264 DR. MILLER S 



(b) On which side of a lake would you prefer to keep — east or 

 west side? 



A. (a) The water is not likely to do any harm, only it is just 

 so much surface without any pasturage, just like so much barren 

 land. If the body of water was so narrow that the bees would 

 cross it to get pasturage on the other side, a few bees might be 

 beaten down in crossing by high winds. 



(b) The side that had the best pasturage. 



Wax (See Beeswax.) 



Wax-Extractor. — Q. How can I make a solar wax-extractor 

 without much expense? Does the solar wax-e.xtractor take out 

 all the wax, especially out of old combs? 



A. Any kind of a shallow bo.x, rfnd of any size, covered with 

 glass, so placed that the rays of the sun shall shine directly into 

 it, will become hot enough on the inside to melt wax. -\ single 

 pane of glass will do if large enough, or a common window-sash 

 may be used. To hold the pieces of comb to be melted, have a 

 plain sheet of tin, slanting 1 to 3 inches (according to the size of 

 the box) from rear to front, so that the melted wax will run 

 down into a vessel that you will place under to catch the wax. 

 You may use a sheet of wire-cloth, so the wax will run through. 

 This will work very nicely with cappings and burr-combs, but a 

 good deal of wax will be left in old brood-combs. Especially will 

 this be so if one brood-comb lies over another. 



Weak Colonies. — Q. \\'ould it be all right to put a new swarm 

 in with a weak colonv and thus make a strong one out of it? 



A. Yes; but in thus uniting, the two queens should both be 

 laying queens, or both virgin queens. If one has a laying queen 

 and the other a virgin, they are likely to fight. 



Q. I have two colonies of bees which I hived last Alay. One 

 of them produced about SO pounds of surplus honey, while the 

 other produced only 5 pounds. What was the matter with the 

 second one? Was it an unprolific queen, or not? 



.\. It may be that there was a difference in the strength of the 

 two swarms at the time they were hived, and it must be remem- 

 bered that a colony twice as strong as another will store a good 

 deal more than twice as much surplus. The difference may have 

 been in the character of the bees. Some bees are more indus- 

 trious than others. There may have been other causes or a com- 

 bination of causes. 



