Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
Foragers collect water where they find it, when they need it. Ponds like this one are
ideal because they have an odor and are easy for other foragers to find.
Try the following techniques:
• Set an outside faucet to drip on a slanted board all the time during flying sea-
son.
• Install a water garden, or a bird bath, that automatically fills when water falls
below a preset level.
• Invest in an automatic pet-watering device that refills itself when the container
falls below a certain level. Check occasionally to make sure animals haven't
overturned or upset it, but this should be a nearly flawless way to provide wa-
ter, without constant inspection, all season long. Be certain to shut it off when
it gets cold, if it gets cold where you are.
• Put in your own swimming pool (admittedly, a significant investment).
Drones
Drones are the males in a honey bee colony. As such, they are different from workers
and the queen in their physical makeup, their activities, and their contributions to the
colony.
A normal colony will produce and support a small number of drones during the
growing season. In a full-sized colony at mid-season, as many as 1,000 drones, in all
the stages of development, may be present. Drones produce their own pheromones that
are recognized as part of the general aroma of the colony.
Drone honey bees emerge from an unfertilized egg laid by the queen, which means
that the genes carried by the drones come from only the queen. The cells in which
drones are raised are a bit larger than worker cells and, like worker cells, are part of the
comb on a frame rather than hanging below it or butting between combs, where queen
cells are constructed.
Drone cells are almost always located along the edge of the broodnest area, often
in the corners of a frame. This placement helps drone development; drone larvae and
pupa do best in temperatures just a degree or two cooler than the 95°F (35°C) in the
very center of the worker brood area. Drones take twenty-four days to develop from an
egg to an emerged adult. They spend six-and-a-half days as a larva, fed a diet that is
a bit more nutritious than a worker's diet but not nearly as rich as a queen's. Workers,
