104 PUTNAM, NOTES ON THE 



velopernent of the eggs is owing to their being 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 prin- 

 cipally developed. 



This opinion seems to be corroborated by the state ot 

 the nest, previously noticed, found on the 28th of July, 

 which had been recently commenced and contained only 

 queen cells, the parent queen being obliged, by her recent 

 impregnation, to lay only such eggs as were adapted to 

 the season. As no first brood of workers, or second 

 one of males and small females, had existed in this nest, 

 the eggs producing the queen larvae must have been laid 

 by the large female or queen, found in the nest, and not 

 by a small female. 



The fact, that our species of Humble Bees take posses- 

 sion of the nest of mice and rats, accounts for the large 

 number of mites found in most nests. 



Three parasites are common in the nests of our New 

 England Humble Bees. They are, a small beetle of the 

 genus Byturus only known thus far in the imago state ; a 

 moth of the genus Nephopjteryx: the larvae of which is quite 

 abundant in most nests, and a dipterous insect which is 

 often found in the larval state. 



It is singular that in all the nests, which I collected, 

 not a single specimen of Apathies was found by Mr. Pack- 

 ard, though this parasitic bee is generally supposed to be 

 quite common in the nests of Bombi. 



Additional Notes, August 3, 1864. A nest of Bombus 

 pennsylvanicus was found at Upton, Me., on the sixth of 

 last June, in which there was but a single queen bee with 

 seven cells of the smallest size, containing larvae, and sev- 

 eral eggs in a mass of pollen. 



A queen of B. pennsylvanicus was taken, on July 20th, 

 under leaves in a wood. 



Professor A. E. Verrill found a queen Humble Bee in 

 a torpid state under leaves, before the snow was off the 

 ground in the spring of 1863. 



