"There are on the other hand certain disadvantages in the use of very small nuclei in the hands of the inexperienced Queens can be mated from small boxes with a comb area not greater than that of a 1 pound section of honey and with a mere handful of bees but experienced bee keepers have failed to make these work successfully merely through ignorance of the special manipulation necessary for the smaller colonies The complaint is also sometimes made that these nuclei are robbed out because the small number of bees will not defend the hive against invaders and that the colony will swarm out or leave the box because it is too small It is also claimed that the nucleus will not be a success unless there is unsealed brood in the comb to hold the bees All of these general statements are too broad for such colonies are not more easily robbed than large ones do not swarm out if properly made and brood is unnecessary under some circumstances However there is a foundation for these complaints every one of which comes from experienced men The entrance to a nucleus of the smallest size should be very small so that one bee can protect the hive from several robbers If by any chance a small colony without brood becomes queenless it will almost invariably swarm out and to this must be attributed most of the cases so reported Unsealed brood undoubtedly helps to hold the bees in the colony and certainly should be used in most cases After the first laying queen is removed from a nucleus this brood will be present and from that time on there is no difficulty To prevent the bees from swarming out with the first queen brood may be given to them If however the bees are confined in the colony for some time to which there is no valid objection they will rarely swarm out even without brood and to remove them to an out yard lessens this difficulty still further Nuclei with not more than a few dozen bees will mate a queen and this has been done and is being done repeatedly There is objection however to the use of the smallest nuclei in the hands of the inexperienced for they will die out unless watched and often require restocking In a large queen rearing yard this frequently amounts to considerable labor and to avoid that feature a somewhat larger nucleus is desirable Bee keepers are not always adepts at handling small nuclei and in actual practice a colony should be in such condition that it can be handled quickly safely and sometimes even rather roughly"

Franklin (1905)  USDA Bulletin #55- The Rearing of Queen Bees 1905 https://archive.org/details/rearingofqueenbe55phil/page/24

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