New observations on the natural history of bees Part 7

The queen this day between twelve and one became extremely agitated. The royal cells had multiplied very much; she could go no where without meeting them, and on approaching she was very roughly treated. Then she fled, but to obtain no better reception. At last, these things agitated the bees; they precipitately rushed through the outlets of the hive, and settled on a tree in the garden. It singularly happened that the queen was herself unable to follow or conduct the swarm. She had attempted to pa.s.s between two royal cells before they were abandoned by the bees guarding them, and she was so confined and maltreated as to be incapable of moving. We then removed her into a separate hive prepared for a particular experiment; the bees, which had cl.u.s.tered on a branch, soon discovered their queen was not present, and returned of their own accord to the hive. Such is an account of the second colony of this hive.

We were extremely solicitous to ascertain what would become of the other royal cells. Four of the close ones had attained complete maturity, and the queens would have left them had not the bees prevented it. They were not open either previous to the agitation of the swarms, or at the moment of swarming.

None of the queens were at liberty on the eleventh. The second should have transformed on the eighth; thus she had been three days confined, a longer period than the first which formed the swarm. We could not discover what occasioned the difference in their captivity.

On the twelfth, the queen was at last liberated, as we found her in the hive. She had been treated exactly as her predecessor; the bees allowed her to rest in quiet, when distant from the royal cells, but tormented her cruelly when she approached them. We watched this queen a long time, but not aware that she would lead out a colony, we left the hive for a few hours. Returning at mid-day, we were greatly surprised to find it almost totally deserted. During our absence, it had thrown a prodigious swarm, which still cl.u.s.tered on the branch of a neighbouring tree. We also saw with astonishment the third cell open, and its top connected to it as by a hinge. In all probability the captive queen, profiting by the confusion that preceded the swarming, escaped. Thus, there was no doubt of both queens being in the swarm. We found it so; and removed them, that the bees might return to the hive, which they did very soon.

While we were occupied in this operation, the fourth captive queen left her prison, and the bees found her on returning. At first they were very much agitated, but calmed towards the evening, and resumed their wonted labours. They formed a strict guard around the royal cells, and took great care to remove the queen whenever she attempted to approach.

Eighteen royal cells now remained to be guarded.

The fifth queen left her cell at ten at night; therefore two queens were now in the hive. They immediately began fighting, but came to disengage themselves from each other. However they fought several times during the night without any thing decisive. Next day, the thirteenth, we witnessed the death of one, which fell by the wounds of her enemy. This duel was quite similar to what is said of the combats of queens.

The victorious queen now presented a very singular spectacle. She approached a royal cell, and took this moment to utter the sound, and a.s.sume that posture, which strikes the bees motionless. For some minutes, we conceived, that taking advantage of the dread exhibited by the workers on guard, she would open it, and destroy the young female; also she prepared to mount the cell; but in doing so she ceased the sound, and quitted that att.i.tude which paralyses the bees. The guardians of the cell instantly took courage; and, by means of tormenting and biting the queen, drove her away.

On the fourteenth, the sixth young queen appeared, and the hive threw a swarm, with all the concomitant disorder before described. The agitation was so considerable, that a sufficient number of bees did not remain to guard the royal cells, and several of the imprisoned queens were thus enabled to make their escape. Three were in the cl.u.s.ter formed by the swarm, and other three remained in the hive. We removed those that had led the colony, to force the bees to return. They entered the hive, resumed their post around the royal cells, and maltreated the queens when approaching.

A duel took place in the night of the fifteenth, in which one queen fell. We found her dead next morning before the hive; but three still remained, as one had been hatched during night. Next morning we saw a duel. Both combatants were extremely agitated, either with the desire of fighting, or the treatment of the bees, when they came near the royal cells. Their agitation quickly communicated to the rest of the bees, and at mid-day they departed impetuously with the two females. This was the fifth swarm that had left the hive between the thirtieth of May and fifteenth of June. On the sixteenth, a sixth swarm cast, which I shall give you no account of, as it shewed nothing new.

Unfortunately we lost this, which was a very strong swarm; the bees flew out of sight, and could never be found. The hive was now very thinly inhabited. Only the few bees that had not partic.i.p.ated in the general agitation remained, and those that returned from the fields after the swarm had departed. The cells were, therefore, slenderly guarded; the queens escaped from them, and engaged in several combats, until the throne remained with the most successful.

Notwithstanding the victories of this queen, she was treated with great indifference from the sixteenth to the nineteenth, that is, the three days that she preserved her virginity. At length, having gone to seek the males, she returned with all the external signs of fecundation, and was henceforth received with every mark of respect; she laid her first eggs forty-six hours after fecundation.

Behold, Sir, a simple and faithful account of my observations on the formation of swarms. That the narrative might be the more connected, I have avoided interrupting it by the detail of several particular experiments which I made at the same time for elucidating various obscure points of their history. These shall be the subject of future letters. For, although I have said so much, I hope still to interest you.

_PREGNY, 6. September 1791._

_P. S._--In revising this letter, I find I have neglected taking notice of an objection that may embarra.s.s my readers, and which ought to be answered.

After the first five swarms had thrown, I had always returned the bees to the hive: it is not surprising, therefore, that it was continually so sufficiently stocked that each colony was numerous. But things are otherwise in the natural state: the bees composing a swarm do not return to the hive; and it will undoubtedly be asked, What resource enables a common hive to swarm three or four times without being too much weakened?

I cannot lessen the difficulty. I have observed that the agitation, which precedes the swarming, is often so considerable, that most of the bees quit the hive, and in that case we cannot well comprehend how, in three or four days afterwards, it can be in a state to send out another colony equally strong.

But remark, in the first place, that the queen leaves a prodigious quant.i.ty of workers' brood, which soon transforms to bees; and in this way the population sometimes becomes almost as great after swarming as before it.

Thus the hive is perfectly capable of affording a second colony without being too much weakened. The third and fourth swarm weaken it more sensibly; but the inhabitants always remain in sufficient numbers to preserve the course of their labours uninterrupted; and the losses are soon repaired by the great fecundity of the queen, as she lays above an hundred eggs a day.

If, in some cases, the agitation of swarming is so great, that all the bees partic.i.p.ate in it, and leave the hive, the desertion lasts but for a moment. The hive throws only during the finest part of the day, and it is then that the bees are ranging through the country. Those that are out, therefore, cannot share in the agitation; when returned to the hive, they quietly resume their labours; and their number is not small, for, when the weather is fine, at least a third of the bees are employed in the fields at once.

Even in the most embarra.s.sing case, namely, where the whole bees desert the hive, it does not follow, that all those endeavouring to depart become members of the new colony. When this agitation or delirium seizes them, the whole rush forward and acc.u.mulate towards the entrance of the hive, and are heated in such a manner that they perspire copiously.

Those near the bottom, and supporting the weight of all the rest, seem drenched in perspiration; their wings grow moist; they are incapable of flight; and even when able to escape, they advance no farther than the board of the hive, and soon return.

Those that have lately left their cells remain behind the swarm, still feeble, they could not support themselves in flight. Here then are also many recruits to people what we should have thought a deserted habitation.

LETTER X.

_THE SAME SUBJECT CONTINUED._

To preserve greater regularity in continuing the history of swarms, I think it proper to recapitulate in a few words the princ.i.p.al points of the preceding letter, and to expatiate on each, concerning the result of new experiments, respecting which I have still been silent.

In the first place. _If at the return of spring, we examine a hive well peopled, and governed by a fertile queen, we shall see her lay a prodigious number of male eggs in the course of May, and the workers will chuse that moment for constructing several royal cells of the kind described by M. de Reaumur._ Such is the result of several long continued observations, among which there has not been the slightest variation, and I cannot hesitate in announcing it as demonstrated.

However, I should here add the necessary explanation. It is necessary that the queen, before commencing her _great_ laying of the eggs of males, be eleven months old; when young she lays only those of workers.

A queen, hatched in spring, will perhaps lay fifty or sixty eggs of drones in whole, but before beginning her great laying of them, which should be two thousand in a month, she must have completed her eleventh month in age. In the course of our experiments, which more or less disturbed the natural state of things, it often happened that the queen did not attain this age until October, and immediately began laying male eggs. The workers, as if induced by some emanation from the eggs, also adopted this time for building the royal cells. No swarm resulted thence, it is true, because in autumn all the necessary circ.u.mstances are absolutely wanting, but it is not less evident, that there is a secret relation between the production of the eggs of males, and the construction of royal cells.

This laying commonly continues thirty days. The bees on the twentieth or twenty-first lay the foundation of several royal cells. Sometimes they build sixteen or twenty; we have even had twenty-seven. When the cells are three or four lines high, the queen lays those eggs from which her own species will come, but not the whole in one day. That the hive may throw several swarms, it is essential that the young females conducting them be not all produced at the same time. One may affirm, that the queen antic.i.p.ates the fact, for she takes care to allow at least the interval of a day between every egg deposited in the cells. It is proved by the bees knowing to close the cells the moment the worms are ready to metamorphose to nymphs. Now, as they close all the royal cells at different periods, it is evident the included worms are not all of an equal age.

The queen's belly is very turgid before she begins laying the eggs of drones; but it sensibly decreases as she advances, and when terminated is very small. Thus she finds herself in a condition to undertake a journey which circ.u.mstances may prolong; thus this condition was necessary; and as every thing is harmonious in the laws of nature, the origin of the males corresponds with that of the females, which they are to fecundate.

Secondly. _When the larvae hatched from the eggs laid by the queen, in the royal cells, are ready to transform to nymphs, this queen leaves the swarm conducting a swarm along with her; and the first swarm that proceeds from the hive is uniformly conducted by the old queen._{M} I think I can divine the reason of it.

That there may never be a plurality of females in a hive, nature has inspired queens with a natural horror against each other; they never meet without endeavouring to fight, and to accomplish their mutual destruction. Thus, the chance of combat is equal between them, and fortune will decide to which the empire shall pertain. But if one combatant is older than the rest, she is stronger, and the advantage will be with her. She will destroy her rivals successively as produced.

Thus, if the old queen did not leave the hive, when the young ones undergo their last metamorphosis, it could produce no more swarms, and the species would perish. Therefore, to preserve the species, it is necessary that the old queen conduct the first swarm. But what is the secret means employed by nature to induce her departure? I am ignorant of it.

In this country it is very rare, though not without example, for the swarm, led forth by the old queen, in three weeks to produce a new colony, which is also conducted by the same old queen; and that may happen thus. Nature has not willed that the queen shall quit the first hive before her production of male eggs is finished. It is necessary for her to be freed of them, that she may become lighter. Besides, if her first occupation, on entering a new dwelling, was laying more male eggs, still she might perish either from age or accident before depositing those of workers. The bees in that case would have no means of replacing her, and the colony would go to ruin.

All these things have been with infinite wisdom foreseen. The first operation of the bees of a swarm is to construct the cells of workers.

They labour at them with great ardour, and as the ovaries of the queen have been disposed with admirable foresight, the first eggs she has to lay in her new abode are those of workers. Commonly her laying continues ten or eleven days; and at this time portions of comb containing large cells are fabricated. It may be affirmed, that the bees know their queen will also lay the eggs of drones; she actually does begin to deposit some, though in much smaller number than at first; enough however to encourage the bees to construct royal cells. Now, if in these circ.u.mstances the weather is favourable, it is not impossible that a second colony may be formed, and that the queen may depart at the head of it within three weeks of conducting the first swarm. But I repeat, the fact is rare in our climate. Let me now return to the hives from which the queen has led the first colony.

Thirdly. _After the old queen has conducted the first swarm from the hive, the remaining bees take particular care of the royal cells, and prevent the young queens successively hatched from leaving them, unless at an interval of several days between each._

In the preceding letter, I have given you the detail and proof of this fact, and I shall here add some reflexions. During the period of swarming, the conduct or instinct of bees seems to receive a particular modification. At all other times, when they have lost their queen, they appropriate workers worms to replace her; they prolong and enlarge the cells of these worms; they supply them with aliment more abundantly, and of a more pungent taste; and by this alteration, the worms that would have changed to common bees are transformed to queens. We have seen twenty-seven cells of this kind constructed at once; but when finished the bees no longer endeavour to preserve the young females from the attacks of their enemies. One may perhaps leave her cell, and attack all the other royal cells successively, which she will tear open to destroy her rivals, without the workers taking any part in their defence. Should several queens be hatched at once, they will pursue each other, and fight until the throne remain with her that is victorious. Far from opposing such duels, the other bees rather seem to excite the combatants.

Things are quite reversed during the period of swarming. The royal cells then constructed are of a different figure from the former. They resemble stalact.i.tes, and in the beginning are like the cup of an acorn.

The bees a.s.siduously guard the cells when the young queens are ready for their last metamorphosis. At length the female hatched from the first egg laid by the old queen leaves her cell; the workers at first treat her with indifference. But she, immediately yielding to the instinct which urges her to destroy her rivals, seeks the cells where they are enclosed; yet no sooner does she approach than the bees bite, pull, and drive her away, so that she is forced to remove; but the royal cells being numerous, scarce can she find a place of rest. Incessantly hara.s.sed with the desire of attacking the other queens, and incessantly repelled, she becomes agitated, and hastily traverses the different groupes of workers, to which she communicates her agitation. At this moment numbers of bees rush towards the aperture of the hive, and, with the young queen at their head, depart to seek another habitation.

After the departure of the colony, the remaining workers set another queen at liberty, and treat her with equal indifference as the first.

They drive her from the royal cells; being perpetually harra.s.sed, she becomes agitated; departs, and carries a new swarm along with her. In a populous hive this scene is repeated three or four times during spring.

As the number of bees is so much reduced, that they are no longer capable of preserving a strict watch over the royal cells, several females then leave their confinement at once; they seek each other, fight, and the queen at last victorious reigns peaceably over the republic.

The longest intervals we have observed between the departure of each natural swarm have been from seven to nine days. This is the time that usually elapses after the first colony is led out by the old queen, until the next swarm is conducted by the first young queen set at liberty. The interval between the second and third is still shorter; and the fourth sometimes departs the day after the third. In hives left to themselves, fifteen or eighteen days are usually sufficient for the throwing of the four swarms, if the weather continues favourable, as I shall explain.

A swarm is never seen except in a fine day, or, to speak more correctly, at a time of the day when the sun s.h.i.+nes, and the air is calm. Sometimes we have observed all the precursors of swarming, disorder and agitation, but a cloud pa.s.sed before the sun, and tranquillity was restored; the bees thought no more of swarming. An hour afterwards, the sun having again appeared, the tumult was renewed; it rapidly augmented; and the swarm departed.

Bees generally seem much alarmed at the prospect of bad weather. While ranging in the fields the pa.s.sage of a cloud before the hive induces them precipitately to return. I am induced to think they are disquieted by the sudden diminution of light. For if the sky is uniformly obscured, and there is no alteration in clearness or in the clouds dispelling, they proceed to the fields for their ordinary collections, and the first drops of a soft rain does not make them return with much precipitation.

I am persuaded that the necessity of a fine day for swarming is one reason that has induced nature to admit of bees protracting the captivity of their young queens in the royal cells. I will not deny that they sometimes seem to use this right in an arbitrary manner. However the confinement of the queens is always longer when bad weather lasts several days together. Here the final object cannot be mistaken. If the young females were at liberty to leave their cradles during these bad days, there would be a plurality of queens in the hive, consequently combats; and victims would fall. Bad weather might continue so long, that all the queens might at once have undergone their last metamorphosis, or attained their liberty. One victorious over the whole would enjoy the throne, and the hive, which should naturally produce several swarms, could give only one. Thus the multiplication of the species would have been left to the chance of rain, or fine weather, instead of which it is rendered independent of either, by the wise dispositions of nature. By allowing only a single female to escape at once, the formation of swarms is secured. This explanation appears so simple, that it is superfluous to insist farther on it.

But I should mention another important circ.u.mstance resulting from the captivity of queens; which is, that they are in a condition to fly, when the bees have given them liberty, and by this means are capable of profiting by the first moment of suns.h.i.+ne to depart at the head of a colony.

You well know, Sir, that all drones and workers are not in a condition to fly for a day or two after leaving their cells. Then they are of a whitish colour, weak, and their organs infirm. At least, twenty-four or thirty hours must elapse before the acquisition of perfect strength, and the development of all their faculties. It would be the same with the females was not their confinement protracted after the period of transformation; but we see them appear, strong, full grown, brown, and in a better condition for flying than at any other period. I have elsewhere observed, that constraint is used to retain the queens in captivity. The bees solder the covering to the sides of the cell by a cordon of wax. As I have also explained how they are fed, it need not be repeated here.

It is likewise a very remarkable fact, that queens are set at liberty earlier or later according to their age. Immediately when the royal cells were sealed, we marked them all with numbers, and we chose this period because it indicated the age of the queens exactly. The oldest was first liberated, then the one immediately younger, and so on with the rest. None of the younger queens were set at liberty before the older ones.

I have a thousand times asked myself how the bees could so accurately distinguish the age of their captives. Undoubtedly I should do better to answer this question by a simple avowal of my ignorance. At the same time, I must be permitted to state a conjecture. You will admit, that I have not, as some authors, abused the right of giving myself up to hypothesis; may not the humming or sound emitted by the young queens in their cells, be one of the methods employed by nature to instruct the bees in the age of their queens? It is certain that the female, whose cell is first sealed, is also the first to emit this sound. That in the next emits it sooner than the rest, and so on with those immediately subsequent. As their captivity may continue six days, it is possible that the bees in this s.p.a.ce of time may forget which has emitted it first; but it is also possible, that the queens diversify the sounds, encreasing the loudness as they become older, and that the bees can distinguish these variations. We have even ourselves been able to distinguish differences in the sound, either with relation to the succession of notes, or their intensity; and probably there are gradations still more imperceptible that escape our organs, but may be sensible to those of the workers.

What gives weight to this conjecture is, that the queens brought up by M. Schirach's method, are perfectly mute; neither do the workers form any guard around their cells, nor do they retain them in captivity a moment beyond the period of transformation, and, when they have undergone it, they are allowed to combat until one has become victorious over all the rest. Why? Because the object is only to replace the last queen. Now, provided that among the worms reared as queens, only one succeeds, the fate of the others is uninteresting to the bees, whereas, during the period of swarming, it is necessary to preserve a succession of queens, for conducting the different colonies; and to ensure the safety of the queens, it is necessary to avert the consequences of the mutual horror by which they are animated against each other. Behold the evident cause of all the precautions that bees, instructed by nature, take during the period of swarming; behold an explanation of the captivity of females; and that the duration of their captivity might be ascertained by the age of the young queens, it was requisite for them to have some method of communicating to the workers when they should be liberated. This method consists in the sound emitted, and the variation they are able to give it.