NOTES OF THE BEEKEEPER

Shannon News, 10 May 1927, Page 1

NOTES OF THE BEEKEEPER

LIFE HISTORY OF THE BEE,

A knowledge of the life history of bees will assist anyone of better understand what conditions are necessary to the highest welfare of the colony and the maximum of profit to. the beekeeper. The bee, like other insects, goes through four stages of development, viz.: (1) egg, (2) larva, (3) chrysalis, and (4) imago, or perfect insect.

The ovaries of the queen contain up to 500,000 eggs, which she deposits in the cells of the comb during the breeding season—after the cells have been prepared for her by the worker bees. The life of a queen bee is about three years. Under the most favourable conditions she will deposit up to 3000 eggs in 24 hours. The eggs in the ovaries of the: queen are all alike as to sex.

The act of fertilisation takes place in the oviduct when the egg is on its way out, i.e., if it is to produce a female —a queen or a worker bee —the egg producing a drone is not fertilised. Thus, even a qitfeen which has never met a drone will, after a delay of two or three weeks, deposit eggs. None of these, however can produce anything but drones. This reproduction without fertilisation was first discovered by Dr. Dzierszon in 1353. It is known as parthenogensis or vir-gin-development, and has a very important bearing on practical bee culture.

The drones of a pure-bred queen of any variety are always pure to that variety, even though the queen herself was mated to a drone of a different variety. Thus by having one single queen, and raising from her eggs a new queen for each colony, the race or. strain of bees of an entire apiary of hundreds of colonies may be changed in one season. As each young queen-is pure-bred, her drone progeny are also pure, irrespective Of how she is mated. The following season -there -will therefore b e none but pure' drones in the apiary. . ' . 'Xi^-i : :-

All young queens will then be mated to pure drones; and, if from a pure-bred mother: will produce queens, workers and drones of pure race. The mating takes place in the air, often . a considerable distance away from the apiary, and some of the queens will most likely be mismated when other bees exist within two miles of the place.

Fertilised eggs are deposited by the queen in the smaller or worker cells of the comb; the cells are l-sth in diameter —25 to a square inch of the comb surface Unfertile eggs arflaid in drone cells, which are Jin. wide —15 to the square inch. By the use of full sheets''of comb foundation in the frames of the modern hive, the raising of drones is reduced to a minimum, because the wax sheets are embossed with the pattern of worker comb only.

Any ctss which is fertilised, and would in the ordinary course produce a worker can, at the will of the nurse bees, be made to produce tf s queen when necessary. This fact is made use of in what is known a? artificial queen-rearing', by depriving a suitable colony of its queen and brood, and substituting a comb containing egg 8 or young larvae from a queen of l,h e »»ce or strain desired. After the egg which produces a worker is laid, it remains unaltered for three days. It is then supplied with a minute quantity of larval food by the nurse bees, and a scar.ceiy visible grub or larvae, which lies coiled at the bottom of the cell; emerges.

It grows rapidly, and on the sixth day after emerging from the egg it nssumes an upright position in the cell. Th e young bee has now entered the third or chrysalis stage, from which it emerges as the perfect insect, 18 day 3 from the time the larva first appeared, or 21 days since the egg was laid. In the case of the queen, the time 'of development is five days less, i.e., three days in the egg stage, six days in the larva state, and seven days as chrysalis, or 16 days in all from the tim e the egg was laid till the young queen emerges from the sealed cell.

The drone is in the ess for three days, larva Pevcn days, and chrysalis 14- days, or a total of 24 to 25 days from the egg to the perfect insect.