LAWS RELATING TO BEES. 



300 



LAYING WORKEES. 



Skc. •'). For the enforconienl of ho provisions nf 

 this act the State Inspector of Apinrlosor his duly 

 authorized assistants shall have access, ing-ress, and 

 egress to all apiaries or places wliere bet s are kept; 

 and any person or persons who shall resist, impede, 

 or hinder in any way the inspector of aplaiies in Ihe 

 discharge of his duties under the piovisioiis of tliis 

 act shall, on conviction before a justice of the i)eace, 

 be liable to a fine of not less than fifty dol ais nor 

 more than one hundred dollars, or not less than one 

 month's imprisonment in the county jail, nor more 

 than two months' imprisonment. 



Sec. 6. After inspecting infected hives or fixtures 

 or handling diseased bees, the inspector or Ids as- 

 sistant shall, before leaving the premises or proceed- 

 ing to any other apiary, thoroughly disinfect any 

 I)ortion of his own person andclothng and any tools 

 or appliances used by him which have come in con- 

 tact with infected material, and shall see thai any 

 assistant or assistants wii h him hi. ve likewi^c thor- 

 oughly disinfected their persons and ( loti ing and 

 any tools and implements used by tht m. 

 Sec. 7. It shall be the duty of any peison in the 



State of engaged in the rearing of queen-bees 



for sale to use honey in the making of candy for use 

 in mailing-cages which lias been boiled for at least 

 thirty minutes. Any such person engagt d in the 

 rearing of queen-bees shall have his queen-rta ing 

 apiary or apiaries inspected at h ast twice duiing 

 each summer season; and on the discovery if the 

 existence of any disease which is infectious or con- 

 tagious in its nature, and injurious to bees in their 

 egg, larval, pupal, or adult stages, said person shall 

 at once cease to ship queen-bees from such dii^eased 

 apiary until the inspector of apiaries shall declare 

 the said apiary free from all disease. On complaint 

 of the inspector of apiaries, or of any five bee-keep- 

 ers in the State, that said bee-keeper engaged in the 

 rearing of queens is violating the provisions of this 

 section, he shall, on conviction before a jiistiieof 

 the peace, be liable to a fine of not less than one 

 hundred dollars nor more than two hundred dollars. 

 Sec. 8. The inspector of apiaries shall make an- 

 nual reports to the .giving the number of api- 

 aries visited, also the number of diseased apiaries 

 found, the number of colonies treated, a' so the 

 number of colonies destroyed, and the expenses in- 

 curred in the performance of Ids duty. He shall also 

 keep a careful record of the localities where disease 

 exists; but this record shall not be public, but can 

 be consulted with the consent of the inspector of 

 apiaries. 



Sec. 9. There is hereby appropriated out of any 

 moneys in the State treasury, not otherwise appro- 

 priated, a sum not exceeding per year, for the 



suppression of contagious bee diseases among bees 



in . The salary of the deputy inspectors shall 



be determined by the State Inspector of A\ iaries. 



Sec. 10. All acts and parts of acts inconsistent 

 herewith are hereby repealed. 

 Sec. 11. This act shall take effect immediately. 



IiAVirra IVORKXSRS. These queer 

 inmates, or, rather, occasional inmates, of 

 tlie hive are worker-bees that hiy eggs. Aye, 

 and the eggs they lay hatch too ; but they 

 hatch only drones, and never worker-bees. 

 The drones are rather smaller than the drones 

 produced by a queen, but they are neverthe- 

 less drones, in every respect, so far as we 



can discover. It may be well to remark, 

 that ordinary wcn-ker-bees are not neuters, 

 as they are sometimes called: they are con- 

 sidered undeveloped females. Microscopic 

 examination shows an undeveloped form of 

 the special organs found in the queen, 

 and these organs may become, at any time, 

 sufficiently developed to allow the bee to lay 

 eggs, but never to allow of fertilization by 

 meeting the drone as the queen does. See 



(qJUKENS. 



CAUSE or LAYING WORKERS. 



It has been over and over again suggested, 

 that bees capable of this egg-laying duty 

 are those reared in the vicinity of queen- 

 cells, and that by some means they have re- 

 ceived a small portion of the royal jelly 

 necessary to their development as bee-moth- 

 ers. This theory has, we believe, been entire- 

 ly disproven by many experiments; and it is 

 now pretty generally conceded that laying 

 workers may make their appearance in any 

 colony or nucleus that has been many 

 days queenless, and without the means of 

 rearing a queen. Not only may one bee take 

 upon herself these duties, but there may be 

 many of them ; and wherever the bee-keep- 

 er has been so careless as to leave his bees 

 destitute of either brood or queen for ten 

 days or two weeks, he is liable to find 

 evidences of their presence, in the shape of 

 eggs scattered about promiscuously; some- 

 times one, but oftener half a dozen in a sin- 

 gle cell. If the matter has been going on 

 for some time, he will see now and then a 

 drone larva, and sometimes two or three 

 crowding each other in their single cell; some- 

 times they start queen-cells over this drone 

 larva: the poor motherless orphans, seeming 

 to feel that something is wrong, are disposed, 

 like a drowning man, to catch at any straw. 



HOW TO GET RID OF LAYING WORKERS. 



I'revention is better than cure. If a colony, 

 from any cause, becomes queenless, be sure 

 it has unsealed brood of the proper age to 

 raise a queen ; and when this one is raised, 

 be sure that she becomes fertile. It can nev- 

 er do any harm to give a queenless colony 

 eggs and brood, and it may be the saving of 

 it. But suppose you have been so careless 

 as to allow a colony to become queenless, 

 and get weak, what are you to do? If you 

 attempt to give them a queen, and fertile 

 workers are present, she will be pretty sure 

 to get stung; it is sometimes difficult to get 

 them to accept even a queen-cell. The 

 poor bees get into a habit of accepting 

 one of the egg-laying workers as a queen. 



