98 



THE BEE-KEEPERS' REVIEW 



shelter for bees and no bees occur 

 except those purposely taken to the 

 mating station. 



The matings thus far have been con- 

 fined to crosses between the Italian 

 and Carniolan races. As is well known, 

 the pure bees of the former race are 

 distinctly yellow, while those of the 

 latter are more or less gray, but al- 

 ways, when pure, devoid of yellow 

 color. For the primary crosses stocks 

 were selected which had been under 

 observation for several generations 

 without having shown any indication 

 of impurity. 



Pure Italian queens mated to Car- 

 niolan drones produce workers and 

 nueens which are indistinguishable, so 

 far as color is concerned, from the 

 parent Italian stock: that is. in the 

 Fi generation of this, the "primary." 

 cross, the yellow color is completely 

 dominant. In the reciprocal cross, in 

 which Carniolan queens are mated to 

 Italian drones, the yellow color is also 

 dominant, but not as completely so as 

 in the primary cross: the Fi queens 

 and workers show nearly, but not 

 quite, as much yellow color as the 

 parent Italian stock. The significance 

 of this in practical bee-breeding is 

 at once apparent. For years profes- 

 sional queen-breeders have assumed 

 that if an Italian oueen throws work- 

 ers which show the typical Italian 

 coloring it is prima facie evidence that 

 she has been purely mated. From the 

 above results it is evident that such 

 is not necessarilv the case, for such 

 a queen might have mated to either 

 an Italian or Cai'niolan drone (or 

 even presumably, to a black drone), 

 and in either case her workers would 

 have the typical Italian color. The 

 nuritv of an Italian queen's mating 

 therefore cannot be determined by an 

 examination of her workers. Further 

 reference to this is made below. The 

 production of yellow workers by a 

 mire Carniolan queen, on the other 

 hand, immediatelv stamps her as hav- 

 ing been impurely mated. 



There is also excellent evidence as 

 to the inheritance of characteristics 

 other than color. For example, the 

 marked proclivity of the Carniolans 

 to use wax instead of propolis for 

 sealing crevices, fastening frames 

 together, attaching hive-covers to 

 frames, etc., comes dominantly to the 

 surface in the Fi generation of the 

 primary cross. In the F^ generation 

 of the reciprocal cross this trait is 

 also much more in evidence than in 

 the pure Italian race, though not as 



completely dominant as in the case 

 of the primary cross. 



It seems to be a well-established 

 law of heredity that an individual al- 

 ways produces gametes of the same 

 kind as those of which it is itself 

 composed. With this law the queen- 

 bee appears to comply without excep- 

 tion. As the drone is produced par- 

 thenogenetically he is essentially a 

 gamete and behaves as such in in- 

 heritance, at least so far as the color 

 factor is concerned. Pure Italian 

 aueens mated to Carniolan drones pro- 

 duce only Italian drones; and Car- 

 niolan queens mated to Italian drones 

 produce only Carniolan drones. This 

 is strictly in accordance with the the- 

 ory of Dzierson. However, the daugh- 

 ters of Italian queens which have 

 mated to Carniolan drones produce 

 both Italian and Carniolan drones.- 

 produce them in equal numbers, and 

 do not produce any other kind. The 

 F' queens of the reciprocal cross like- 

 wise produce drones of these two 

 kinds and in equal numbers. This is 

 in accordance with the theoretical ex- 

 pectation under Mendelian law. If 

 the constitution of a pure Italian 

 queen be represented by 11 and of a 

 pure Carniolan queen by CC, the for- 

 mer will produce gametes I and I, 

 and the latter, gametes C and C. these 

 being Italian and Carniolan drones, 

 respectively. A hybrid oueen, how- 

 ever, has the constitution IC and pro- 

 duces gametes I and C in equal 

 numbers, these of course materializing 

 as Italian and Carniolan drones. The 

 practical application of this is that 

 the only test of an Italian queen's 

 mating is found in the color of the 

 drones produced by her daughters. 



Another interesting consideration is 

 that the production of an Fi drone 

 seems to be an impossibility and this, 

 in turn, makes the production of a 

 strict F= generation look like another 

 impossibility. Beekeepers will at once 

 argue that drones intermediate in 

 color occur in nature, and such is the 

 case. However, drones from purely 

 mated queens are known to vary 

 widelv in color and this may possibly 

 explain the occurrence of intermediate 

 coloring. We are still in ignorance 

 regarding the causes of this varia- 

 tion, and it is honed that further data 

 from the mating-station will throw 

 more light on this as well as on other 

 phases of this interesting problem. — 

 Science, Feb. 5, 1915. 



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