10 the rearing of queen bees. 
(2) Super sedure. — When a queen on account of age or other cause 
ceases to lay eggs enough to keep up the strength of the colony, the 
workers build queen cells and rear queens. When the first one of 
these emerges, an encounter ensues between the young queen and the 
old one, and almost invariably the latter is killed. 
(3) Queenlessness. — It may happen that the queen in a colony is killed, 
and in that case, if there are young larva? in the combs, the workers 
will rear queens, one of which later becomes the mother of the colony. 
While in nature this is probably a more rare condition than is either 
of the two preceding, it is a normal and natural circumstance under 
which queens are reared. 
In the rearing of queens by the so-called artificial methods it is 
necessary to follow rather closely one of the three natural conditions. 
As will be shown later, queens can be reared in colonies with a lay- 
ing queen, provided a perforated zinc sheet be used to prevent the 
latter from tearing down the cells, but in such cases we probably 
approach the swarming condition. 
In practice the bee keeper can, if he wishes, take queens from nor- 
mally constructed cells. By making a colony queenless a considerable 
number of these will be reared, and by very careful watching almost 
all of them can be captured and caged before they kill each other or 
destroy other queen cells. To do this, however, it is necessary to 
look over the entire colony several times a day for several da} 7 s, and 
thus it is far from a time-saving method. The plan is not to be recom- 
mended except where it is impossible to use some of the better methods. 
In the same way queens emerging from cells built in swarming time 
or during supersedure may be captured. There are, however, better 
methods of queen rearing; for, by modern appliances, the work is not 
only made much more simple, but also gives better results. A descrip- 
tion of these methods may seem rather complicated to one who has 
not tried them, but the manipulation is easily learned, and after a 
brief acquaintance with the appliances the whole subject of queen 
rearing becomes very simple. 
ARTIFICIAL QUEEN REARING. 
The methods to be described here are not those of any one system, 
but are the result of many investigations in this field. It is impossible 
to give credit to every one who has offered valuable suggestions on 
this subject, and no such attempt will be made; for it is often difficult 
to learn with certainty who first used and recommended any particular 
plan. The bee-keeping journals are full of valuable hints on this 
work, and methods long ago in use are repeatedly rediscovered and 
given as new. To prevent any injustice, then, it seems best to avoid 
giving credit in all cases, except where there is no doubt as to the 
origin of the plan. The author disclaims all credit of originality in 
