96 
BEE BEHAVIOR 
as soon as let alone, will quietly resume 
their duties. 
Virgin queens are almost always nervous 
or timid; and if put into a strange colony, 
large or small, very often, or perhaps it 
would be more accurate to say generally, 
run out and fly away, by no means always 
returning. 
Before mating,- a queen hunts up her own 
food from the combs; but after she begins 
to lay she turns to the workers for virtually 
all her food. Once in a great while she will 
dip her tongue into a cell of honey, but not 
often. As she passes about her duties, she 
from time to time crosses antennae with 
workers. Finally one is found with a sup¬ 
ply of food; the worker’s mouth opens and 
the queen inserts her tongue and begins to 
eat. The worker’s tongue is kept folded 
behind the head. It is quite common to see 
several other workers extend their tongues 
and try to get a taste of the food, and 
sometimes one will succeed in putting her 
tongue in with the queen’s. It is not at 
all unusual to see two workers getting food 
thus from another worker, and the drones 
obtain their food in the same way. 
Egg production is influenced.by several 
factors. Queens differ in fecundity, and 
egg development is dependent on food. 
The food supply comes chiefly from the 
younger bees; and, if they are not numer¬ 
ous, the queen cannot 'produce eggs in 
abundance. If honey and pollen are scarce 
or temperature is low, food is not pre¬ 
pared freely. 
If the queen is young and vigorous and 
the colony small, she may deposit several 
eggs in each cell. If comb surface is insuf¬ 
ficient and bees abundant, she will use cells 
of any shape, deep, shallow, or crooked, 
and will put in each one an egg which will 
produce a worker. If no drone cells are 
available, a normal queen may at times 
put into worker cells eggs which will pro¬ 
duce drones. 
So many are the vagaries of a queen that 
only by observation and experience can 
most of them be learned, and the seasoned 
veteran not infrequently runs across some 
new peculiarity. 
A normal laying queen proceeds over the 
comb depositing drone eggs in drone cells 
and worker eggs in worker cells, apparent¬ 
ly being able to lay either drone or worker 
eggs at will. After an egg is put in a cell 
a worker is pretty sure to pop in and in¬ 
spect it, and it has been supposed that pos¬ 
sibly they did something to it. Inspection 
of thousands of bees occupied in examin¬ 
ing eggs has failed to find a single one that 
touches an egg in any way. Bees often 
take their nap in cells containing eggs or 
larvee. 
During a heavy flow of nectar, the bees 
often deposit it in cells containing eggs, 
sometimes filling the cells half full. Such 
nectar is removed within a few hours, and 
the eggs hatch as usual. 
DRONES. 
Drones have many interesting habits, and 
are well worth closer study than they have 
yet received. They are much slower to ma¬ 
nure after emergence from cells than the 
workers. They are very fond of warmth, 
and may often in cool weather be found 
massed shoulder to shoulder in outlying 
sealed brood. 
It seems to take a lot of preparation on 
the drone’s part before he can take wing. 
Drones pay no attention to a virgin queen 
among them in the hive, no matter what 
her age. 
SWARMING. 
Swarming apparently starts with a bee 
here and there. Such a bee suddenly begins 
to run a few steps one way, then a few 
another, then spins around and finally ap¬ 
pears to work itself into a veritable frenzy. 
Other bees take it up and soon a rush is 
made, and is quite as apt to be from as 
toward the entrance. As soon, however, as 
part of the flood begins to emerge from 
the entrance the tide turns that way and 
the majority of the bees begin pouring 
from the hive by thousands until the air 
is filled with a great cloud of humming 
bees. Usually they cluster on the branch 
of a tree not far from their hive, waiting 
to make certain that the queen is with 
them before leaving for their new home, 
which generally has been chosen by the 
scouts sent out several days before the 
swarm issues. See Swarming. ■ 
For the behavior of bees during winter, 
see Temperature, sub-head “Temperature 
of the Cluster in Winter.” 
