The Drone Honey Bee Morphometric Character

Abstract

The Drone caste exhibits specific diagnostic morphometric characteristics that facilitate its differentiation from other colony castes. Drone formation gets completed in about 24-25 days, with the first ten days in an open cell and the final 14 days under capped conditions. Furthermore, the drone caps are convex in shape. The Drone egg is measured about 1.49±0.12 (range 1.12–1.85) mm, the width is 0.35±0.02 (range 0.30–0.40) mm, and the volume is 0.10±0.02 (range 0.06–0.15) cubic mm. After hatching for the first three days, the larval weight is 0.11 mg, the 7th-day-old larva is 120 mg, 11th-day-old larva reaches a weight of 350 mg. An adult has a mean body length of about 1.5 cm. Further, the drone character varies as per ecological conditions, species, genotype, and other environmental conditions.

Keywords: Diploid drones, Haploid drones, Pheromones, Reproductive system.

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