184 ECONOMIC ZOOLOGY AND ENTOMOLOGY 



or drones, and many infertile females, or workers. A small 

 nest is made in the spring out of chewed old wood mixed with 

 saliva so as to form "wasp-paper," by a queen that has mated 

 in the autumn before and passed the winter solitarily in hiding. 

 In this little "queen nest" she lays a few eggs, brings food to 

 the hatching larvae until they change to pupae in their cells, 

 and then awaits their issuance. They issue as workers, and 

 immediately enlarge the nest, making more paper combs and 

 cells, in which the queen lays more eggs. The workers bring 

 food, which is killed and masticated insects, and care for the 



young, which develop into 

 more workers. Thus the com- 

 munity, or really family, 

 grows through the summer, 

 till it may contain many hun- 

 dred individuals. In the late 

 summer males and fertile fe- 

 males are produced, and then 



FIG. 87. Two workers of the w jth the oncoming of winter 

 yellow-jacket, Vespa sp. (From ,1 , i i i 



life; natural size.) the workers and males and 



many of the females die, leav- 

 ing a few mated females to pass the winter and begin new 

 colonies in the spring. Thus the social wasp communities 

 break down and are rebuilt annually. 



Bees. This is also the case with the communities of bumble 

 bees, which are the simplest kind of social bees. There are 

 among the bees solitary kinds also, with the same general 

 manner of life of the solitary wasps, except that the food col- 

 lected and stored for the young is never killed or paralyzed 

 insects but always flower nectar and pollen mixed. This is 

 also the kind of food brought by the bumble-bees for their 

 larvae. 



Among the bees there is however another and more special- 

 ized type of social kind. This type is represented in America 

 by a single species, the honey-bee or hive-bee, Apis mellifica, 

 which is not a native insect but one introduced long ago from 

 Europe. With this bee the community does not break down 

 annually but persists, under favorable conditions, indefinitely. 



