THE PRODUCTION OF DRONE COMB AND DRONE BROOD IN HONEY-BEE COLONIES

From May 2 to September 13, 1994 in six overwintered honey bee (Apis m ellifera) colonies, the third comb was replaced with an empty frame in each of the second brood chambers and then one week later the eighth comb was also replaced. This procedure was repeated six times per colo ny, at 21-day intervals throughout the span of the experiment. On the empty frames the colonies rapidly built out mainly drone combs and rea red mainly drone brood, The average number of drone pupae produced per colony was 17,137 and the mean weight of wax was 1,108.7g. These find ings indicate that with selected colonies, it is possible to produce l arge numbers of drones.