90 MANUAL OF APICULTURE. 
taining eggs or very young larvae, or to cut out strips of comb about an 
inch wide just below worker cells containing eggs or just-hatched larvae. 
This practice gave the bees space in which to build perfect full-sized 
cells, but it had certain disadvantages. Good worker combs were 
mutilated, often quite ruined, in order to secure the construction of the 
cells and also in cutting out the latter. Cells so formed are often in 
groups so close together that they can not be separated without injury 
to numbers of them, necessitating, if desirable to save all, a close watch, 
or at least frequent examination, for hours or even days, since all the 
queens are not likely to emerge at the same time. 
To remedy this Mr. O. H. Townsend, of Michigan, devised a plan which 
is described in Gleanings in Bee Culture for July, 1880 (Vol. VIII, p. 322). 
It consists in cutting combs whose cells coutain eggs or freshly hatched 
larvae into narrow strips and pinning or sticking these on the sides of 
brood combs in such a manner that the cells containing the eggs or larvae 
from which queens are desired shall open downward. Mr. Townsend 
removed the larvae from some of the cells, believing that he secured 
better developed queens by limiting the number, and also because he 
could then cut them out more easily for insertion in separate hives. In 
the succeeding number of Gleanings (August, 1880), Mr. J. M. Brooks, 
of Indiana, illustrated a plan for securing even greater regularity. 
This consists in shaving off the cells on one side down nearly to the 
midrib of each strip of worker comb containing the eggs or larvae 
selected to rear queens from, and then sticking these strips on the under- 
sides of horizontal bars nailed in ordinary comb frames. Mr. Henry 
Alley, in his work on queen rearing, published in 1883, recommends 
sticking the prepared strips, shallow cells downward, on the lower edges 
of combs which have been trimmed so as to round downward. This 
leaves plenty of space for the full development of queen cells, the eggs 
or larvae in alternate cells having been removed as in the plans previ- 
ously mentioned. All conditions being favorable, many cells conven- 
iently located are thus secured, and if the exact age of the eggs or just- 
hatched larvae has been noted the time the young queens will emerge 
may be known beforehand, so that preparation can be made for them. 
Nuclei — small clusters of bees containing a quart to two quarts — are to 
be placed in separate hives and given combs, emerging brood, and a 
supply of food, and to each of these a mature cell is to be given. The 
nuclei thus jjrepared ma y be confined to their hives with wire cloth 
and placed in a cellar for two or three days, and when set out, just at 
dusk (p. 117), the bees will adhere to their new location. Full colonies, 
whose queens it is desired to replace, may also be made queeuless about 
two or three days beforehand, and when mature the cells inserted 
one each in these. In cutting out the cell a small piece of comb, 
triangular shaped, 1£ to 2 inches long and about 1£ inches broad at 
the top, is to be left attached to it whenever practicable, since it will 
then be easy to insert it in one of the combs of the queenless colony 
