GROWTH AND FEEDING OF HONEYBEE LARVAE. 



13 



*0O 



varying conditions strengthens this assumption. Larvae destined to 

 become queens, however, receive a highly nutritious food, " royal 

 jelly," produced by 

 the worker bees, 

 throughout the entire 

 larval period. It is 

 well known that 

 queen larvae at ma- 

 turity are larger and 

 heavier than worker 

 larvae. Unfortunate- 

 ly, no weighings of 

 queen larvae were 

 made, so that figures 

 are not available for 

 comparison with 

 those of worker lar- 

 vae, but it is safe to 

 assume that although 

 they would raise 

 somewhat the per- 

 centage increases for 

 the last two days, yet 

 the drop would doubt- 

 less still be evident. 



! 

 \ 



RATE OF GROWTH. 



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The weighings re- 

 corded above are too 

 few in number to jus- 

 tify broad generaliza- 

 tions, but are never- 

 theless of value in 

 some particulars. 

 The most obvious and 

 striking feature is the remarkably rapid growth of the larva, which 

 within 4| to 5 days increases its initial weight more than 1,500 times. 

 The ratio of initial weight to weight at maturity of several insects is 

 shown below : 



Fig. 4. 



-Per cent ratio of unconsumed food in the cell to 

 weight of honeybee larva. (Table 3.) 



Cossus (4) 1 



Sphinx (6). 



Bombyx (1) 1 



Telea (10) 



Apis 



Anthophora (6) 



Sarcophaga (2) 



Lucilia (2) 



72,000 (Lyonet). 

 9,976 (Newport). 



(Dandolo). 



(Trouvelot). 



9,500 



8,600 



1,580 



1,020 



451 



404 



(Newport), 



(Herms). 



(Herms). 



The first four of the insects listed above, as compared with the 

 honeybee, have an extended larval period — 3 years in the case of 

 Cossus — and their food is of low nutritive value. In the case of 

 the last four 7 particularly the honeybee, the larval food is of high 

 nutritive, value and is rapidly assimilated. In rate of growth the 

 honeybee larva exceeds all of those listed, followed by the fly Sar- 

 cophaga, which attains 451 times its initial weight in about 71 hours. 



