The Mabyland Fabm Btjeeau Federation 9 



This abnormal condition exists in some of the queens inseminated artifi- 

 cially by the method, devised by Watson' but was more common at first 

 than since the method has been improved. It may be present in any degree 

 when artlfically Inseminated queens first begin to lay or may develop at 

 any time thereafter. 



Partial drone-laying queens are not uncommon among queens that have 

 been shipped in mailing cages. Although the percentage of queens that 

 are affected is usually small, considerable loss occurs at times among 

 queens reared in the South and sent to northern States in mailing cages. 

 The affected queens may be partial drone-layers as soon as they are in- 

 troduced but more often the disorder does not show up for a few weeks 

 or until the following season. Even the worst affected queens may be 

 prolific layers and have the appearance of normal young queens. Such 

 queens are of little value even though there are but a few drones in worker 

 cells. The percentage of drones usually increase more or less rapidly and 

 the colonies do not prosper. The best remedy is to kill the queen and 

 introduce a normal one or unite the bees and combs with another colony. 



When colonies are seriously iwisoned from working California buckeye 

 the queens frequently become drone layers. Drone laying is supposed 

 to come on gradually, although this point has not been fully investigated. 

 In case of buckeye poisoning, however, drone-laying queens have returned 

 to normal egg laying when introduced to normal colonies of bees outside 

 the buckeye territory. 



When queens remain to head the colonies in which they are reared and 

 are not subjected to injury, they rarely become partial drone layers while 

 they are still young and vigorous. There are, however, a few references 

 to this condition in beekeeping literature. Hoot' states that "any queen 

 is liable any day of her life to begin laying drone eggs altogether or in 

 part." Langstroth and Dadant' state that "some very prolific queens oc- 

 casionally lay drone-eggs in worker cells. It may be due toi fatigue." 

 Langstroth and Dadant^ also report as follows regarding an experiment 

 by M. Barthelemy of France. "A queen may be temporarily rendered a 

 drone layer by exposure to cold, as was proven in an experiment conducted 

 by Mr. M. Barthelemy of Marseilles, France in 1918. He tried the ex- 

 periment of introducing a young queen by dipping her in cold honey. The 

 refrigeration caused her to lay drone eggs for several weeks after the 

 operation when she again resumed her laying of fertilized eggs." There 

 are other reports of queens laying only drone eggs after having been 

 exposed to low temperatures. 



In April, 1932 the writer found two partial-drone-laying queens that 

 were reared during the summer of 1931 in the colonies that they headed 

 at Somerset, Maryland. It seems probable that the condition may have 

 been brought on by some injury to the queens but this was not determined. 

 Since there are but few reports of observations on the work of such queens 



