No. 527] COLOR SENSE OF THE HONEY-BEE 685 



hives. If you remove a white hive, many of the bees will 

 pass the blue one on the one side and the red one on the 

 other side, and go into the white hives further on. This 

 shows conclusively that bees mark the position of the 

 hive by color as well as by its environment. 



I admit that where a few colonies are kept in one place there is very 

 little danger of the bees mixing; hut where you have long rows of hives 



great deal of confusion and save the lives of many bees and some young 

 queens. 11 



While this plan works admirably so long as the hives 

 are not moved, it of course, gives very unsatisfactory 

 results, if for any reason a hive is removed and one of 

 another color is substituted for it. When a colony swarms 

 naturally, says another apiarist, or is swarmed arti- 

 ficially, or for any reason the old hive body is removed, 

 unless the new hive is of the same color as the old hive 

 many of the bees will not return to it, but will scatter 

 among the hives nearest to the old location, which are of 

 the same color as the hive which lias been removed. For 

 example if the dwelling of the parent colony was white 

 and if at the time of swarming an attempt was made to 

 put the swarm in a blue hive a large part of the bees 

 would refuse to enter it and would fly away to the 

 nearest white hive, with the result that the new colony 

 was materially weakened. He, therefore, found it more 

 convenient to paint all his hives one color. 12 



Another bee-keeper placed his hives in two house- 

 apiaries, each containing 150 colonies. The three end 

 hives at each end of the shed or house were painted green. 

 If now all the green hives at one end were removed, the 

 bees instead of entering the hives nearest to the old loca- 

 tion, which were painted a different color, flew to the 



