>
> >This is to summarize my thoughts based on the various recent posts.  If
> you disagree please tell me what I am missing.


Dick, all evidence to date supports your initial proposition.  Just as all
female bees emerge from their eggs as queens, but are only epigenetically
regulated to become workers by how they're fed as larvae, it's likely a
similar process occurs with emerging adult workers to cause them to develop
into nurse bees (as opposed to diutinus bees) under certain in-hive
environmental cues.

The main cue would be the presence of incoming pollen and nectar, (the lack
of which results in an almost immediate restriction of the amount of jelly
fed to the larvae --Crailscheim).  A resultant secondary cue would be the
presence of young larvae (which would be cannibalized if the colony were in
survival mode).

The most parsimonious explanation (and one that is pretty well supported by
experimental evidence), is the the olfactory cues upon emergence are the
trigger.  The main cue appears to be e-beta-ocimene produced by young
larvae, and perhaps that in incoming pollen (it is a major component of
flower volatiles, but I've yet to confirm how much is in pollen).  There
could also be the cue of the existing nurses  being willing to share jelly
with the newly-emerged workers.

A lack of e-beta-ocimene would signal to the emerging worker that the
colony was in survival mode, and not in need of nurses.


-- 
Randy Oliver
Grass Valley, CA
www.ScientificBeekeeping.com

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