51

THE HONEY-BEE IN NEW ZEALAND. 49

hive (in the plane of the combs, remember), and give the
cluster of bees a good sprinkling with syrup. The new
comers will be at once attracted by the smell of the
syrup; will mingle freely with the daubed bees, who
have something else to think of than to repel intruders;
they will help to set them to rights, by licking off the
syrup; and though you may call it a selfish act of kind-
ness, it will cement a friendship between those whom
you wish hereafter to be peaceable inmates of one home.
The union of swarms in this manner will to a certain
extent prevent your apiary from growing to an outra-
geous size. Such hives as exhaust themselves by swarm-
ing, should have their old black combs cut out, and they
will then be ready to have a new swarm put into them.
Don't let an exhausted stock stand doing comparitively
nothing in your bee house, when you have daily fresh
swarms ready to tenant the house, if you take the trouble
to put them in possession. It may be done, not by the
ejectment of the original holders, but by reinforcing
them by a fresh colony. The number of your hives may
be brought still more within limits by the autumn, in the
following way: - If you have ninety hives which you
wish to reduce to thirty, you must join to every hive
which you intend to leave, its right and left hand neigh-
bour. I think May is about the best season for doing
this; but the proper time will vary in different districts.
It should be after the breeding season is over, and when
the hives are the heaviest. Cut out the combs entirely
from the side hives by the aid of your three instruments,
the smoke-bellows, the bee knife, and the bunch of
feathers, and return the bees, as directed above, into
their new impoverished hive. Place it where it stood
before, till the evening, when they will have formed a
large cluster inside the hive, just as if they were a new
swarm. A stranger coming to see your apiary, and not
knowing what you had done, would think this your very
strongest stock; for the entrance will be crowded by
bees rushing in and out, carrying away broken bits of
comb, and doing their best to set their pillaged house
in order. They are nothing discouraged by what has
happened; but, like a sensible man under similar cir-