76 
ITALIAN BEES. 
the bees upon a sheet, that the queen may be seen and destroyed 
as she crawls toward the hive. If the Italian queen was ob- 
tained from a distance, the box in which she was shipped should 
be opened before a window, in a closed room, that the queen be 
not lost should she fly from the box. "When introducing a 
choice queen, we should run no risk of having her stung by the 
bees ; she must therefore be confined in a small wire-cloth cage, 
which should be immediately inserted near the centre of one of 
the brood combs, where the bees will cluster upon it, feeding 
the queen and keeping her warm. A drop of honey placed 
within her reach can do no harm. At the end of thirty-six hours, 
she should be liberated, smeared with honey, and allowed to 
crawl down among the bees. 
Another method is to remove the native queen, and if near 
the swarming season, look for queen cells and destroy them if 
any are found. The stock is now allowed to stand queenless 
for about ten days. Open the hive on the tenth day, at the 
farthest, and cut off all the queen cells, for if longer neglected 
a queen might hatch which would have to be hunted up and 
destroyed. The bees being now without eggs or young larvae, 
will give up all hopes of rearing a queen, and the Italian may 
be safely introduced as before directed. In all cases the queen 
should be well smeared with honey before she is allowed to go 
among the bees, as while cleaning off the honey they have no 
disposition to sting, and having time to discover her rank , re- 
ceive her kindly. 
In the proper seasons a populous stock may be divided (page 
63) and an Italian queen caged and given to the queenless part, 
