432 



THE ANIMALS AND MAN 



Try to observe the making of wax and the building of 

 comb in the hive (fig. 221). The process is as follows: 

 after having fed bountifully on honey and pollen from the 

 food cells a number of bees gather together at the top of the 

 hive and there hang in a mass, usually buzzing the wings 

 violently. After a while small drops of liquid wax ooze 

 out on the under side of the body. There are several pairs 

 of small scale-like folds of the skin, called wax plates, on 

 the under side of the hinder or abdominal body-rings. 

 On these plates the wax spreads out and hardens into tiny 



FIG. 220. Honeybees gathering pollen and nectar. 



thin sheets. After some of it has been made by a bee it 

 leaves its wax-making companions and goes to the place 

 where a new comb is to be builded or is building. Here 

 it nips off its wax by means of its hind legs, which are fur- 

 nished with a scissors-like arrangement, and with its broad, 

 trowel-like jaws moulds it on the forming cells. Examine 

 the "wax-shears" on the hindmost legs of a dead bee and 

 also the trowel-like jaws. Make drawings. Watch care- 

 fully the growth of the new comb. Of what shape are the 

 new cells? Are they all of the same size? Is the bottom 



