David Eyre wrote:

>                 Another method. Buy from us a small phial, marked 'experience', not
> overly expensive, but vital when dealing with bees.

A flock of geese, chased by a fox, scatters frantically in all
directions. The fox fixes its attention on one goose and begins its
chase, only to be distracted time and time again as another goose cuts
across its path from one side or another. With luck and a sufficiently
unfocused fox, each and every goose just might succeed in getting
airborne in time to excape becoming dinner. Older, more experienced
foxes learn to pick one goose and stick to that goose no matter how many
other geese flap across their noses. Such a fox can oftentimes taste
more than feathers.

What are the mental tricks old beekeepers use to find queens? Could
beekeepers have the opposite problem from the fox, that is, unfocusing
the vision instead of tunneling it toward one more or less arbitrary
goose. How much of queen finding is simply determination to keep staring
at the side of a frame until she is spotted? What kinds of cues do the
other bees give to the queen's location? There's got to be a better way
than smoking an entire hive through an excluder.