THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



85 



[For the American Bee Journal. ] 



Fertile Workers once more. 



Mr. J. N. Clarke wishes to know how I am 

 certain that the fertile workers, referred to by 

 me in the March number of the Journal, never 

 bad been fed royal food. (See Bee Journal, 

 volume 3, page 229). I supposed the article 

 referred to was sufficiently plain to be under- 

 stood, but I will try and be more explicit. A 

 queenless colony will rear one or more queens 

 from any eggs or young worker larva? found in 

 the hive in worker comb, by enlarging the cell, 

 or cells, changing their position, and feeding 

 the larva? an extra quantity, and, writers assert, 

 a different quality of food. This food is called 

 royal food ; is said to be compounded and used 

 exclusively for royalty, and never used in the 

 hive except 'when the workers are feeding a 

 queen, or queens in embryo. It is said that 

 this 1'ood, that is, the kind of food, has an in- 

 fluence on the development of the several or- 

 gans of the female bee. The idea advanced by 

 the advocates of the fertile worker theory, is 

 this, that in the distribution of this food some 

 portion of it is given to worker larva? in cells 

 adjoining queen cells, thereby producing the 

 partial development of the generative organs of 

 such worker. By referring to the article in the 

 March number of the Journal, it will be seen 

 that the fertile workers were taken in the month 

 of May, from hives from which no swarms had 

 issued since t'.ic preceding July. It w T as late in 

 June when tt ese workers became fertile, conse- 

 quently, if they had been fed royal food in the 

 vicinity of a queen's cradle, they must have been 

 nearly or quite eleven months old when they 

 became fertile. I had several of them, taken 

 from several hives, and it is not at all probable 

 that the young queens were lost after they had 

 become fertile, and new ones reared in all of 

 them after swarms had ceased issuing, or later 

 than July. My experience in changing colo- 

 nics of native bees to Italians, by introducing 

 Italian queens to such colonies, is altogether 

 against the worker bee's living to exceed nine 

 months, under ordinary circumstances, even 

 with the winter months included. If an Italian 

 queen is introduced to a colony of native bees 

 in May, June, or the fore part of July, the last 

 of the natives will have disappeared in about 

 ninety days. If the colony is broodless when 

 she is introduced, they will all be gone in about 

 seventy days after her introduction. If she is 

 introduced as late in the season as October, per- 

 haps a few of the black workers will be alive 

 the first of June following, but the number will 

 he exceedingly small, and they will very soon 

 disappear. I might relate numerous instances 

 to prove that such is the case, but it would be 

 sup< rfluous, as I think every reader of the 

 Journal, who has introduced Italian queens to 

 stocks ot black bees and watched the result, 

 will sustain me in the above assertions. If my 

 observations and the inferences drawn from 

 them are correct, we must either admit that 

 royal food is used in the hive at other times 

 than when queens are being reared, and in that 

 case it ceases to be exclusively royal food, or 



we must look elsewhere than to the royal food 

 for a cause of fertility in workers. But it may 

 be said that my conclusions may be incorrect, 

 that as are in part at least guess work. For 

 the sake of the argument, admit it ; and what is 

 the fertile worker theory but guess work ? 

 Under certain circumstances the workers in a 

 hive will select a worker larva and change it, 

 from what would otherwise have produced an 

 imperfect female or worker, to a perfect female 

 or queen. We guess that this change is effec- 

 ted, in part at least, by the quality of the food 

 consumed by the larva. Under certain other 

 circumstances we have fertile workers, aud w y e 

 guess that they must have been reared in the 

 vicinity of a queen's cradle, and have received 

 a portion of this food. Here is not only guess 

 work, but guess work founded on guess work. 

 Strictly speaking, it should hardly be called a 

 theory at all, as it has more of the character of 

 a mere hypothesis, " a proposition assumed to 

 account for a certain phenomena, having no 

 other evidence for its truth than that it affords 

 an explanation of such phenomena." As before 

 stated, we are sometimes hasty in our conclu- 

 sions. A neighboring bee-keeper once told me 

 the worst trouble he had with black drones, in 

 Italianizing his apiary, was with those from 

 fertile workers. He took workers from native 

 stocks and supplied them with brood from his 

 Italian queen. If they failed to raise a queen, 

 fertile workers soon made their appearance. 

 He claimed that these workers were reared in 

 his queen rearing hive, and had been dosed with 

 food intended for royalty. He entirely over- 

 looked the fact that if the brood given them 

 was pure, not only the fertile workers reared 

 from this brood, but the drones from such wor- 

 kers, would also be pure and would make him 

 no trouble whatever. Again, we will take, if 

 you please, the Varronian theory, as given in the 

 Journal, volume 3, page 147. The Professor 

 held that this royal food consisted in part of fer- 

 tilized eggs, laid by a fertile queen ; and in 

 proof of his position he says, in substance, that 

 a queen cannot be produced from a single egg 

 that will ever lay eggs at all. Mr. Quinby tells 

 us a queen may be reared without being fed 

 eggs at all. Mr. Quinby is correct. If Profes- 

 sor Varro, before advancing his theory, had 

 taken a small piece of worker comb cootaining 

 young larva? only — no eggs— and given it to a 

 queenless and broodlees colony and noted the 

 result, his theory would not have been penned, 

 or at least it would have been somewhat modi- 

 fied or changed. 



My object in introducing this question was, 

 not to debate or argue it at all, but to stimulate, 

 excite to investigation and experimenting on 

 the part of others; and if possible ascertain 

 some positive fact, something aside from mere 

 guess work, in proof of either the truth or falsi- 

 ty of the position assumed. 



J. H. Town let. 



Tompkins, Mich., Sept. 8, 1868. 



A large prime swarm carries with it three or 

 four pounds of honey, when leaving the parent 

 hive. 



