29 
the oldest, larvae full grown and beginning to pupate from the 12th to 
the 16th of June, and pupation continues, of course, thruout the 
season, as larvae from the later eggs successively get their growth. 
The first workers to emerge from the pupae in these small colonies 
come out early in July — from the 7th to the 11th of that month, 
according to our experience — and the last emerge in October, or pos- 
sibly in November. 
From solitary queens brought in from the field April 26 to May 3, 
1906, and kept in the insectary under natural conditions, the first eggs 
were obtained May 8, 9, 10, and 15, and the first larvae from these eggs 
June 4. The length of the egg stage in the various lots deposited by 
these females varied from twenty-two to twenty-eight days. The larvae 
began to pr.j^ai: about the middle of June, the larval period being, in 
four cases, - xteen, seventeen, nineteen, and twenty-three days. The 
first adult appeared in this cage July 7, and others emerged at intervals 
thruout tiie remainder of the year, the pupal stage averaging about 
eighteen days. Judging by these data, the time from the deposit of 
the egg to the appearance of the adult is approximately two months. 
In several cases where second egg-masses were laid on dates definitely 
ascertained, these dates were found to coincide closely with the time 
of pupation of larvae from the previous lot of eggs laid by the same 
female. 
The notes of my field observers make no definite statements as to 
the numbers thus produced during the first season of the queen's inde- 
pendent life, but three families reared under observation in our insec- 
tary, in 1906, gave respectively, 8, 9, and 19 workers as the final product 
of the season's operations. These numbers are perhaps too small for 
the average in the field, altho larger than those of families reared dur- 
ing the .first year by the carpenter-ant, as reported by Pricer in 1907.* 
Forty-one first-year colonies of this latter species contained from 2 to 
27 workers, with an average of 10 ; and 19 colonies of a related ant 
{Camponotus ferrugineus) contained from 2 to 19 workers, with an 
average of only 6. 
The process of growth and multiplication are interrupted by 
winter, during which the ants hibernate in a dormant state in whatever 
stage they happen to have reached, resuming their activities in spring 
at the point where cold weather arrested them. The workers open up 
the nests to the surface, usually in late March or in April, the evidence 
of this beginning of their seasonal activities being the appearance of 
circular heaps of minute pellets of earth around the mouths of their 
burrows. The young larvae grow little, if at all, as long as the weather 
is cool, but, fed and cared for "by the workers, increase rapidly in size 
as soon as the weather becomes warm, the oldest of them reaching the 
pupal state as early as May. Whether males and females appear in the 
family colony during this second summer is not definitely known, but 
it is rendered very doubtful by the small size of the family during the 
•The Life History of the Carpenter-ant, by Jolin Lessen Pricer. Biological Bulletin, Feb- 
ruary, 1908, pp. 177-218. 
