This study, just out yesterday, challenges a few long-held beliefs about queen development. Foremost is the role of certain nutritional components in Royal Jelly that are believed to determine the queen caste. Secondarily, their results indicate that abundant feeding of 5th instar larvae destined to be workes will result in the development of queen traits. 

The study modifies the protein and carb content of a test jelly and feeds it out in various amounts, which in effect, controls the quantity and nutritional value of the food. They determined that nutrition has less of an influence on caste development than quantity does. 

> A biological active substance in royal jelly has been thought to determine caste in honeybees since the late 1890s ...... Many studies have evaluated caste determination both in vivo and in vitro ........., and while these studies offer important insights, the influence of diet quantity has not been explicitly tested. Our results indicate diet quantity is a significant factor in caste determination. Nutritional stress is a simple and elegant mechanism for controlling reproductive potential. 

> Large amounts of diet in the final instar were capable of inducing queen traits, contrary to the received wisdom that queen determination can only occur in the third instar. These results indicate that total diet quantity fed to larvae may regulate the difference between queen and worker castes in honeybees.


>Diet quantity influences caste determination in honeybees (Apis mellifera)
Garett P. Slater, George D. Yocum and Julia H. Bowsher
Published: 27 May 2020https://doi.org/10.1098/rspb.2020.0614

https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/rspb.2020.0614

Bill Hesbach
Cheshire CT

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