THE AMERICAN APICULTURIST. 



181 



QUEENS MATING. 



Query No. 27. At wluit age do young 

 queens ii.-ually become I'evtile? ;inrl alter 

 liaving met the drone, when do they coin- 

 meuce to lay ? Querist. 



ANSWERS BY JAMES HEDDON. 



1. From five to fifteen (la3^s. 



2. From two to three days. 



ANSWER BY AVILL. M. KELLOGG. 



Usually from five clays to two 

 weeks old, and the\' begin to lay 

 within three or four days. 



ANSWER BY R. L. TAYLOR. 



Young queens usually become 

 fertile when about a week old and 

 begin to lay in about two days 

 thereafter. 



ANSWER BY DR. G. L. TINKER. 



At from eight to twelve daj-s old 

 usually, but if the weather is too 

 cold, as in early spring or in the 

 fall, they often do not mate for 

 twenty days. After meeting the 

 drone they mostly begin to lay on 

 the third day. 



ANSWER BY DR. C. C. MILLER. 



My observation does not cover 

 the whole of this question, as I have 

 only noticed that I find young 

 queens laying at ten or twelve days 

 old. The other part of the ques- 

 tion is answered in "Alley's Handy 

 Book" and other text books. 



ANSWER BY F. R. RUSSELL. 



Naturally', queens become fertile 

 when six to eight days old and 

 about four daj^s thereatter will be- 

 gin to lay. This is a season of 

 peculiar peril to the young queen 

 and colony from extraneous causes, 

 and I have often discovered the 

 loss of a queen by the agitated 

 manner of the bees about the en- 

 trance at night. 



ANSWERS BY J. E. POND. 



1. Queens emerge from their 

 cells about the sixteenth day from 



the egg, depending upon the 

 strength of the colony and state of 

 the weather, as to heat and cold. 

 Tdey usually take their wedding 

 fiight from five to ten days there- 

 after, though in one instance, com- 

 ing under my own observation, the 

 queen did not meet a drone till the 

 twenty-eighth day after she left 

 her cell. 



2. They usually begin la^Mng in 

 a da}' or two (but sometimes long- 

 er) after they have successfully 

 mated. 



ANSWER BY G. W. DEMAREE. 



In my locality young queens us- 

 ually mate at seven or eight da3's 

 old and begin to lay at ten days 

 old. There is really no fixed rule, 

 however. The ordinary limit of 

 time for them to begin to lay eggs 

 is from nine to fourteen days old. 

 They generally lay eggs in three 

 days after they mate, but not al- 

 ways. I have had 3'oung queens to 

 lay eggs in two days after mating, 

 and I have had them to mate late 

 in the fall and lay no eggs till 

 the February following, over three 

 months after mating. 



ANSWERS BY H. ALLEY. 



1. Young queens will certainly 

 take a flight for the purpose of mating 

 during the hone^'-gathering season, 

 when they are five days old, provided 

 the weather is suitable. After the 

 honey harvest, they will be from 

 ten to fifteen days about it, unless 

 the bees are treated according to 

 directions given in my work on 

 "Queen-rearing." Although 1 have 

 reared over 60,000 queens during 

 the past twenty-eight years, I never 

 knew a queen to make the mating 

 flight until she was five days old, 

 and I think I have watched the 

 process as closely as any one. 



2. If she is a good queen, eggs 

 will usually be found in the cells 

 on the second morning after fertil- 

 ization. 



