24 MANUAL OF APICULTURE. 
white sage, mesquite, sourwood, aster, tulip tree, mangrove, orange, and 
other kinds of honey may be harvested separately, and each be readily 
recognizable by its color, flavor, consistency, and aroma. When, how- 
ever, no great honey yielder is present in large quantity and the source is 
miscellaneous, all manner of combinations of qualities may exist, intro- 
ducing great and often agreeable variety. Thus the medicinal qualities 
and the food value of different kinds of honey differ as greatly as do 
their prices on the market. 
PROPOLIS. 
This substance, commonly known as "bee glue," is obtained by the 
bees from the buds and crevices of trees, and is carried to the hives in 
the corbicula or basket-like cavities on the outside of the tibial joints 
of the workers 1 hind legs, the same as they carry pollen. The workers 
with their mandibles scrape together and bite off the particles of pro- 
polis, and with the front and middle legs pass them back to the baskets, 
where the middle legs and feet are used to tamp them down. The 
pellets can be readily distinguished from those of pollen, the latter 
being dull and granular in appearance, while the freshly gathered 
propolis is compact and shiny. This resinous material, which becomes 
hard soon after it is gathered, is at first quite sticky, and the bee bring- 
ing it requires aid in unloading. Another worker takes hold of the 
mass with its jaws, and by united exertion they get it out of the pocket, 
though often by piecemeal and in long threads. It is not stored in cells, 
but is used at once to stop up crevices in the hives and to varnish the 
whole interior surface, as well as to glue movable portions fast, also in 
strengthening the combs at their attachments, and if the latter are 
designed exclusively for honey, and especially if not filled at once, the 
edges of their completed cells receive a thin coating of propolis, which 
adds considerably to their strength. The bees often make the flight 
hole smaller by filling a part of it with masses of propolis, sometimes 
mixed with old wax. Carniolans gather the least and Tunisians the 
most propolis of any of the different races. On this account the former 
are better suited than the latter to the production of fancy white 
comb honey. 
BEE POISON AND THE STING. 
The worker and the queen are supplied with another organ which is 
of great importance to them, namely, the sting; for without this the 
hard-earned stores of the hive would soon be a prey to all manner of 
marauders, and the queen would be deprived of an organ of occasional 
use to her in dispatching rivals, and of daily use to her during the 
working season in the deposition of eggs. The darts work independ- 
ently and alternately, and are connected at the base with the poison 
sac, without whose powerful contents such a tiny weapon would be 
wholly ineffective. Poison glands pour an acid secretion — largely 
formic acid — into this sac, whence it is conveyed to the tip of the sting 
