A TEAR AMONG THE BEES. 79 
nuclei than to take bees of a swarming colony. Most of them 
will stay wherever they are put. In fact, any bees that 
know they are queenless, are more apt to remain attached 
to their combs wherever they are put. 
As the queens may hatch out on June 16, it is well to have 
these nuclei made two or three days in advance, and it is 
absolutely necessary to do so if the bees for the nucleus are 
taken from a colony having a queen. They must be queen- 
less long enough to fully realize their condition or they will 
tear down the queen-cells given them. I have, however, 
started the nuclei frequently just at the time of cutting 
out and giving them queen-cells, by taking a good number of 
bees from a colony or larger nucleus engaged already in 
building queen-cells. If I want to use a nucleus or a pair of 
them, for queen-rearing only, to be broken up afterward, I 
generally put them on the top, over some other colony, so 
that the bees may be there united when the nucleus is taken 
away. 
Por cutting out queen-cells or for cutting comb for any 
purpose, it is quite important to have the rightkind of knife. 
For some time, I used the small thin blade of a pocket-knife, 
but it was too short ; the large blade was too thick. I 
happened upon an old-fashioned case-knife or tea-knife that 
suits me well. It is of fine steel, extremely thin, the blade 
4J^-inclies long, and %-inch wide at the widest part and 
%-inch wide toward the point. 
On June 1, the empty comb was given to the imported 
queen, on June 4 or 5 the eggs were given to the strong, 
queenless colony, and on June 15 or 10 the queen-cells must 
be cut out and given to the nuclei. 1 have had queen-cells 
hatch out in good shape by simply placing them between the 
combs, and even by laying them on top of the frames, but I 
think I have had better success by the old-fashioned way of 
patching them into the comb, right among the brood. 
In some cases I have done well in giving virgin queens, 
caged for a day or two, but my experience has been limited’ 
About five days after giving the queen-cell, on June 20 or 21. 
