The apiary; or, bees, bee-hives, and bee culture [1878]: being a familiar account of the habits of bees, and the most improved methods of managementNeighbor, Alfred
Science
The apiary; or, bees, bee-hives, and bee culture [1878]: being a familiar account of the habits of bees, and the most improved methods of management
Dzierzon thus writes: "In general, so long as the young queen
continues her wedding flights--which in the warm summer she does at
the very most for four weeks, but in the cool spring or autumn, when
life and development are slower in the hive, she still pursues for
even five or six weeks--she is capable of becoming properly fertile."
But some queens continue to fly long after it is hopeless, cases
being recorded in which they have gone on for ten or twelve weeks.
The same observer speaks of having had several young queens which
were either lame in their wings or born in a continued cold season,
so that they were prevented from leaving the hive, and thus developed
into confirmed drone-breeders. The queen leaves the hive _every_ fine
day till her purpose is accomplished, and this led Bevan and others
to surmise that she met successively with several drones till one
Of them lost his life in consequence; but we do not find in later
authorities any confirmation nor even mention of this conjecture, and
it may be set down as entirely improbable. In the case observed by
Von Klipstein, and referred to above (page 22), as the queen met with
her death shortly after, he sent her to Leuckart, who found that from
this obviously first impregnation her organs were so completely filled
as to imply no need for a second. Leuckart has elsewhere stated that
a queen's spermatheca is capable of containing twenty-five millions
of spermatozoa, so that there need be no wonder at the fact of a
single fecundation being sufficient to answer for her entire term of
existence.
The fertile workers, which by their course of adding to the drone stock
may prove a terrible nuisance in a hive, were ascertained by Huber to
be always hatched in close proximity to the queen cells, whence he
conjectured that they obtained by accident a portion of the royal jelly
designed for the rearing of princesses. Von Berlepsch and Langstroth
prefer the theory that such jelly was purposely given them, and the
conversion of their own cells into royal ones commenced, but that the
intention was afterwards abandoned, as it is known that bees often,
start more of such cells than they ultimately proceed with. They are of
only exceptional occurrence in hives in a normal condition, but in a
queenless stock they very often appear, sometimes even in considerable
numbers, having been probably fostered with the jelly, but at too late
a period to convert them into queens. They usually deposit their eggs
correctly in drone cells, though drone-breeding queens lay in those of
workers and even in royal cells--thus evincing a presence of the will
though an absence of the power. To get rid of a fertile worker it has
been recommended by Mr. Rorl to "drive" the bees (Chap. V. § iv.) to an
empty hive, and place this in a near spot; all will return to their old
home except the one to be got rid of, she having probably never flown
before, and therefore not knowing her way.
§ X. RELATION OF SEX TO CELLS.
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