“I know!” cried Russ. “Our teacher in school told us! They gather yellow stuff. It is called——”
“Pollen!” exclaimed Rose. “I know that.”
“Yes,” her father answered, “the bees gather pollen, or the yellow dust from the flowers, and by mixing this yellow dust with some juices from their bodies they make beeswax, from which the cells are built to hold the sweet honey juice.”
“But I thought you said only one queen bee could live in a swarm,” said Violet. “And if the queen bee lays eggs and other queens hatch out I should think——”
Mr. Bunker pointed to Farmer Joel, who was still chasing after his runaway swarm.
“That’s what happens when two queens get in a hive,” said Daddy Bunker. “One queen leaves, taking with her perhaps half the worker bees and some drones. They fly away to start a new hive, swarm, or colony, as it is sometimes called.
“But not always do bees swarm because there are two queens in a hive. Often the queen may take a notion that she would like a new home, so out she flies and with her go her faithful subjects, just as in real life the subjects of a human king or queen follow them.”
“Where do you think these bees will go?” asked Rose.
“It is hard to say,” answered their father. “It looks now as though they would go to the woods,” for they could see the dark cloud of insects near the edge of the forest. “They may pick out some hollow tree and set up housekeeping there, making a wax framework to hold the honey juices they will later gather from the flowers.”
“Then couldn’t Farmer Joel go to that hollow tree and get the honey if he wanted to?” asked Laddie.