VIII. 

 NUCLEUS SWARMING. 



Up to this time I had been so fortunate as to have 

 no swarms issue from the hive. I say fortunate, be- 

 cause it is best to keep one's bees at work securing 

 honey. If they swarm, the old stock, from which 

 the swarm issues, is weakened, and the new stock is 

 not strong enough to store much surplus. If all hives 

 can be kept full of bees until after white clover, they 

 will then in most locations, have gathered the main 

 harvest of the year. The bee-keeper can then make 

 as many new swarms as his judgment approves. But 

 it is not easy to keep bees from swarming until so 

 late in the season. Unless very cautiously managed 

 they will sometimes swarm so much as to weaken 

 nearly every stock, and so destroy all hopes of a 

 large yield of surplus honey. My success in keep- 

 ing them from swarming gave me much pleasure. 

 It was a real triumph to succeed in my first year 

 where so many veteran bee-keepers fail. My suc- 

 cess in preventing swarming was due in large meas- 

 ure to these two reasons: 100 



