170 MONEY IN" BEES IN AUSTRALASIA 



tlaem away, wet, in the manner described. There will 

 never be any trouble from so doing; in fact, they induce 

 the colonies to enter supers in early spring. The ex- 

 pected excitement due to returning wet combs does not 

 occur, simply because the supers are not placed on the 

 hives until there is something to store in them. 



GENERAL AUTUMN WORK. 



OLD QUEENS AND LAYING WORKERS. 



When the super-combs are being removed from the 

 hives the apiarist will often discover some colonies 

 without a queen. This is awkward so late in the season, 

 unless the apiarist has a nucleus with young laying 

 queen, to give to the queenless lot. Should no laying 

 queen be on hand, it is better to imite the stock with 

 another hive. This "doubling up" is practised largely 

 in some places during autumn. Queenless bees unite 

 readily with those possessing a fertile queen. 



At times the apiarist will be somewhat confused on 

 opening a colony to find drone but no worker brood; 

 this is not uncommon, and is due to an aged queen that 

 has lost all trace of the fertilising semen, consequently 

 only drone eggs result. As already pointed out, drones 

 "have no father," so that when the spermatozoa are 

 exhausted, ' ' worker ' ' bees are no longer produced. This 

 phenomenon is known as Parthenogenesis (literally the 

 ability of a virgin to bring forth young without the 

 intervention of the male), and was discovered by 

 Dzierzon (pronounced Tiertsone), who asserted "all 

 impregnated eggs produce females, and all unimpregnated 

 ones males (e.g., drones). This is demonstrated daily 

 during summer-time on many modern bee-farms. With 

 this thesis before us, we can readily grasp the pheno- 

 menon of "worker" bees laying drone eggs. 



Hives that are left queenless and without young larvae 

 for a considerable time will almost invariably have one 



