Chris Slade wrote

> Robert Brenchley asks if anyone has ever seen laying workers in a
queenright
> colony.  I have this weekend.  A week ago I was puzzled by drone cappings
in
> a colony with a young marked queen.  They seemed happy enough and I had
lots
> to do so I made a note to look again when I had more time, which was
> yesterday.  Marked queen was still there.  I saw eggs but many of them
were
> not fixed to the base of the cells in the usual manner but were either
offset
> or on the wall of the cell.

I wonder if the situation Chris has seen is actually a laying worker.  I
have seen many queens that after a time start to lay eggs in these positions
that we attribute to laying workers.  I actually had a young breeder queen
once that started multiple egg laying and these were deposited on the side
of the cells.

Being curious, I grafted the eggs and these turned out to be queens so they
were certainly fertilsed eggs.

As for drones in amongst the workers, this is the common situation of a
failing queen.  Just because the queen is young doesn't necessarily mean
that she cannot start failing.  She may not have been properly mated and her
sperm reserves are running out.  She may have some deficiency where she
fails to fertilise some eggs as they are laid.

Trevor Weatherhead
AUSTRALIA