ESTABLISHING AN APIARY, AND LIGUEIANIZING. 87 



maternity, she at length deposits eggs producing drones only. The 

 vitalizing fluid retained in the spermatheca of the impregnated mother 

 causing the eggs brought in contact with it to produce workers, while 

 those eggs not so affected yield males only. That is, drones are hatched 

 from unimpregnated eggs. Hence a black queen mated with a Ligurian 

 will produce crossed workers and black drones, and vice versd, but it 

 is by no means settled that the drones of unimpregnated queens are 

 equally virile with those of the impregnated. This interesting question 

 must not, however, draw us from our intention of adhering to the 

 " practical " only in these pages, our object in introducing it being to say 

 something of fertile workers, i.e., worker bees (all of which are known to 

 be undeveloped females), capable of laying eggs. Sometimes, soon after 

 the loss of a queen, less frequently at other times, evidences wiU be 

 found of the presence of one of these pests, the cells will either 

 contain three, four, or more eggs each, or will have been considerably 

 elongated to give room for the excessive size of the grubs — drones, 

 although in worker cells. The fertile worker cannot be distinguished 

 from the rest. She is destroyiag the hive, and queens stand very little 

 chance of safe introduction while she lives. The bees, in despair, often 

 construct queen cells around her eggs, which of course yield dead drones 

 only. The giving of a normal queen cell will now and again succeed ; but 

 after aU the worker brood the hive contains has been some days hatched 

 out we may try this plan of losing the pseudo-mother : Take all the 

 frames and adherent bees from the hive to a distance of twenty or thirty 

 yards, and then jerk the bees into the air ; they will return to their known 

 stand, but the fertile worker, not haviiig flown, wiU probably be lost. 

 The combs will be replaced, and if eggs cease to appear in them a new 

 queen may be given, but the colony is usually by this time only worth 

 uniting to another. 



Our friend, Mr. J. Hunter, has had quite recently the good fortune to 

 obtain, through Mr. Obed Poole, a worker caught in the act of ovipositing. 

 Upon dissection, one of the ovaries was found to be rudimentary, but the 

 other was partially developed. Five of its ovarian tubes (egg tubes) 

 contained about twenty eggs each. At last, then, anatomical demonstra- 

 iion of the existence of fertile workers has been obtained. 



