lo Dec. 1912.'^ Putrefaction and Decay. 761 



raised the cells as soon as the sealed cells are removed but the brood 

 combs should be examined occasionally for a cell they may be raising on 

 their own account. Three to six cells are all I raise in a superseding 

 colony at a time. When greater numbers are raised they are not so perfect. 

 The thirteen cells in P'ig. 2 are on three strips, each from a different 

 superseding colony. 



The great advantage of this method of queen-rearing is that, having 

 a laying queen in the hive, the bees will not rai.se the cells given, unless 

 conditions are as they should be. No inferior queens will therefore 

 result. 



{To be continued. ) 



PUTREFACTION AND DECAY. 



Jno. ir. Paterson, B. Sc, Ph. D. 



It is a matter of everyday experience that when organic substances 

 or mixtures such as milk, wines, flesh products, or wood are exposed 

 to ordinary atmospheric influences they luidergo chemical change and 

 become unwholesome or useless. At one time it was believed that 

 those changes were due to instability in the complex chemical molecule, 

 and that decay, therefore, was a spontaneous result. More modern 

 investigation has shown this view to be wrong, and that the whole 

 series of changes variously known as souring, rotting, decay, fermenta- 

 tion and putrefaction are caused by various low forms of life, especially 

 by bacteria and moulds. As these latter are plants — bacteria are very 

 small plants indeed — it will easily be understood why perishable com- 

 modities can be preserved in various ways. As all plants — including 

 bacteria — require water, it will be seen that dried milk or dried fish 

 can be kept indefinitely. Again, as all plants have a temperature at 

 which they grow quickest — generally between 80 and 100 degrees F. — 

 decay is quicker in warm weather. Then, again, each plant — including 

 bacteria — has a temperature below which it cannot grow — usually 

 between 32 and 50 degrees F. — therefore, freezing prevents decay. 

 Boiling kills all sorts of plants, and a tin of meat sealed up while hot 

 is free from bacteria, and will keep indefinitely ; but if a cold tin be 

 opened decay soon starts because decay germs are floating about in 

 the air. Again, plants may be poisoned just like animals, and anti- 

 septics are things which are poisonous to the bacteria causing decay. 

 Borax, formalin, and carbolic acid are used in different cases to pre- 

 vent decay — they are germ poisons. Lastly, crops cannot grow in 

 soils too salty because the soil water has too much dissolved matter — 

 it is too strong a solution — to pass into the roots by osmosis. It is 

 for this reason that putrefactive germs cannot work in meat that has 

 been made too salt for them ; and also why jam and preserves keep all 

 right when enough sugar has been used in the making. Altogether, 

 the many and different methods of preventing putrefaction and decay 

 all have the same immediate object — it is to render the conditions of 

 life unfavorable to the growth of the little plants which cause the 

 damage. 



