NATURAL SWARMING. 211 



or brush, and start them into the hives, having sev- 

 eral inches to travel from the main cluster to the 

 hive. In this way an expert apiarian can certainly 

 see the queen, if one should pass into the hive. 

 Watch carefully that no other enters ; should one 

 make her appearance, catch her and put her into the 

 other hive ; then divide the bees as nearly equal as 

 possible. Should you find but one queen, mark the 

 hive in which she was put; and if either swarm 

 comes off a movable comb hive, examine it imme- 

 diately to obtain a comb containing a queen cell 

 (care must be taken to leave one still in the hive) ; 

 put this into the swarm where no queen was observed, 

 if it still contains enough bees for a good sized swarm, 

 if not, take some from the other, making them run 

 the gauntlet to see that no queen passes. Shut up 

 the hive, being careful to ventilate; set it on the 

 stand, let it remain until a few minutes before sun- 

 set, give them their liberty, when they will note their 

 locality, and by morning will go to work. With box 

 hives this is not so easily accomplished ; however, it 

 may be done by inverting the hive which sent forth 

 a swarm, where queen cells will, or ought to, be 

 found; cut one of these out, with a small piece of 

 comb attached. If the swarm is put in a box hive, 

 this queen cell may be suspended from one of the 

 holes in the top where bees ascend to the honey box; 

 the piece of comb should be cut to fit the hole nicely, 

 the cell projecting below into the hive. This embryo 

 queen will very soon emerge and supply the swarm, 

 if neither of the old queens were put in the hive ; 



