§ III. THE DRONE.
The drones are the male bees; they possess no sting, are larger and more hairy than the workers, and may be easily distinguished by their heavy motion, thick-set form, and louder humming. They have a strong odour, which becomes very noticeable if several of them are confined in a box. Evans thus describes the drones:—
"But now, when April smiles through many a tear,
And the bright Bull receives the rolling year,
Another tribe, to different fates assigned,
In ampler cells their giant limbs confined,
Burst through the yielding wax, and wheel around
On heavier wing, and hum a deeper sound.
No sharpened sting they boast; yet, buzzing loud,
Before the hive, in threatening circles, crowd
The unwieldy drones. Their short proboscis sips
No luscious nectar from the wild thyme's lips;
From the lime's leaf no amber drops they steal,
Nor bear their grooveless thighs the foodful meal;
On others' toils, in pampered leisure, thrive
The lazy fathers of the industrious hive.
Yet oft, we're told, these seeming idlers share
The pleasing duties of parental care,
With fond attention guard each genial cell,
And watch the embryo, bursting from its shell."
But Dr. Evans had been "told" what was not correct when he sought to dignify drones with the office of "nursing fathers" ("brood bees" as the Germans used to call them), for that task is undertaken by the younger of the working bees. Nor are they even utilised in maintaining warmth, for they are expelled just at a time when warmth is most required. No occupation falls to the lot of the drones in gathering honey, nor have they the means provided them by Nature for assisting in the labours of the hive. They are the progenitors of working bees, and nothing more; so far as is known, that is the only purpose of their short existence.
In a well-populated hive the number of drones is computed at from one to two thousand. "Naturalists," says Huber, "have been extremely embarrassed to account for the number of males in most hives, which seem only a burden to the community, since they appear to fulfil no function. But we now begin to discern the object of Nature in multiplying them to such an extent. As fecundation cannot be accomplished within the hive, and as the queen is obliged to traverse the expanse of the atmosphere, it is requisite that the males should be numerous, that she may have the chance of meeting some one of them in her flight. Were only two or three in each hive there would be little probability of their departure at the same instant with the queen, or that they would meet her in their excursions; and most of the females might thus remain sterile." It is important for the safety of the queen bee that her stay in the air should be as brief as possible, as her large size and slowness of flight render her an easy prey to birds. It is not now thought that the queen always pairs with a drone of the same hive, as Huber seems to have supposed. On the contrary, it would appear that with bees, as with so many other animals, there is a provision against such interbreeding. Mr. John Hunter, in his "Manual of Bee-keeping," speaks of this as amounting to a law, and thus represents the fact as diametrically opposite to Huber's conclusion. But we believe the question to be complicated by another—whether the drones that inhabit a particular hive at any given time are regularly born of the same family with that hive, or whether they are not very often to be viewed as "strangers within the gates." At all events, it appears established that the queen and drones within a hive do watch each other's movements when the former is about taking her nuptial flight, and that the union is sometimes consummated close at hand, though certainly never attempted within the precincts of the hive itself. This last circumstance, which by all accounts is absolutely invariable, would seem to be the extent of the provision, and it is one that in ordinary circumstances would preclude the recurrence of in-and-in breeding. A confirmation of these views is afforded from the interesting experience of Captain von Baldenstein with his one Italian stock maintained by itself for seven years, who found that all this time, with one exception, the young queens produced bastard workers, clearly proving that all but that one were impregnated by the drones of other colonies.
The drone that happens to be the selected husband is by no means so favoured as at first sight might appear, for it is a law of Nature that the bridegroom does not survive the wedding-day. His death, however, is doubtless generally instantaneous, whereas in other case it would probably have been one of torture or starvation. In 1867 the German apiarian Von Klipstein was witness of an instance of the wedding ceremony, when a young queen, who was leading a swarm, became detached from it and settled upon a currant bush, where she was joined by a drone; after a few seconds the two flew away together for three yards and then fell to the ground, when the queen disengaged herself, and the drone was found to be dead. But we learn from the American Bee Journal, of March 1861, that two similar cases were observed in the United States some years earlier than this. The latter of these two agreed with the above in showing the immediate death of the male bee, the rule as to which is also confirmed by a fact noticed by Mr. Langstroth, that if a drone is taken between the fingers and squeezed, as one would squeeze a wasp to cause protrusion of the sting, it will give a crack and shrivel up dead as if struck by lightning. The instance in point was also communicated to the Bee Journal through this gentleman, it having been noticed, on a July afternoon in 1860, by his friend Mr. W. W. Gary, of Coleraine, Massachusetts. The queen was returning from a presumably unsuccessful flight, when a drone met her at about three feet from the hive entrance; a sharp snap was heard almost directly, and the male fell to the ground perfectly dead. The other case was witnessed by the Rev. Mr. Millette, of Whitemarsh, Pennsylvania, and occurred in June 1859, during the process of hiving. A young queen—there were four in the swarm—"was observed on the wing, and in a moment after was seized by a drone. After flying about a rod they both came to the ground in close contact; ... the drone was about departing (having broken loose) ... but after crawling about ... in a very few minutes it expired"—the circumstance being probably quite exceptional in this lapse of minutes, and it is unfortunate that we have no information as to the immediate or subsequent effect upon the queen.
As a general rule the royal lady, not meeting drones straightway upon her issue from the hive, spends a little time in reconnoitring her home, and then, often not till her second day's exit, sails away high into the air, and sometimes to a considerable distance horizontally as well. "A Renfrewshire Bee-keeper" states in the British Bee Journal, of May 1877, that an undoubted instance had come to his knowledge in which a common queen, located five miles distant in a bee-line measured upon the Ordnance map, had become impregnated by one of his own Italian drones—these being positively the only Italians in the entire district.
On the queen's return—that is, supposing her object to have been achieved—she will exhibit the male organ adhering to her extremity, and sometimes she is unable to free herself of it, nor can the bee-keeper give her any assistance without the risk of effects as fatal to herself as they were to her spouse. The explanation of this series of phenomena lies in the structure of the organ itself. It is simply the expanded prolongation of the seminal duct, and is attached to the orifice like the sleeve of a coat to the shoulder, but is wholly internal. To be protruded it must therefore be turned literally inside out, and to effect this a powerful inflation is required, in which act the forces of the system are in some way fatally ruptured; while, as Professor Leuckart very rationally deduces—thus clearing up another mystery—it is only when the breathing vessels are filled by motion in the air that the drone is able to accomplish it at all. Then the singular scales and protuberances with which the organ is beset render it when once inserted very difficult of withdrawal, even if its owner were not already dead. Mr. Langstroth remarks as to the design of this seemingly harsh provision that in default of it the queen would be compelled to remain with the drone much longer in the air, thus incurring far greater danger of falling a prey to some passing bird. After all it is undoubtedly one of those instances as to which it may be said of Nature, in Tennyson's words:—
"So careful of the type she seems,
So careless of the single life."
Her majesty, although thus left a widowed, is by no means a sorrowful bride, for in from two to three days she becomes the happy mother of a large family. Such at least is the normal rule, but should the season be late in the autumn she may not commence laying till the following spring. It cannot be said that she pays no respect to the memory of her departed lord, for she never marries again. Once impregnated—as is the case with most insects-—the queen bee continues productive during the remainder of her existence.
The swarming season being over—that is about the end of July, when the gathering has materially slackened—-a general massacre of the "lazy fathers" shortly follows. Dr. Bevan observes that now their work is completed, "they are regarded as useless consumers of the fruits of others' labour: love is at once converted into hate, and a general proscription takes place." For it was love, the drones having previously been petted and fed with prepared pollen in the same way as the queen herself. Von Berlepsch describes the work of destruction as commencing with the casting forth of the drone brood just issuing from the cells, after which the larvæ and nymphs are similarly treated. Then the drones themselves are chased from the honey stores, and a watch is kept to prevent their access thereto. On finding it hopeless they crouch away together in corners, till, when thoroughly exhausted by hunger, the workers drive them out one by one, and they die with cold and hunger: very few of them are stung. This work goes on night and day, and occasionally they collect to die in such a heap before the flight-hole that there is a danger of their suffocating the hive. Disabled or useless workers are dealt with in an equally summary fashion; but in the case of a super-annuated queen, the best opinions are that she is allowed to take her own quietus.
Supposing the drones come forth in April or May, which is the usual period, then, as their destruction takes place somewhere about the commencement of August, three or four months will be the ordinary extent of their existence; but should it so happen that the development of the queen has been retarded, or that the hive has by chance been deprived of her, the massacre of the drones is deferred. On the other hand, in case of the cutting short of the gathering season by bad weather, it occasionally happens at an earlier date—even so soon as May. Now and then a drone or two escape, and prolong their lives through the winter.