The Cycle of the Year 
55 
the indistinctly circumscribed honey-flows and for temporary 
disturbances in weather conditions. 
BROOD-REARING 
A normal colony of bees in good condition just previous 
to the beginning of the season’s activity may be assumed to 
be broodless and to consist of a mated queen and perhaps 
10,000 or more worker bees. The combs contain an adequate 
supply of honey and stored pollen. The workers fly from 
the hive whenever the days are warm enough, especially 
after a period of confinement, and with the opening of the 
earliest spring flowers they replenish their stores of honey 
and pollen. Previous to the stimulus of incoming nectar, 
however, the rearing of brood is begun. This usually com¬ 
mences, in colonies wintered out of doors, in the coldest 
period of the winter, in February or even in January in the 
North, and this fact indicates strongly that the beginning 
of brood-rearing is usually not due to a rise in the outside 
temperature or to the procuring of nectar or pollen, as is 
usually assumed. It certainly is not due to any instinctive 
knowledge of the coming of spring. 
The first eggs (Fig. 42) are laid in the center of the winter 
cluster, before it is loosened. They are usually deposited 
in circular areas of cells on adjacent combs and, if the queen 
can pass around the combs without leaving the cluster, such 
circles of eggs will be found opposite each other on the comb. 
As breeding continues, eggs are placed in concentric rings, 
not only on the middle comb but on contiguous combs, so 
that the form of the brood nest becomes approximately 
spherical. The development of the brood (Fig. 35) will be 
discussed in greater detail in a later chapter (p. 93) and it 
will suffice here to state that after approximately three days 
there hatches from the egg a small worm-like larva, pearly- 
white 1 in color. This is fed great quantities of food by the 
1 In the comb the larva appears white but, if one is removed from the 
cell and placed on white paper, a slight yellow or brown color is evident. 
