A Test For The Presence Of Queen Doubted

Categories: BEE PASTURAGE.
Bee Keeping: Mysteries Of Bee-keeping Explained

It is further asserted that if a hive loses its queen "no pollen is

collected." Also, "that such quantities are sometimes collected, and

fill so many cells, that too little room is left for brood, and the

stock rapidly dwindles away in consequence." The first of these

assertions has been given as a test to decide whether the hive contains

a queen or not. Now my bees have such a habit of doing things wrong

that the abov is no test whatever. It is made to appear very well in

theory, but wants the truth in practice. I will say what I have known

on this point, and perhaps clear up the difficulty of a stock

containing an unusual quantity of bee-bread with the honey, and instead

of being the cause of its having but few bees, it is the effect. Stocks

and sometimes swarms lose their queen in the swarming season, (the

particulars will be given in another place,) when, instead of remaining

idle, the usual quantity of both _pollen and honey is collected_

(unless the family is very small). There being no larvae to consume the

bread, the consequence is, more than half the breeding cells will

contain it; they will be packed about two-thirds full, and finished out

with honey. I have known a large family left under such circumstances,

and about all the cells in the hive would be occupied. Whereas, in a

stock containing a queen and rearing brood, _a portion of the combs

will be used for this purpose until the flowers fail_, and then such

comb will be found empty.