Dividing. 191 



greatly divide brood. The new colony will have eight frames 

 of brood, comb, etc. , three from the nucleus and five from the 

 old colony, ayoungfertilequeen, plenty of bees, thoseof thepre- 

 vious nucleus and the young bees from the old colony, and will 

 work with a surprising vigor, often even eclipsing the old colony. 



If the apiarist has several colonies, it is better to make the 

 new colony from several old colonies, as follows : Take one 

 frame of bri^-comb from each of six old colonies, or two 

 from each of three, and carry them, bees and all, and place 

 with the nucleus. Be sure that no queen is removed. Fill all 

 the hives with empty combs, or foundation, as before. In 

 this way we increase without in the least disturbing any of 

 the colonies, and may add a colony every day or two, or per- 

 haps several, depending on the size of our apiary, and can 

 thus almost always, so my experience says, prevent swarming. 



By taking only brood that is all capped, we can safely add 

 one or two frames to each nucleus every week, without adding 

 any bees, as there would be no danger of loss by chilling the 

 brood. In this way, as we remove no bees, we have to spend 

 no time in looking for the queen, and may build up our nuclei 

 into full stocks, and keep back the swarming impulse with 

 great facility. 



These are unquestionably the best methods to divide, and 

 so I wUl not complicate the subject by detailing others. The 

 only objection that can be urged against them, and even this 

 does not apply to the last, is that we must seek out the queen 

 in each hive, or at least be sure that we do not remove her, 

 though this is by no means so tedious if we have Italians or 

 other races of yellow bees, as of course we all will. I might 

 give other methods which would render unnecessary this cau- 

 tion, but they are to my mind inferior, and not to be recom- 

 mended. If we proceed as above described, the bees will sel- 

 dom prepare to swarm at all, and if they do they will be dis- 

 covered in the act, by such frequent examinations, and the 

 work may be cut short by at oncft: dividing such colonies, as 

 first explained, and destroying their queen-cells, or, if desired, 

 using them for forming new nuclei. 



