RACES AND RELATIONSHIPS OF HONEY-BEES. 217 



It is a well-known fact that the Ligurian bee, when brought 

 away from its original home, is, to a certain extent at least, 

 subject to colour variation. For the mattter of that, a con- 

 siderable difference exists among the various strains found in 

 Italy, and, as mentioned before, those found in the Canton of 

 Tessin are rather dark, leather-like in the bands, whilst the more 

 southern are of lighter yellow tints. Now such local variations, 

 whilst occurring in their native home, appears frequently in a 

 more pronounced manner when the Italian bees are removed 

 from their original habitat. Queens which are unquestionably 

 purely mated will occasionally produce offspring differing con- 

 siderably in colour ; this is noticeable in the same hatchings 

 sometimes, and between the different hatchings of the same 

 season, and very often between the hatchings of successive 

 seasons. No doubt this is largely due, in many cases, to 

 individual variability, and is not always, or not entirely, attri- 

 butable to altered conditions of life ; still, ever since the Italian 

 bee has become the favourite race, it has been found necessary to 

 renovate the blood at times to prevent deterioration, or for the 

 purpose of keeping them up to the required standard. If this 

 renovation of blood is not attended to, the loss of the high 

 colouring frequently results, and in some cases is soon per- 

 ceptible. This deterioration may probably be due to altered 

 conditions of life, but it shows, to a certain degree at least, the 

 instability of the colour variation, and seems to indicate this to 

 be a subsequently acquired character, which the typical ancestor 

 did not possess. 



Still stronger evidence than this is the tendency towards a 

 dark colour, which is nearly always the case when a stand is left 

 for some time without the infusion of a new, well-coloured strain, 

 or without careful attention being paid to selection. This is 

 generally more noticeable in a large stand than in a small one, 

 and must be accounted for by the fact that a greater mixture of 

 blood takes place between, say, fifty colonies, than between six to 

 ten. In the latter the descendants are more closely related to each 

 other than in the larger number, and, consequently, will remain 

 more uniform on account of the lesser chance of the effect of 

 variation asserting itself in any particular colony. On the other 

 hand, in a large stand all colonies rarely descend from the same 

 swarm, and even if it were the case, their relationship would have 



ZOOLOGIST, THIRD SERIES, VOL. XX. JUNE, 1896. S 



