4 OUEEN-REARIXG IX l.NGLAXD. 



swarm another year, (^ueen-bees have been known to live 

 as long as five years, but they are often worn out in three. 



Queen-Reating to Supersede a Failing Queen. -In 

 the rearing of queens to supersede a queen whose egg-laying 

 powers are failing, fewer queen-cells are started than under 

 the swarming impulse, and they are very lavishly supplied 

 with royal jelly ; also the young queens usually emerge, and 

 the surviving one is sometimes fertilised and commences 

 laying before the old one dies. The rearing of some of 

 these queens is sometimes started in the manner described 

 in the following paragraph. 



Queen-Reai-ing: when the Queen is Accidentally 

 Lost. — Should the queen of a colony die or get lost acci- 

 dentally, about a dozen larvae, not more than three days 

 old, \\'hich would in the ordinary course de^-elop into workers, 

 are supplied with an abundance of royal jelly, and at the 

 same time their cells are enlarged and formed into queen- 

 cells (Fig. I, B), with the result that they develop into 

 queens. The explanation of this is that both queen and 

 worker are developed from the female egg, and the worker 

 larva is fed during the first three days of its existence on 

 chyle-food similar to that supplied to the queen lar\a during 

 the whole term of its existence ; but on the fourth day the 

 worker larva is weaned, and a large quantity of honey is 

 added to its food. The nature of the bee is such that this 

 change to a less nourishing diet prevents the develop- 

 ment of the reproducti\e organs, but .causes the develop- 

 ment of perfect organs for collecting fr>od and for per- 

 forming the manifold duties of the hive, together with the 

 intelligence necessary to use them ; in other words, it makes 

 a worker instead of a queen. Occasionally bees choose 

 larvae over three davs old for rearing into queens ; these 

 produce undersized queens which more or less resemble 

 workers. 



Approximate Duration of Stag-es in Development of a 

 Fertile Queen Bee. 



Egg 3 days I 



Lar\-a (unsealed) ... ... 5 ,, riSa days. 



Sealed queen-cell ... ... 7^ ,, ' 



Virgin queen ... ... 6 to 25 ., 



