(3.) The combs must contain not less than twenty pounds of good honey for food during the winter.
These three conditions being fulfilled, we may be satisfied that the colony is in good condition to withstand the rigours of winter without further attention, and only requires to be wrapped up warmly later on before the advent of cold weather.
If, however, the colony should happen to be queenless, or weak (that is, covering less than six standard frames), it will have to be united to another colony. Thus, two colonies, neither of which, alone, would be strong enough to stand the winter, can be united together to form one strong colony, which, if properly looked after, will almost certainly turn out strong in the spring and do well the following year.
The colonies which are to be united should stand near to one another; by this I mean within a yard or two of one another. If they are further apart or have several other hives standing between them, they will have to be brought together, the moving being done by degrees, a yard or two at a time, and only on fine days during which the bees fly freely, otherwise many bees will be lost.
For the operation of uniting a flour-dredger will be required, containing about half-a-pint of flour. Also a goose-wing for brushing the bees off the combs. The dome queen-cage is an appliance that may come in useful. It is made of tinned wire-cloth, and shaped like the strainer that is sometimes hung from the spout of a tea-pot to retain the leaves. Such tea-strainers make very good queen-cages. To use the queen-cage it is pressed into the comb with the queen inside.
The hive to contain the united colonies should be placed midway between the two old stands. The alighting-boards should be extended by means of the hiving-board which was used in hiving the swarm.
A bright calm afternoon will be the best time to do the uniting. We have already seen that bees belonging to different colonies when mixed will not, under ordinary circumstances, agree. If, however, they are prevented from recognising one another they will unite together quite peaceably, and this condition may be brought about by dusting them over with flour. Every comb must therefore be lifted out of both hives and the bees on them well powdered with flour from the dredger. In replacing the combs, one from one hive should be put next to another from the other hive, thus ensuring the better mixing of the bees. Combs containing brood should be placed together in the middle of the hive. The bees on the lightest of the outside combs may be shaken off on to the hiving-board, where they should receive a sprinkling of flour, the combs being then taken indoors at once.
During the operation a sharp look out should be kept for the queens on the brood combs, and if one of them should be preferred for heading the new colony she should be caged by herself on a comb in the manner described above to prevent any hostile workers from attacking her. The other queen must then be found and removed, and the bee-keeper must remember to liberate the caged queen on the following day. If left to themselves, however, the workers soon learn to recognise one of the queens as their mother, so that the trouble of finding and caging the queen is not really necessary in uniting, but it is an additional safeguard which the practised bee-keeper is glad to be able to take advantage of.
It was stated just now that the presence of worker-brood in the hive was sufficient evidence of the presence of a good queen. In some cases where there is a bad queen or no queen at all, drone-brood may be found in the hive. Usually the bees build a special comb with cells of a larger pattern for raising drone-brood in, but a bad queen will often lay drone eggs in worker-cells. In either case drone-brood may be known from worker-brood by its raised convex cappings, the capping over the worker-brood being almost flat. The best thing to do with a drone-raising colony is to unite it to another good colony without delay in the manner described above.
Having settled the question of strength, the next thing to see about will be the food supply. If each hive does not possess the minimum weight of 20 lb. of stored honey, combs containing food must be given from another hive that can spare them, or syrup must be supplied through the feeder.