APIARI^. 119 



Ruber's theory, that the change is due to "the quality as well 

 as quantity of food with which the royal larva is supplied," 

 though Dr. Leitch objects, that it has been by no means con- 

 clusively proved " that the so-called royal jelly differs in any 

 respect from the ordinarj^ food supplied to the worker larva ; " 

 and Mr. Woodbury cites the experiments of Dzierzon, as 

 quoted by Kleine, "that as Huber, by introducing some royal 

 jelly in cells containing worker-brood, obtained queens, it may 

 be possible to induce bees to construct royal cells, when the 

 Apiarian prefers to have them, by inserting a small portion of 

 royal jelly in cells containing worker-larvee." Kleine takes "an 

 unsealed royal cell — which usually contains an excess of 

 royal jelly — and removes from it a portion of the jelly, on 

 the point of a knife or pen, and by placing it on the inner 

 margin of any worker cell, feels confident that the larvae in 

 them will be reared as queens." 



Before these points are settled we must stud}^ the habits of 

 the Wild Bees, and of the other social H3auenoptera and White 

 Ants, together with the social Aphides more carefully. Mr. F. 

 W. Putnam pertinently states, "at present I cannot believe 

 that the peculiarity of food, or the structure of the cells, pro- 

 duces a difference of development in Humble-bees, for the lar- 

 vae, as has been previously stated, were seen to make their own 

 cells from the pollen paste. Is it not more natural to believe, 

 as has been suggested to me by Professor J. Wyman, that the 

 difference in the development of the eggs is owing to their be- 

 ing laid at various times after impregnation? Thus, if I am 

 right in supposing that the queens are impregnated by the 

 males late in the summer, the eggs, laid soon after, produce 

 the large queen larvae ; * the next set of eggs, laid in the spring, 

 produce the workers, or undeveloped females, while from those 

 deposited still later, male bees are principally developed." 

 (Proceedings of the Essex Institute, Salem, vol. iv, 1864, p. 

 103.) 



Referring to Mr. Putnam's statement that there are both small 

 and large queens (besides the workers) , Dr. Gerstsecker infers, 



*Di'. Gerstseoker, on the other hand, states that "from the brood-cells of a nest 

 of Bombus muscorum, found by him on the ISth of September, there were devel- 

 oped at the end of the same month only workers." 



