406 ANNUAL REPORT OF THE Off. Doc. 



the bees to fly. In the cellar it is more likely there is something 

 wrong that may be righted. If the ventilation of the cellar is bad, 

 see to that. The temperature may be at fault. If above 45 degrees, 

 if that is the temperature at which you have found the bees most 

 nearly dormant, then cool it down. Less easy it is to warm it if too 

 cold, but that may be done in most cases. If you cannot make a 

 fire in the cellar, take down hot stones or jugs or bottles of hot water 

 tightly coi'l-ed. Raising the temperature when it is too cold will 

 at least prevent the disease from being as bad as it otherwise would 

 be, and it has even been thought that heating the cellar for a few 

 hours to a temperature of 60 degrees or more acts a little in the 

 nature of a cure. It seems natural to suppose that when a warm 

 day comes, say in February, it would be the part of wisdom to take 

 out of the cellar a colony affected with diarrhoea, and then return 

 it after it has had a flight. In actual practice, however, this does 

 not w'ork well. Let the bees stay in the cellar until they can be 

 taken out for good; but if a colony is badly affected it may be well 

 to take it out a little earlier than it would otherwise be taken out. 

 In any case do not take it out unless the day is warm enough for a 

 flight. 



Not so common as diarrhoea, but greatly more to be feared is the 

 dread scourge, foul Irood. So bad, indeed, is it that if you have 

 only two or three colonies, and all have foul brood, you may about 

 as well burn up all and go out of the business, for at least a time. 

 Whole apiaries of fifty or a hundred colonies have been swept away 

 by it as with a besom of destruction. The disease is highly con- 

 tagious, and is caused by the presence of a microbe, hacilhis alvd. 

 If these bacilli or their spores obtain entrance into a hive, the colony 

 is doomed unless vigorous measures are taken. The mature bees are 

 affected little, if at all. As the name foal hrood indicates, it is the 

 larvae that suffer. The disease most commonly makes its way into 

 new territory by means of honey from a diseased colony. A single 

 drop of honey from a foul-brood colony may carry the disease to a 

 whole apiary. A frame of brood from a diseased colony given to 

 a healthy one means another case of the disease. When a colony 

 has the disease and the owner is ignorant as to its nature, the colony 

 dies or becomes so weak as to be overcome by robbers, and the 

 robbing bees carry the diseased honey to their own hives, thus spread- 

 ing the disease in every directioi). So, if a man has only one or 

 two colonies, he may think it is not worth while to fuss with them 

 and may leave them to their own course; but if he has any honor 

 about him he will want to burn them up for the sake of his bee- 

 keeping neighbors. 



The symptoms of foul brood are thus given in Root's ABC of Bee 

 Culture: "Some of the brood fails to hatch. Cappings here and 



