62 



THE A]SIERICAN BE.K-KEEPEK. 



March 



Coggshall's visit, that he invariably 

 uses the staple in the end of the bot- 

 tom-bar, where it is of genuine service 

 to the x'apicl manipulator. 



THE MAKING OF THE QUEEN- 

 BEE 



To the American Bee Journal col- 

 umns Mr F. Greiner contributes a vrey 

 interesting translation from the Ger- 

 man, by Pastor Kline, bearing the 

 above heading, and supported by this 

 foundation sentence. 



"In regard to the physiology of the 

 worker and the queen bee I have con- 

 cluded, after a close observation, that 

 the female bee-larva, when but little 

 developed, embraces within her little 

 body two distinct possibilities or ten- 

 dencies, viz: 1st, to develop either 

 into a mother-bee, or, 2nd, into a nurse 

 or worker bee. One is irresistibly 

 forced to the conviction of its 

 being an error that the worker-bee is 

 a dwarfed or undeveloped female bee, 

 for in the worker as well as in the 

 queen do we find different organs in 

 the highest state of perfection. The 

 worker is endowed with that wonder- 

 ful system of glands, the pollen-bas- 

 kets, the stronger tongue and jaws; 

 the queen with those perfect organs of 

 reproduction." 



Mr. Kline proceeds 1p show that no 

 distinguisking line really exists — that 

 the degree of development of the re- 

 spective functions is proportionate to 

 extent or thoroughness of the treat- 

 ment during the larval stage, as pre- 

 scribed by nature — and that the dis- 

 tinguishing characteristics blend, or 

 overlap to an extent that entirely 

 obliterates the dividing line. He says: 



"What do we know about a larva de- 

 veloping into a worker in one case, 

 into a queen in another? It is believed 

 that we must look for a certain admix- 

 ture in the laiwal food, or that the lat- 

 ter is more plentifully administered, 

 and thus produces the queen bee. It 

 appears that as soon as the larval food 

 is changed the development changes 

 with it, but it comes very gradually. I 

 have taken five-day worker larvae and 

 transferred them to queen-cells. They 

 should have been sealed after one-half 

 day, but it was accomplished only in 

 a full day, and yet the resulting queen 

 could hardly be distinguished from a 



worker. The older the larva selected 

 for a queen at the time the change Is 

 made, the nearer the resulting queen 

 will be like a worker. 



"Worker larvae, when from one to 

 one and a half days old, have hardly 

 received other treatment than queen 

 larvae. Not till the end of the second 

 day can we notice that the lai'val food 

 is more scantily supplied to woriver 

 than to queen larvae. Even when a 

 three-day worker larva is placed into 

 a qiieen cell full of royal food, its 

 growth is slower than that of one that 

 has been in a queen cell from the be- 

 ginning, and we can notice some dis- 

 tinguishing marks in the natural in- 

 sects between those that were reared 

 from one, or two-day larvae. I trans- 

 ferred 30 one-half to one day old 

 worker larvae to queen cells, let them 

 remain therein for two days, and final- 

 ly returned them to worker cells. I 

 succeeded only with two. One of the 

 larvae was immediately sealed after 

 the second transfer, and produced a 

 perfect worker bee; the other one was 

 not sealed quite so quickly and pro- 

 duced a queen, small and weak, show- 

 ing round head and curved hairs on 

 the hind legs, and possessing a short 

 tongue. This experiment shows that 

 a queen larva can be changed into a 

 worker." 



"The moral of the whole," says Mr, 

 Kline, "is this: The earlier a larva re- 

 ceives royal treatment, and therefore 

 the more lavish she is fed. the better 

 and more perfect will be the resulting 

 queen." 



In conclusion, Mr. Greiner makes 

 the following supplementary com- 

 ments: "While I fully endorse the 

 moral, I wish to say this: Our posi- 

 tive knowledge of this mysterious mat- 

 ter is restricted to the fact that the 

 queen larva is fed more lavishly and 

 slightly differently during the latter 

 pei'iod of her life. We do not know 

 that this difference in food and food 

 supply produces the I'esults we see. I 

 believe the real cause is not under- 

 stood, and what we see are only the 

 accompanying circumstances.'' 



It is evident, as asserted by Mr. 

 Greiner, that nothing very definite is 

 really known upon this subject; but 

 The Bee-Keeper is pleased to be able 

 to assure its readers that this problem 

 is now undergoing a series of very 



