Apiculture. 



258 



TMarch 1908. 



There is another point that may, 

 perhaps, puzzle a beginner— how to get 

 empty, fully-made combs. Take the 

 outside comb from a strong hive. This 

 will almost certainly contain only honey. 

 Place it outside in the apiary at some 

 distance from the hives ; and in a short 

 while the bees will have effectually 

 licked all the honey out. 



TO FIND A QUEEN. 



As a general rule, the queen will be 

 found on one of the central frames 

 of a hive. But this does not invari- 

 ably apply ; and as many operations 

 in apiculture imperatively demand the 

 removal (or, at least, the location) of 

 a queen, I will give a few hints to 

 enable the tyro to find her easily. 

 I surmise, of course, that he is acquaint- 

 ed with the appearance of a queen 

 when he sets eyes on her. Once seen, 

 no one can ever mistake a queen for 

 a worker or drore. 



Italian queens are never hard to find, 

 as they and their attendants stand per- 

 fectly still when the frames are lifted 

 out. This also, I believe, applies to 

 Caucasians. But in the case of the 

 English Black and the Mee-messa — and 

 in a lesser degree the Cyprian— the queen 

 tries to bury herself under her attend- 

 ants when the frame is lifted. If, there- 

 fore, you find it hard to discover a 

 queen's whereabouts, proceed as fol- 

 lows :— 



Place an empty hive beside the one 

 you intend overhauling, and, beginning 

 with the outside frame on one side of 

 the full hive, take out the frames one by 

 one, and, after examining them carefully, 

 place them in the empty hive, being 

 careful to maintain them in their 

 original positions in regard to one 

 another. In this way the queen has no 

 chance of crawling from an unexamined 

 frame on to one that you have already 

 inspected ; and as you are not hurried, 

 you are sure to find her— at any rate, on 

 the second inspection. If you wish to 

 get rid of her, pinch her head or thorax ; 

 and if you desire to cage her, lift her 

 gently by the thorax (on no account 

 touch her abdomen) and head her into 

 the cage. If to be sent by post, you 

 must also put a few young bees in with 

 her. These are much more downy than 

 the old bees. 



It is possible that you may require to 

 find the queen of a vicious colony. This 

 is never a very agreeable business ; so I 

 will try to assist you here with advice. 

 Remember, worker bees remain in the 

 hive for at least a fortnight after emerg- 

 ing from the cells ; and these young bees 

 are never vicious. Your object, there- 

 fore, must be to rid the hive temporarily 



of the old bees. Towards the middle of 

 a fine day remove the vicious colony to a 

 fresh locality, and in its place stand an 

 empty hive previously fitted with one 

 comb of open brood taken from a quiet 

 lot, together with some frames of comb 

 or foundation. By the middle of the 

 next afternoon all the old bees will have 

 found their way to this new hive, 

 because it occupies their old stand ; and 

 you can, if you wish, give them a sealed 

 queen-cell or a caged queen. You can 

 now examine your quondam vicious hive 

 with impunity. If you would prefer to 

 unite the two parts of the vicious hive 

 again, instead of making a fresh stock 

 from one half, you can bring back your 

 original hive to the old stand, setting it 

 above the new one with a sheet of wire 

 gauze to separate them. This can then 

 be withdrawn in a couple of days— as 

 soon as the upper hive has the scent of 

 the lower. 



This principle of working with a wire 

 gauze between an upper and a lower 

 hive is often employed for the purpose 

 of building up a weak stock. The weak 

 colony is super-imposed on a strong one ; 

 and the warmth rising from below will 

 enable the upper stock to build up far 

 more rapidly. 



NUCLEI. 



I now propose tu deal shortly with the 

 question of small nuclei or mating-boxes. 

 If you decide to rear queens extensively 

 for the local market— and I warn you, 

 there will probably be money in it for 

 some years to come ! — since the mating 

 of each queen requires her to be placed 

 in a separate hive with a separate lot of 

 attendants, it is mere waste of material 

 to give each virgin more than two or 

 three cupfuls of attendants at a time. 

 But such a small number of bees will 

 find it hard to cover one large frame 

 properly. Therefore, the custom has 

 arisen of allowing each nucleus to have 

 two or three small combs, three of 

 which, when placed end on, exactly fill 

 a standard frame. And so, when you 

 have finished with your nuclei, you can 

 build them together into standard 

 frames and unite them into a few strong 

 stocks. Two of these small frames are 

 really quite sufficient in each box, which, 

 to accommodate them, must, therefore, 

 be 3| inches wide inside measurement, 

 and 9| inches deep. Their internal 

 length will depend on the thickness of 

 the wood of which these frames are 

 made ; for you must be careful to allow 

 § inch bee-space between each end of the 

 frame and the end walls of the hive. 

 You require, of course, a small entrance- 

 hole ; but the floor can be nailed on to 

 the walls of the hive. 



