Spring management rightly begins in the fall when bees are preparing for winter. The beekeeper should see that each hive contains at last thirty pounds of honey for winter stores. No very weak or diseased colonies should be allowed to winter. Each one should have a good queen. These precautions will as a rule simplify the work in the springtime.

The spring season begins in Southern California with the willow and eucalyptus bloom, usually about the middle of January. In the more elevated sections where neither are to be had it will be about a month later. Bees must have a supply of fresh pollen in order to commence breeding to any extent. When you see the workers coming in loaded down with pollen you may look for spring brood rearing to be nicely under way in a few weeks. It is of little or no use to open the hive or attempt any manipulating until spring brood rearing has advanced for say, three week's time. Then a thorough inspection should be made. Some colonies perhaps will be found to have no brood at all when the others have several combs partly filled. This is evidence of queenlessness in most cases or else a failing queen on the part of the broodless colony. In either case it is impractical to assist them by drawing brood from another hive. A better plan is to unite what remains of the colony with the one nearest to it. A good way to unite is to place the combs and bees of the queenless one in a super. Now spread a newspaper on top of the frames of the hives with which it is to be united. Make a few small holes with a pencil through the paper, then set the super combs, bees and all on the paper and put on the cover. The bees from the super will gradually filter down through the paper and take up life in the new home without creating any disturbance. Putting strange bees together abruptly is apt to start a fight which may result In the loss of a queen. It is impossible to unite two queen right colonies. The lesser will always be destroyed. Always be sure that both colonies are free from disease before uniting. If you are not already informed send to the Dept. of Agriculture, Washington, D. C., for their publications on bee diseases.

It is important at this time to see that all colonies have at least twenty pounds of honey for bees will not increase rapidly when their honey supplies are low. This however is not arbitrary. A great deal will depend on the condition of the range, amount of nectar coming in, etc. It is not a safe plan to feed sugar syrup too early in the spring because the nights are cold and no young bees in the hive. When old bees are fed cold syrup they are very apt to contract dysentery and die. A better plan is to borrow a comb or two of honey from another hive to reinforce the one that is light. Bees will winter better and increase faster in a single story hive than in a two story.

There are various systems of manipulating the brood combs, calculated to assist the bees in rapidly filling the brood chamber with brood but in the writer's opinion they are of questionable value, at least in the hands of a novice. See that your colonies all have a good food supply, are free from diseases and have good queens, then let them alone till they have increased sufficiently to occupy the entire brood chamber. Then they must have more room or they will swarm (see "Swarming"). The season will by that time have advanced to about the middle of March or even later. Drones will be flying. It is then up to the beekeeper to adopt methods calculated to prevent swarming if he does not wish to increase the number of his colonies or else to divide if he desires more. (See "Artificial Increase. ")

When no increase is desired a course must be followed, the object of which is to prevent swarming. The stronger the colony the more honey they will gather. In a general way this is accomplished by giving them plenty of room and plenty of work to do drawing foundation. As soon as the colony fully occupies the brood chamber put on a full depth super and if necessary later on put on another. Move some of the brood combs up into the super replacing them with full sheets of foundation. This should be done before the colony has begun building queen cells prepara-try to swarming. Once they have taken the notion to swarm it may be a difficult matter to break it up. Of course all this requires some experience. The questions will arise, when is a colony crowded? When are they preparing to swarm? When will they draw foundation? and so on. A visit to the yard of a professional bee man will usually put you right. Where a yard consists of two or more colonies there is danger of getting robbing started if combs are exposed too long or hives left open for more than a few minutes where the honey flow is light. One of the first things the beginner should learn is to detect the presence of disease, for sooner or later he will have to encounter it.