SPRING MANIPULATION TRANSFERRING. 



71 



workers in an emergency have stored wherever they found vacant cells, 

 are made available for the queen. Before the main harvest opens it may 

 even be necessary in order to keep the combs filled witli brood to feed 

 back gradually tliis extracted honey or its eciuivalent; but by taking 

 it away and returning it gradually the object sought will have been 

 accomplished, namely, keeping the combs stocked with brood until tlie 

 harvest is well under way, or as long as the larger population thus 

 gained in the hive can be made available. 



It is in this getting workers ready for the early harvest — hives over- 

 flowing, as it were, with bees — that the skill of the apiarist is taxed to 

 its utmost. The work properly begins with the close of the summer 

 preceding the harvest, for the first ste])S toward successful wintering 

 should be taken then, and unless wintered successfully the colony can 

 not be put in shape to take full advantage of an early honey harvest. 



Good judgment in the application of the hints given iu this chapter, 

 with careful and frequent attention, will bring colonies to the chief 

 spring or early summer flow of honey in good condition, with plenty 

 of bees and Avith combs well stocked with brood, provided they have 

 wintered well and have good queens. 



TRANSFERRING. 



If colonies have been purchased in box hives, it is advisable at the 

 first favorable opportunity to get them into frame hives. 



Fig. 53.— Trausferring — drumming tlio bees from ;i box hive into a frame hivo. (Original.) 



Early in the season — that is, in April or May in middle latitudes, 

 before the brood nest has reached its greatest extension and while the 

 hive contains the least honey — it is not a ditticult matter to drive the 



