i6 A MANUAL OF BEE-KEEPING. 



their name implies, to work—hy them all the labour is 

 done: honey gathered, wax made, combs built, young 

 tended ; in fact, everything that requires work is accom- 

 plished by the Workers. These Bees are barren, or 

 more properly speaking, not fully developed females, 

 which may be proved on dissection, the organs of their 

 sex being discoverable, although not in a fully developed 

 state. Workers have a sting, which they are ever ready 

 to use on an enemy, even though, as is usually the case, 

 their lives pay the penalty, for, being barbed, the sting 

 is retained in the wound and drags out with it part of 

 the Bee's intestines. 



They are furnished with an exceedingly curious tongue, 

 with which they obtain honey from the flowers and con- 

 vey it to their mouth, whence it passes to the honey bag, 

 to be afterwards ejected into the cells. The hind legs 

 of the Workers are furnished with a spoon -shaped 

 hollow, called the " Pollen Basket," in which they con- 

 vey that material to the hive. The length of life of a 

 Worker Bee is determined by the amount of work it 

 does, and the introduction of Ligurian Queens at various 

 seasons enables us to determine this question with almost 

 certainty. After the introduction of a fertile Ligurian 

 Queen to a colony of Black Workers in May, if we ex- 

 amine the hive two months subsequently, we shall find 

 very few Black Bees remain, they having died and been 

 replaced with Ligurians ; and as, probably, at the time 

 the strange Queen commenced her reign, some eggs or 

 young larvae of her predecessor remained, we may con- 

 clude that six weeks is the limit of time a Worker Bee 

 will live in summer. Should the new Queen be intro- 

 duced in October, not until April following will the same 

 state of affairs be found; it is thus evident that the 

 quietude and rest of winter prolongs the Bee's life fourfold. 



