76 
WHT one colony of bees does not do as WELL 
AS ANOTHER, ALE CONDITIONS BEING APPARENTLY 
EQUAL, WHEN STANDING IN THE SAME YARD OB 
EVEN ON THE SAME STANDS. 
Tliis question has been frequently asked and has 
given rise to more thorough investigations in relation 
to this point. When bees first issue from the hive in 
spring, instinct prompts them to search for honey. . If 
any deposit is found by a single bee, the members of its 
colony is informed of the fact, and they are brought into 
requisition, if the amount requires their aid. This 
course is always pursued by the bees, and if a bee 
should visit a field in one direction and find flowers that 
yielded even a moderate quantity of honey, the inmates 
of its hive would be very apt to visit the same fields, 
so long as there is honey to be found there, while the 
bees from another colony may, under similar circum- 
stances, be visiting a field in an opposite direction where 
an abundance of honey may be gathered ; consequently 
this colony would gather much more than the other. 
Sometimes, from all outward appearances, the colonies 
may be alike, when a real difference exists in the age 
of the queens; and with the difference would be a corres- 
ponding fertility of the two. The younger, being the 
most prolific, would people her hive much the fastest, 
the result being a greater number of bees to gather 
honey. It is highly important that a register of the 
queens and their ages be kept by the bee-master, and 
the hives numbered ; then old queens can be known 
and destroyed, and young ones put in their places and 
remedy the foregoing evils. 
THE DRONE, OR MALE BEE. 
The drones, or male bees of the colony, are usually 
hatched in moderately small numbers, compared with 
