1870.] 



THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



the existence of scanty nourishment agree with 

 the new theory set up by Landois?" 



From his experiments on bees, Landois draws 

 the conchision that the development of the male 

 and female bees is induced, independent of 

 the fecundation or non-fecundation of the ova, 

 only by the difference of food supplied to the 

 larva3 — abundant nourishment producing- fe- 

 males, and scanty nourishment males. Accord- 

 ing to the observations and statements of our 

 most experienced observers of bee-life, this 

 opinion expressed by Landois, as to the different 

 feeding of the larvae of bees, is not correct. All 

 writers who have treated of the rational man- 

 agement of bees agree in this that the whole of 

 the larvm in the earliest period of their life (up to 

 the sixth day) receive the same nutriment, name- 

 ly, food paste (partially digested chyle-paste) 

 with which the larvae destined to become queens 

 are fed abundantly and uninterruptedly until 

 their change to the pupa-state ; whilst the larvce 

 of the workers and drones afterwards (from the 

 sixth day) receive, instead of the chyle-paste, a 

 coarser sort of food from indigested honey and 

 pollen.* 



This identity of the nourishment of the young 

 brood of the workers and drones, seems to have 

 been entirely overlooked by Landois. A differ- 

 ence between the food of the workers and the 

 drones, such as Landois lays so much stress 

 upon, does not exist. As from the observations 

 of our most experienced breeders of bees, the 

 workers are able to rear a queen from worker 

 larvoe before it is six days old, and as the work- 

 ers can by means of royal food procure a cj[ueen 

 from every egg originally laid in a worker cell 

 by a healthy normal queen ; but not from an 

 an egg normally deposited in a drone cell ; it 

 follows as a matter of course that in bees the 

 sex is definitely fixed beforehand, even in the 

 egg, by the effectuation or omission of fecunda- 

 tion, and not merely defined by the difference of 

 the food of the larvae. 



The development of the eggs, laid by unfertil- 

 ized queens, from which, according to the expe- 

 rience of all observant bee-keepers, only drones 

 are produced, is not regarded as parthenogenesis 

 by Landois ; at least the term parthenogenesis 

 is avoided by him, although he speaks of a pri- 

 mary and secondary drone-brooding, the cause of 

 which is thus explained by him — " that eggs are 

 laid by queens or workers which are furnislred 

 scanty formative materials from which weakly 

 larvcB must be developed and consequently 

 drones." 



Whence does Landois conclude that these eggs 

 laid by drone-brooded queens or workers, are 

 furnished only with scanty formative materials ? 

 By what investigation has he arrived at the 

 knowledge that from such eggs weakly larvce 

 and consequently drones must be developed ? 

 Has he convinced himself by careful observation 

 and exact dissection of such drone mothers, of 

 the absence of male semen in their sexual or- 



*To indicate only a few of the many authorities who have 

 expressed tliemselves concordantly as above, with regard to 

 the feeding of the larva; of bees, I cite tlie following : Leuck- 

 art Ueber die Nahruug der Bieneu ; Bieueuzietnng 1855, p. 

 237 ; Berlepsch, Die Biene und die Bienenzucht, 1S60, p. 102 ; 

 Kleine, die Biene und Ihre Zucht, 1864, p. 29. 



gans ? Our scientific bee-keepers could state, 

 with regard to a great number of drone-brooded 

 queens, with certainty, that they had remained 

 unfecundated and that they consequently laid 

 unfertilized eggs, though, as experienfe has 

 proved, capable of development, and from which, 

 whether deposited in drones or worker-cells, only 

 drones are developed. The dissection of such 

 drone mothers, which has been often enough 

 undertaken by persons well acquainted with the 

 subject, has always proved that the seminal i-e- 

 ceptacle, whether normally developed or rudi- 

 mentary, contains no trace of male semen. 



As Landois refers to the fact that, with i-egard 

 to the proposition "that drones always pro- 

 ceed from unfertilized eggs," Dzierzon him- 

 self doubted his own theory, "because in one 

 experiment on intercrossing German and Italian 

 bees, remarkable and inexplicable phenomena 

 occurred, which could not be brought into 

 harmony with Dzierzon's theory, " I must appeal 

 to the arguments which I have already urged 

 against this doubt of Dzierzon's.* 



Landois states that by taking my young larvae 

 of Vanessa urticcv, and feeding them imperfectly, 

 he reared from them only males, and by feeding 

 them abundantly only females. This assertion 

 is in complete contradiction to the phenomena 

 which may be observed on Polistes gallicce, with 

 regard to the production of the sexes. Every 

 female of the Polistes fecundated in the autumn, 

 after passing through its winter sleep, founds a 

 separate colony at the commencement of spring. 

 It makes a comb for itself, furnishes the cells 

 with eggs, and then still quite alone, feeds the 

 larvae produced from these eggs until they are 

 full-grown. From these larvae the so-called work- 

 ers (that is to say, small female individuals,) are 

 always developed. Male individuals are never 

 bred in the months of June and July ; and it is 

 only in August that the males issue from the 

 operculated cells of these colonies of Polistes. 

 According to Landois' theory, the larvfe reared 

 by the solitary Polistes mother ought to furnish 

 males, as this brood is usually very scantily pro- 

 vided with nourishment, and is indeed often left 

 for a considerable time Avithout food by their 

 mother, which has to complete the business of 

 feeding them without any assistance. This 

 starvation of the brood of the Polistes occurs 

 when the temperature becomes cold, when the 

 sky is overcast, and during rain and wind ; for 

 when the weather is unfavorable, even if this 

 last for several days, the females of the Polistes 

 remain uninterruptedly inactive, concealed be- 

 hind their combs. As no supply of food is laid 

 up in the combs of the Polistes, but the nourish- 

 ment is always poured from mouth to mouth by 

 the wasp into the larvae, the scarcity of food 

 often causes the development and growth of the 

 larvae to go on very slowly, and with interruiJ- 

 tions. According to Landois, all these circum- 

 . stances ought especially to favor the develop- 

 ment of male individuals ; but until a large 

 number of workers (Avhich, as larvae, certainly 

 did not revel in a superabundance of food) have 



*Wahre Parthenogenesis bei Schmatterlingen und Bienea 

 — English translation, p. 74. 



