Improved Queen-Rearing; or, How to Rear Large, Prolific, Long-Lived Queen Bees / The Result of Nearly Half a Century's Experience in Rearing Queen Bees, Giving the Practical, Every-day Work of the Queen-Rearing Apiary

by Henry Alley

QUEENS, HOW TO PRESERVE AND CARE FOR THEM

At the swarming season many bee-keepers have more or less queen-cells, and sometimes young queens, they would like to preserve if possible to do so and if proper fixtures were at hand to aid them in carrying out their desires. At just that time several cages, such as are described on a previous page and are used in the queen-nursery, would be the right thing to have. Remove the cells from the hive at the proper time, place them in the nursery-cages and after supplying each cage with food sufficient for a week, or longer, place the nursery in some full colony, according to directions given on another page in connection with the description of the nursery. A much better way for the novice to dispose of queen-cells would be to supersede old queens and at once insert the queen-cells. If this seems too risky, dequeen the hive a few days before the cells are matured, say on the fifth day after a swarm issues. This method of dequeening would do away with the necessity of nucleus colonies which one would be obliged to have in order to preserve young queens until fertilized.