THE SOCIAL INSECTS 



smaller colonies can be roughly determined by examining 

 the contents of the combs and by seeing how many cells are 

 being used for a second time. If the age of the colony is 

 divided into the number of cells it gives a measure of the 

 rate of construction — so many cells per day. This rate 

 depends partly on the number of workers in the nest and 

 partly on the number of queens and on the total of eggs 

 they have produced. But of course the number of workers 

 themselves, so far as they are not members of the original 

 founder swarm, also depends on the number of eggs which 

 has been laid. It is, however, possible by a statistical analysis 

 to show that the number of queens, and therefore the egg- 

 supply, controls both the growth of the colony and the 

 eventual number of workers. What is not yet clear is how 

 a large number of queens together limit their egg production. 

 It may be that production is controlled automatically, from 

 the necessity to share some essential food which is limited in 

 quantity. 



WASPS IN GENERAL 



It is generally held that the wasps have the least advanced 

 type of social organisation of the four principal social groups 

 (wasps, bees, ants, termites). The worker caste is least 

 sharply differentiated from the queen. The queen is relatively 

 short-lived except in some of the colonies where many 

 queens are present. Foraging still mainly takes the primitive 

 form of hunting for other insects. Such animal food can be 

 stored only for short periods. Thus only in the very few 

 kinds of wasp that store honey can the whole colony with- 

 stand a prolonged period of food scarcity. 



The behaviour of wasps is rather uniform amongst the 

 different species. Almost without exception they construct 

 hexagonal cells of paper ; this tends to limit the size of the 



72 



