October 17,1865. ] 



JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 



3.^1 



FOTIL BROOD. 



AftkI! wliat has been written on foul brood, it will bo deemed 

 quite unnecessary by those who have never exi)eriuuced the 

 evil, to return to the subject ; but I am convinced that its 

 existence in our aiiiarics, either in a mild or virulent form, has 

 much more to do with unsuccessful bee-keeping than most 

 apiarians are aware of. It is beyond doubt tin; greatest enemy 

 witli which bee-keepers have to contend, and from the difli- 

 culty of wlinlly eradicating it, or preventing its spreading from 

 affected to healthy hives, the utmost vigilance ought to be main- 

 tained in case of a visitation. The present time, when egg- 

 laying on the part of the queen has altogetlior ceased, is very 

 suitable for making a thorough insj)ection of the state of our 

 hives, and if in any of the brood-combs we find cells still 

 sealed with tlarl; brown covers, or a hanlened crust black as 

 ink lying along the bottom of any that are o]ien, we might be 

 quite certain that the lUsease is present; In some of the un- 

 opened cells there will also, probably, be foimd a dark, slimy, 

 tough, putrid mass. 



This year I am in a position to affirm, without the slightest 

 doubt or hesitation, that neither "chilled brood" nor dysen- 

 tery anunigst the adult population, is the cause of the disease 

 called foul brood, as develojiLd in my ajjiary. I have now 

 watched its progress during two summers, and I believe that 

 the deaths •:vhieh take place in the larva state, irrespective of 

 the far greater evils arising from death in the chrysalis state, are 

 quite sufficient to reduce any hive to an unprosperous condition. 



In the beginning of August, 1804, I introduced a large swarm 

 to a Huljor-hive which had undergone the purifying process 

 rccommeudcd by Mr. Woodbui-y for foid brood, and placed it 

 within reach of heather, where it made such progress, as at 

 the end of a fortnight to have combs brought nearly half down. 

 Subsequently I fed it with sugar, and breeding went on ex- 

 tensively till the close of the season, not a single foul cell being 

 visible. The winter proved severe, but it did not sensibly 

 affect the population, .ind with the return of spring they 

 vigorously resumed their labours. 



The IHli of April was somewhat cold, and on that day I was 

 surprised to see them more than ordinarily busy, when most 

 of my other hives were idle. The mystery was soon explained ; 

 for on inquiry I learned that a neighbour at a little distance, 

 whose bees were never prosperous and which had been defimct 

 for a year or two, had throwm into his garden some old comb 

 containing honey from a hive that had long ago perished. Coulil 

 this be the source whence the disease with which my hive had 

 been affected in 1863 was derived ? If so, I concluded, I shaU 

 not have seen the last of it, my bees having found out and 

 partaken so liberally of the spoil. 



I had not long to wait, for with the arrival of .June, fine 

 weather also arrived, and the half combs of the Huber-hive 

 were completed and filled with brood. Larva; disappeared, 

 several cells presented a most suspicious appearance, but not- 

 withstanding these drawbacks great numbers of young bees 

 reached maturity, and on the 1st of July the queen led oft a 

 swarm ; but from that moment the hive might be said to 

 dwindle, foul cells increased, and the queen had only one suc- 

 cessor, all the other embryo queens having succumbed at an 

 early stage. Besides, there were not sufficient bees for a second 

 swarm. How different the result from that of another hive 

 which was more backward in spring than the one in question, 

 but being in a healthy condition was able to swarm earlier, 

 and throw off three swarms without being too much tlimiuished 

 in numbers. 



I next wished to see the effect of numbers in a foul-breeding 

 hive, and for this purpose joined three swarms together and 

 put all into the diseased hive, filling it to overflowing. No 

 attempt was made to clear out the foul cells. The coverings 

 were merely perforated when the enclosed matter became 

 viscous, and apparently the contents of every foul cell are left 

 undisturbed to become a dark encrustation, and so hard as to 

 retm-n an audible sound when scratched with the point of a 

 knife. From the bees in the hive having diminished to less 

 than half the numbers added, and that, too, at a time when 

 the queen was proUfic, I .strongly suspect that foul brood 

 exercises a deleterious influence on the adult population. 



B-aving cut out the brood-combs containing foul cells, and 

 subjecVd the stored honey to the fumes of sulphur for twenty 

 minutes, I shall be glad to have Mr. Woodbury's opinion 

 whether it U probable that the disease will re-appear when 

 the breeding season returns.— R. S. 



[We all owe a debt of gratitude to " E. S.," for his persever- 



ing investigations into the cause and effects of, as well as tha 

 possible remedies for, foul brood. In my own case I must 

 honestly confess, that as soon as I had idontitied the malady 

 all my efforts were at ouco directed to banishing it from my 

 ajii.iry as speedily and as entirely as possible, and .so well have 

 I succeeded in this endeavour, that " my last glimpse of foul 

 brood,"' which occurred fully twelve montlis ago, appears also 

 to have been a final one, for I have, I am happy to say, seen 

 nothing whatever of it since. Far different has been the course 

 of " R. S.," who (and all honour to him for it), during the 

 past two years has been observing and experimenting upon 

 what he most justly terms " the greatest enemy with which 

 bee-keepers have to contend," having even gone the length of 

 purposely inoculating previously healthy colonies by feeding 

 them with honey taken from foul-breeding stocks. Tluxt he 

 may ultimately succeed in obtaining a satisfactor3' insight into 

 the causes of, and the best remedies for, this my.'^terious 

 malady must Ije the earnest wish of every apiarian, and I for 

 one shall have great pleasure in affording him my best advice 

 and assistance. 



Judging, then, from my own experience of the virulent 

 character of the disease, I should say that there were little or 

 no chance of its being eradicated by partial excision eveu when 

 combined with sulphurous fumigation ; but in advancing this 

 opinion I must be understood to do so with extreme diffidence, 

 since in some cases foul brood, even when fully developed, ap- 

 pears to have become modified and even subdued altogether 

 without any apparently sufficient cause, as the following in- 

 stances wiU show. 



It may be remembered that in " our Journal " of the 17th of 

 November, 1863, 1 published a lamentable appeal from a German 

 bee-keeper for advice and assistance in the cure of foul brood, 

 which was then devastating all the apiaries in the neighbour- 

 hood of Guben, in Prussian Saxony. The following letter, dated 

 February last, describes the remedies adopted, and an apparent 

 cessation of the disease : — 



"In 1863, I asked bee-keepers far and near, whether there 

 was not a means of curing foul-breeding stocks. In conse- 

 quence of this request, I recived several replies with various 

 excellent propositions, for which I now return my best thanks, 

 wishing that tliose gentlemen who sent these replies, and all 

 bee-keepers, may be protected from the worst of all evils in 

 bee-keeping — foul brood. Of the remedies prescribed for foul 

 brood, 1 have employed two, and, as I firmly believe, with the 

 best success. 



" 1. For ten stocks take a peeled nutmeg, make it into fine 

 powder, mix it with the honey for feeding, and feed three times 

 with it every other evening. 



" 2. Take three loth (Ij oz.) of powdered Indian anLse, and 

 pour a quart of boiling water on it. After cooling dilute with 

 it two quarts of old honey and mix one auentcheu (one-eighth 

 of an ounce), of laudanum with it. With this mixture feed 

 twelve stocks morning and evening. 



" These two remedies have been employed by myself and 

 some other bee-keepers in this district. I say purposely some 

 other bee-keepers, as many bee-keepers detest the name of foul 

 brood like that of pestilence. However weak their stocks, how- 

 ever idle the bees may be, yet their stocks are not foul-breed- 

 ing, although one after another may leave the hive during the 

 best time for gathering, and although they mav- count the 

 heads of their darlings every month, and find each time a 

 few dear heads wanting, and a few others lying on their death- 

 bed. 



" ' When the child is drowned the well is covered.' i- So have 

 I almost every day examined my bees, and with trembling hands 

 searched for new traces of the eril on all the brood-combs ; but I 

 am glad to be able to state, that not even a siispicious cell was 

 found, either in my apiaiy or in the apiaries of some neigh- 

 bours, where the stocks had been fed with this medicine, while 

 in apiaries where everything is left t® dear ' mother Nature,' I 

 have seen that the evil had become much worse. I should say 

 with certainty we had cured our stocks of foul brood by the 

 above-mentioned medicine, if there were not some few stocks 

 in the neighbourhood which were foul-breeding in 18C3, but 

 which, nevertheless, worked well in 18(34, and even swarmed ; 

 yet these are mostly such hives only as are examined closely 

 but once a-year — namely, at the time of the honey-harvest. 

 Whether these stocks that have nut been fed are, in spite of 

 their busy flight, really healthy is not yet proved ; but that 



• r»(le .JocBNAT. OF Horticulture, Vol. YHE., i)age 141. _ . 

 f German proverb. 



