This section is from the book "Bees For Pleasure And Profit", by Samson G. Gordon. Also available from Amazon: Bees for pleasure and profit; a guide to the manipulation of bees, the production of honey, and the general management of the apiary..
The first young queen to issue from her cell after the old queen's abdication becomes the reigning sovereign, maintaining her right by might, tearing down all queen cells and killing any young princesses who are making their entry into existence. For about a week she marches around, monarch of all she surveys, exempt from all toil or duty; then she issues from the hive, takes a few circles about and returns. Probably on the same day, or on the day following, she will take what is called the nuptial flight, meet some drone in mid-air, and return some hours later, to become sole mother of the hive, and to be so treasured by the colony that they feed her on royal jelly all her life, and wash and tend her with the most jealous care. During every twenty-four hours of a good season, when honey and pollen are plentiful, a queen lays from two thousand five hundred to four thousand eggs.
Within a week or two after a virgin queen has taken her nuptial flight the hive should be opened and the frames removed one by one and examined until the queen is found. She can be distinguished from the others, the workers or the drones, by her length of body and the way the other bees cluster around her. Pick her up very gently by the back, being careful not to squeeze the abdomen, and, with a pair of sharp scissors, clip both wings on one side of her body. This insures a short flight a swarming time.
The drones, as the name implies, are lazy fellows, not even earning their own living, and are tolerated by the busy workers only during the summer of plenty, being ruthlessly killed at the first approach of scarcity.
The modern hive, with the movable frame and the inexpensive honey extractors, makes the caring for bees light work. All makers send plain printed directions for manipulating their special machines. Any one living near New York should take advantage of the apiary established by the Government in Van Cortlandt Park; it is well stocked, and the keeper is there expressly to answer questions and explain to interested visitors all the different conditions of the working bee colony.
Philadelphia has the same advantage at the Root Apiary, situated near the toll-gate at Jenkinstown; here an appointment should be made two days ahead to insure the keeper being in attendance.
Even if you do not care to undertake another business, at least keep one colony for honey for home consumption.
-From Self-supporting Home Department, Pearson's Magazine.
If you will study the subject until you get the bee-fever, as they say, you can make a success of bee-keeping. See Chap. IV.
 
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