Page:How to Keep Bees.djvu/90

62 were in use, and was the natural outgrowth of the close relations of bees and the home for many centuries.

The bee collects the propolis by cutting it off with her mandibles and packing it in her pollen baskets; and when she arrives at the hive, she never attempts to unload it herself, evidently deeming it safer to let the sister, whose business it is at the moment to stop cracks and crevices, take it from her legs and apply it at once.

There are various uses in the hive for the bee-glue: It is used as a filler to make smooth the rough places of the hive; it holds the combs in place; it calks every crack; it may serve as a sarcophagus for any intruder too large to be pitched out: snails and slugs have been found thus encased; it is applied as a varnish to the cells of the honey-comb if they remain unused for a time; and it is especially useful as a window shade. A nature-study teacher of our acquaintance established an observation hive in her school-room, which had an uncovered pane of glass set in one side so that the pupils might observe the interesting life of the hive. To her dismay the bees straightway hung a curtain of propolis over the window and so shut out intrusive eyes.

One of the chief uses of propolis is to try the temper of the bee-keeper. If there is the least crack between hive and super, or cover, the two are glued together so that nothing but a knife and much muscular force can loosen them. Cover blankets are stuck fast; the frames are welded to their places by it,