99 



STATE BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



two or three weeks. As soon as mated the queen returns to the hive 

 and within a day or two begins laying. 



Young queens sometimes mate several times before they begin 

 to lay, but after they commence to lay they never mate again. If a 

 queen fails to mate she will ultimately begin to lay, but her eggs will 

 produce onl}- drones. These may be placed in worker comb, but as 

 soon as the bees cap the brood the raised bullet-like cappings betray 

 the sex of the contained young. Such a queen should be replaced 

 with a good one. 



The average time of incubation of the eggs is three daj-s, though it 

 varies with the temperature. From the eggs a minute white grub 

 (larva) is hatched, and this is supplied with and lies in a milky white 

 food prepared in the stomachs of the nurses from pollen and honey. 

 It is fed thus for six days by which time it has grown until it fills the 

 cell and it is then capped over and spins its cocoon and metamor- 

 phoses, turning from a grub into a bee as does the caterpillar into a 

 butterfly. 



The worker takes twelve days to make the change and the drone 

 fifteen. 



The " queen larvae " receive a more abundant supply of the prepared 

 food and take only seven days to change from grub to perfect bee. 

 It is currently said that larvse intended for queens receive a different 

 food from that given to the worker larvte, but there are now good 

 reasons for believing that it is c[uantit)' onlj- that is varied, the chem- 

 ical difference arising after it is put into tire cells. 



If the queen of a colon}- is removed intentionally or accidentally, 

 the workers proceed to raise one or several more by enlarging some 

 of the cells containing worker (female) larvte, and supph'ing the 

 necessary food. In clue time such individuals emerge as perfect 

 c^ueens. If the bees have neither eggs nor young larvte they cannot 

 raise a queen and unless the beekeeper supplies brood or a queen, 

 the colony will perish. The bees rarely tolerate more than one laying 

 queen in the hi%'e at a time. Perhaps it were more correct to say 

 that the queen rarely permits another qu(!cn to remain long, for 



