l88 JOHN L. PRICER. 



4. As I shall show in more detail later under polymorphism, 

 the workers which a queen produces the first season are all of 

 the very smallest size and, as the colony increases in size, larger 

 and larger workers are produced until, in colonies of the size in 

 group (b) above, a few of the largest size appear. 



5. As I shall show later, under division of labor, these largest 

 sized workers seem to take no part in the work of gathering food 

 for the colony, but remain in the nest and seem to possess largely 

 the instincts of queens. 



6. Colonies 6 and 7, Table III. and colony 1, Table IV., were 

 kept in artificial nests in the insectory after capture, and the 

 workers laid eggs abundantly during the winter and a large 

 number of these eggs developed into males. 



7. Two smaller ones, 8 and 16, of Table III., were also kept 

 in the insectory after capture, without queens, and were fed just 

 the same as those mentioned above and no eggs were seen with 

 either of these. 



These data make reasonably evident the following conclusions : 



1. Sexually perfect individuals are not produced until the 

 colony consists of approximately two thousand workers, and 

 they are produced by nearly all colonies of this size or larger. 



2. From three to six years or longer are required for a colony 

 to reach this size. 



The fact that neither eggs nor pupae are found in the nest dur- 

 ing the winter, and that the larvae are all very small, must mean 

 that the proper feeding of the young larvae and the egg laying 

 cease several weeks before the temperature is -too low for the 

 process of incubation. This is supported by the fact that colony 

 1, Table III., which was taken on September 4, contained neither 

 eggs nor pupae, and only very small larvae. The cessation of 

 these two processes is probably caused by the workers and 

 queens storing up food in their own bodies for the processes of 

 metabolism during hibernation. If so, egg laying and the feed- 

 ing of the youngest larvae probably cease at about the same time, 

 and the winter larvae are hatched from the eggs which are in the 

 nest when the queen stops laying. Hence we have in the num- 

 ber of winter larvae an indefinite clue to the rate of egg laying in 

 colonies of different sizes. The average number of larvae in the 



