1839] 



FARMERS' REGISTER. 



477 



should have preceded them, during eleven months, 

 in many thousands, totally disappear, and from no 

 other sensible cause. Some viiiation lias ensued, 

 whicii, while it destroys the vitality of which \he 

 workers' ei.^!Ts are susceptible, operates such a 

 chance, as to bring those of I he males eleven 

 months earlier to maturity. On reflecting that a 

 simple copulation is sufficient to impregnate all the 

 eggs which a queen will lay in two years, or, per- 

 haps, the \iJhole that she will lay during her life, 

 the question becomes still more embarrassing. 

 Without being aware of the cause of such pecu- 

 liarities, some observers have maintained, that 

 there were certain species of queens, from which 

 no description of bees, excepting drones, would 

 be generated; which they jusil}^ determined was 

 extremely inju'ious to their respective colonies. 



The laying of a cjueen is retarded, or altogether 

 interrupted, by cold; and one impregnated in the 

 end of October has been known to retain her eggs 

 lour months and a half, owing to (he intervention 

 of winter. This queen, during March and April, 

 laid above 3000 sggs, producing males only; and 

 so very prolific are these insects, that a single 

 queen may be the mother of 12,000 bees, or more, 

 in the space of two months, which is laying at the 

 rate ol 200 eggs daily. The queen before depo- 

 siting an egfr, examines whether the cell is clean 

 and fit to receive it, and also suitable to its future 

 stale; for queens, males, and workers, have cells 

 peculiarly adapted to their kind, and the queen, 

 by anticipation, seems aware which of these will 

 proceed ii-om the egg she deposites. Those pro- 

 ducing workers are deposited in common horizon- 

 tal cells; but the cells containing the eggs which 

 will be translbrnied into queens are large and rude- 

 ly constructed, with a great quantity of wax, and 

 hang perpendicularly in the hive. When the egg 

 is laid, the bees supply the cell with the pollen of 

 flowers, which serves lo feed the young worm 

 coming Irom it. 



The eggs of all the three kinds of bees are 

 hatched in three days; a ihct apparently of trifling 

 import, but which it is essential for the cultivator 

 to learn. A worker then remains five days in the 

 vermicular state; a male six and a hall'; and a 

 queen five. The workers' worm occupies thirty- 

 six hours in spinning its silken envelope or cocoon; 

 in three days it changes to a nymph; and only on 

 the twentieth day of its existence does it become a 

 complete or pcrli^ct winged animal. The drones 

 are still longer of attaining their last metamorpho- 

 sis, which succeeds in twenty-four days after the 

 egg has been laid. But the queen comes to per- 

 fection in sixteen days. 



Food is carried by the bees to the worms as 

 they require it: but when ready to translrom to a 

 nymph, they are aware that it is no longer neces- 

 sary; on the contrary, the mouth of Ihe cell is 

 sealed with a covering of wax formed of concen- 

 tric circles from the edge, convex if including 

 males, and flat if including workers. The same 

 cell may successively bring difi'erent workers to 

 maturity: after one has left it, the bees clean the 

 inside, and tb.e mother again lays there; but the 

 cells containing eggs which become queens are 

 used no more than once. When the perfect in- 

 sect escapes, the cell is usually destroyed. 



While treating of the origin and imperfect state 

 of bees, wo cannot omit observing, that although, 

 generally speaking, the queen is the parent of the 



whole, yet there are some workers, (at least some 

 bees so much resembling workers, that there is no 

 perceptible difference,) which lay eggs. Their 

 ovaries arc smaller, more fragile, and composed of 

 fewer oviducts than those of queens; and tiie eggs, 

 like the eggs of queens whose fecundation has 

 been retarded, produce male bees only, and neither 

 queens nor workers. This singular liict, added lo 

 another not less so. on which we shall immediate- 

 ly make a few remarks, strongly lends to esta- 

 blish, that all working bees are originally of the 

 lemale sex; and that in the ordinary case their ova- 

 ries are vitiated, and become unfit fur laying any 

 eggs except those transforming to males. 



M. Schirach, an eminent naturalist, discovered, 

 that in certain circumstances the animal destineii 

 to become a worker could actually be converted 

 into a queen; and that this conversion was in the 

 power of the bees, by means of a particular mode 

 of treatment bestowed on the worm while in an 

 early stage. lie thence concluded, that every 

 queen is originally a worker, which, without the 

 particular trpatmrnt administered, would have re- 

 mained a worker, but having undergone this treat- 

 ment, it is converted to a queen; and that the bees, 

 to attain the conversion, selected the worm when 

 three days old. Nevertheless it is induiiitable, that 

 specific eggs are laid in royal cells and hatched 

 into queens, which, according to the most credible 

 and satiefactory experiments, never would have 

 produced workers. Ft is surely to avoid the liital 

 consc(]uences which would attend twenty or thirty 

 thousand animals on the loss of a single lile, that 

 they have been endowed with such uncommon 

 prerogatives. 



Immediately on the loss or removal of a queen, 

 the whole hive is a scene of tumult and disorder: 

 the bees seem to anticipate their own destruction, 

 by the precaution they take to guard against it. 

 Should there be neither eggs nor brood in the 

 combs, they will infallibly perish; their instinctive 

 faculties are lost, they have no object for which 

 their labors are united, they cease to collect honey 

 and prepare wax, and in a short time they disap- 

 pear and die. But if there be brood in the combs, 

 the industry of the bees continues unabated; for 

 by the proceeding which they follow, they know 

 that their loss will be repaired. Having selected a 

 worm three days old or less, they sacrifice three of 

 the contiguous cells, that the cell of the worm 

 may be formed into one adapted to breed a queen. 

 They next supply it with the necessary food, 

 which is not the common farina, pollen, or bee- 

 bread, on which the young of workers feed, but 

 a peculiar kind of paste or jelly, of a pungent 

 taste, which is reserved for queens alone. A c}'- 

 lindrical enclosure is raised around the Avorra, 

 whereby its cell becomes a perfect tube with its 

 original rhomboida! bottom; for that part remains 

 untouched. Were it injured, the fabric of the 

 other three cells on the opposite side of comb 

 would be deranged, which would be a needless 

 waste. The cell is still horizontal like the rest in 

 the combs, and thus remains during the first three 

 days of the existence of the worm; but the bees 

 in propccuting its enlargement, alter its direction, 

 and Ibrni it to hang perpendicularly, as all those 

 cell? do which have been inhabited by queens. In 

 performing this essential part of the operation, 

 they do not scruple to destroy the worms surround- 

 ing the tube, and use the wax of their cells in con- 



