and its Economic Management. 187 



Whatever kind you intend to exhibit, see that they are all 

 young bees placed in your observatory, and on a newly built comb 

 of brood, the framework to be painted a pale green in contrast to 

 the light-coloured comb. The young bees are secured by making 

 up a nucleus a few days before they are required, with plenty of 

 hatching brood; most of the old workers returning to the original 

 stand. It will readily be seen therefore that bees from inferior 

 stock may thus gain the prize in competition with others not so 

 prepared, though the latter may on the whole possess the better 

 qualities. 



The man who enters a large bee-farm for a term in the hope 

 of gaining an insight into the practical management of the same, 

 must not think all the necessary information is to be picked up 

 simply by looking around and paying occasional visits to the 

 apiary. On the contrary, he must make up his mind to go there 

 to work just as any other apprentice or assistant. The daily 

 routine must be gone through in every particular, and though 

 some manipulations may be repeated constantly, it will be only 

 by such close study and application that he will make himself 

 master of the entire practical management. 



At my queen-raising apiary the hives face all points of the 

 compass, and though this has sometimes been objected to by 

 visitors, it is well to note the opinion of the oldest queen-rearer of 

 America. - Mr. H. Alley says : — " Should my nuclei be arranged 

 in rows, as some people think they should, not one queen in a 

 dozen would enter the right hive on her return after a flight. 

 Therefore my hives look as though they might have been shot 

 into the yard from the mouth of a big gun. Well, we never lose a 

 queen by her mistaking the hive, though it would seem to a 

 stranger that not one bee in the yard could find its home as the 

 ground is so completely (?) covered by small hives." 



