HYMENOPTERA 



loos 



her first batch of eggs, and seals it over with wax. The queen now 

 sits on her eggs day and night to keep them warm, only leaving them 

 to collect food when necessary. In order to maintain animation and 

 heat through the night and in bad weather when food cannot be 

 obtained, it is necessary for her to lay in a store of honey. She there- 

 fore sets to work to construct a large waxen pot to hold the honey. 

 This pot is built in the entrance passage of the nest (Fig. 1226). 

 The eggs hatch four days after they are laid. The larvce devour 

 the paste which forms their bed and also fresh food furnished by the 

 queen. To feed the larvae the queen makes a small hole with her 

 mandibles in the skin of wax that covers them. While the larvae 

 remain small they are fed collectiveh% but when they grow large they 

 are fed individually. As the larvae grow the queen adds wax to their 

 covering, so that they remain hidden. When the larvae are full- 

 grown, each one spins around itself an oval cocoon, which is thin and 



oney-pot 



Fig. 



honeypol 

 pollen and eqrjs 



1226. — Honey-pot. (From Sladen.) 



papery but very tough. The queen now clears away most of the 

 brown wax covering, revealing the cocoons, which are pale yellow. 

 These first cocoons number from seven to sixteen, according to the 

 species and the prolificness of the queen . These cocoons are incubated 

 by the queen, who spends much time sitting on them, with her 

 abdomen stretched to about double its usual length so that it will 

 cover as many cocoons as possible. 



The bees that are developed during the early part of the summer 

 are all workers ; these relieve the queen of all duties except laying the 

 eggs. They feed the larva, construct honey-pots and special recep- 

 tacles for pollen or store these substances in cocoons from which 

 workers have emerged. The appearance of a nest in mid-summer is 

 represented by Figure 1227. Later in the simimer males and queens 

 are developed; and in the autumn the colony breaks up. 



The bumblebees play a very important role in the fertilization of 

 certain flowers, as those of red clover, in which the tubular corolla 

 is so long that the nectar can not be reached by bees with shorter 

 tongues. 



A monograph of the Bombidas of the New World was published 

 by Franklin ('12-13). 



