- 

 moditiss, whether by road, railway, or sea. As regards the 

 transport of queens it would be more correctly termed posting 

 or mailing queens, as they are generally forwarded by post 

 parcels. 



Wonderful progress has been made of late in sending bees 

 and queens safely over long distances. Not long ago it 

 was considered risky to send a caged queen on a voyage 

 occupying more than eight or nine days, but within the 

 last eighteen months they have arrived safe after travelling 

 over twenty days. This success is due to the improve- 

 ments made both in the shipping cages and in the food 

 supplied to the queens and bees. Formerly hard candy 

 and water was placed in the cage3, but some two years 

 ago Mr. I. R. Good, an American, invented a much more suit- 

 able food which serves the purpose without water. The use of 

 this, together with the improved cages, has quite revolutionised 

 the queen trade. I make the " Good candy," as it is called, by 



