798 
SWARMING 
HOW TO BRING A SWARM HOME FROM A 
DISTANCE. 
A swarm will sometimes escape and be 
traced a mile or so from the beeyard. At 
other times a farmer will report that a 
Carrying a captured swarm on a bicycle. 
swarm of bees is hanging to one of his 
trees, and that, if the beeman will come 
and hive them, he can have them. A good 
swarm is sometimes worth going after; but 
how shall it be brought back with the least 
expenditure of time when bees are swarm¬ 
ing at home? A boy can be sent on a 
bicycle, equipped with a burlap sack, a 
pair of pruning-shears and a smoker, these 
latter fastened to the rider. The bicycle 
enables him to make a quick trip, and on 
arrival the bag is quietly slipped around 
the swarm of bees, clustered on a limb of a 
tree, and the bag tied. The pruning-shears 
cut the limb, when the bag and all are slung 
over the handle-bars, or carried in one 
hand while the other guides the machine 
home. 
PLURAL SWARMS UNITING. 
Sometimes when the swarming-note is 
heard in the apiary other colonies seem to 
catch the excitement and issue one after 
another while the first is still in the air. 
Of course if the wings of the queens are 
not clipped they will unite in one, and as 
many as a dozen have been known to come 
out in this way and go to the woods before 
anything could be done to stop them. If 
for no other reason the wings of all queens 
should be clipped. Even then if a stray 
virgin queen is present all the bees may 
unite as one swarm, taking her along. 
When the queens are clipped, they can 
be caught and caged as the swarms issue; 
then the large cluster of bees can be divided 
up into as many parts as there are queens 
and hived in the ordinary way, each division 
being given one of the queens. 
SOME HANDY SWARMING-DEVICES. 
Almost every apiarist has his own pe¬ 
culiar notion as to how a swarming-device 
should be constructed. Some of these im¬ 
plements are very ingenious, and of valu¬ 
able assistance during the swarming sea¬ 
son. Their particular use is to remove 
a swarm after it has clustered, arid place 
it in the hive where it is desired that it 
take up a new abode. The first one to 
which attention is called, not because it 
is the best but because it is the simplest, 
is a sort of butterfly-catcher. 
A simple and inexpensive swarm-catcher. 
The hoop is made of band iron, about 
20 inches in diameter. The ends are se¬ 
cured, as shown, to a suitable pole. When 
the bag is attached to the hoop, it is de- 
