NECESSITY FOR FURTHER OBSERVATION.
Cannot some experiments, practicable to all, be instituted that will throw more light on this subject? The old hypothesis of limiting drone-egg laying to two or three periods, is evidently at fault.
TWO SIDES OF THE QUESTION.
If we suppose that the eggs are all alike, and the subsequent treatment makes either workers, drones, or queens, and look to analogy for support, we shall find much against, as well as for it. For instance, we find in almost every department of animated nature, that the sex of the germ of a future being is decided before being separated from the parent, as the eggs of fowls, &c. Another fact, some queens (averaging one in sixty or eighty) deposit eggs that produce only drones,[8 ] whether in worker or drone-cells, proving that sex is decided in this case beyond controversy. Hence it would appear reasonable, if sex was decided by the ovaries of the queen, in one case, it would be in another.
To allow the bees the power of making three kinds of bees from one kind of eggs, which would be virtually constituting a third sex, an anomaly not often found. The drones being males, and workers imperfect females with generative organs undeveloped, renders the anomaly of the third sex unnecessary. On the other side it might be said in reply: That if food and treatment would create or produce organs of generation in the female, by making an egg destined for a worker into a queen, (a fact which all apiarians admit,) why not food and treatment make the drone? Is the difficulty of developing one kind of sexual organs greater than another?
Respecting the anomaly of the eggs of some queens producing only drones, the question might be asked, Is this more of an anomaly than that of ordinary queens which are said to germinate eggs in distinct series? It is all out of the usual line. Other animals or insects usually produce the sexes promiscuously. As we are ignorant of causes deciding sex in any case, we must acknowledge mystery to belong to both sides of the question here. The stumbling-block of more than two sexes, which seems so necessary to make plain, is no greater here than with some species of ants, that have, as we are told, king, queen, soldier and laborer. Four distinct and differently formed bodies, all belonging to one nest, and descended from one mother. Whether there are four distinct kinds of eggs producing them, or the power is given to the workers to develop such as are wanted, from one kind, we cannot say. If we make two kinds of eggs, it helps the matter but very little. There is still an anomaly. There is but one perfect female in a nest to germinate eggs, and the myriads produced (being over 80,000 in twenty-four hours, according to some historians) shows that the fecundity of our queen-bee is not a parallel case by any means. And yet they are similar, by having their offspring provided for without an effort of their own.
I shall leave this matter for the present, hoping that something conclusive may occur in the course of my experiments, or those of others. At present I am inclined to think that the eggs are all alike, but am not fully satisfied.
I am aware that this matter is of but little value or interest to many, but myself and a few others have "Yankee inquisitiveness" pretty well developed, and would like to know how it was managed.
As for workers proving occasionally fertile, I have but little to say. After years of close observation directed to this point, I have been unable to discover anything to establish this opinion. Neither have I found the black bees described by some authors. It is true that in the middle or latter part of summer a portion will be much darker than others, and perhaps rather smaller, and some of them with their wings somewhat worn, probably the result of continued labor, peculiar food, or some incidental circumstance.
I have a few times found a humble-bee under the hive, that had entered, and not finding his way out readily, was speedily shorn of his beautiful "locks," and consequently his strength—that is, every particle of hair, down, feathers, bristles, or whatever he had been covered with, was completely removed by the bees, who had no regard for his beautiful alternating stripes of yellow and brown; which left him the very picture of darkness.