Effect of the Access of Worker Honeybees to the Queen on the Results of Instrumental Insemination

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Abstract
Altogether 96 queens were inseminated instrumentally with 8 mm3 of semen, and placed in queenless colonies, protected in various ways: in a screened cage without or with workers; in a cage or isolator provided with queen excluder, permitting free access of workers to the queens. The queens were killed 48 h after insemination, the oviducts were examined for presence of semen, and the number of spermatozoa in the spermatheca counted. The least satisfactory result, with the queen in a screened cage without workers, gave 3·002 million spermatozoa in the spermatheca; the best, when the queen was in a queen-excluder isolator, gave 5·256 million spermatozoa. So the second method gave a 75% increase in the number of spermatozoa that migrated into queen's spermatheca, more than can be gained by a second insemination. It is recommended that the inseminated queen should be released on a comb under a queen-excluder isolator, which remains in position until the queen starts to lay eggs.