632 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE 



Oct. 1 



AMERICAN FOUL BROOD. 



Some Proof that Henry Stewart has It; a Reply to 

 Geo. M. Steele, Page 531, Aug. 15. 



BY HBNBY STEWART. 



At the National bee-keepers' conventions 

 I have seen samples of American foul brood 

 which looked and smelled identically the 

 same as that does which I now have. Fur- 

 thermore, I have sent samples of the disease 

 in my yard to Dr. E. F. Phillips, who has 

 pronounced it American foul brood. I have 

 also seen samples of American foul brood at 

 the apiarian department at Washington. 

 State Inspectors Smith, More, and Piles at 

 different times have inspected my bees, and 

 on each occasion pronounced the disease 

 American foul brood. It looks like the pic- 

 ture of the American variety; and if there 

 is a bad case of it in the yard, one needs 

 only to follow his nose in order to be led di- 

 rectly to the hive. Yes, I am quite sure I 

 have the genuine American foul brood. 



Mr. Steele says that bees can not clean 

 out the dead brood having the bad odor of 

 the American foul brood, and that I will, 

 therefore, have to retract. All right; no one 

 could be more ready to retract than I, when 

 convinced that I am wrong; but I should 

 like to inquire whether this statement by 

 Mr. Steele is founded on actual observation 

 or borrowed from the statements of others. 

 If borrowed (which I surmise) it might be 

 well to go to the bees for proof. 



There are a great many things about foul 

 brood that I do not know, and some other 

 things that I am not sure of; but if there is 

 any one thing about the subject that I do 

 know positively it is that bees can and w^ill 

 and readily do clean the ropy bad-smelling 

 brood of tiie American disease from their 

 cells, and any one else can be just as posi- 

 tive as I am if he will just go to the bees for 

 proof. It does not take a scientist to jirove 

 this, as any one can find out for himself. It 

 is not too late this fall. The worst foul- 

 broody comb that can be found should be 

 placed over a queen-excluder above a foul- 

 broody colony of good strength. If the re- 

 sults are watched, the foul-broody matter 

 will be found disappearing, and patches of 

 nicely polished cells taking its place. The 

 longer the time the larger these patches will 

 become; and if the conditions are at all fa- 

 vorable it will finally take a good deal of 

 hunting to locate the least evidence of foul 

 brood in this once rotten comb. 



Outside of a honey-flow I am not positive 

 that my plan will always work; but I know 

 that it sometimes will work, and it is my 

 belief that it generally will if not always. I 

 base this belief upon the experience of the 

 queenless foul-broody colonies mentioned 

 in my first article, page 415, July 1, as well 

 as on my observation of the bees cleaning 

 up the outside combs as the brood-nest is 

 contracted after the honey season; and, final- 

 ly, on my experience this summer, which 



was as follows: Warm weather and the hon- 

 ey-flow began here June 10. From June 15 

 to 20 I placed all foul-broody combs above 

 queen-excluders, keeping the queens below. 

 The honey-flow continued good up to July 

 1, when the drouth dried up the clover, and 

 my scale hive quit gaining. July 10 the 

 scales showed a loss of three pounds This 

 was a new condition for me. The honey- 

 flow was done, and the combs were only par- 

 tially cleaned up, as an examination show- 

 ed in a large part of the hives that the foul 

 brood could still be seen below. What to 

 do I did not know; so in most cases I did 

 nothing except to watch results. The drouth 

 continued; conditions went from bad to 

 worse; but the cleaning up went on, and 

 about August 1 I extracted the combs, and 

 not a sign of the disease could be found in 

 any of them. I then put them back on the 

 hives for refilling. There are about two hun- 

 dred of these combs. When they come ofT 

 the hives again, no effort will be made to 

 keep them separate, and they will be lost 

 sight of with the thousand or more combs 

 which were previously foul-broody, and 

 wtftch are now being used as extracting- 

 combs. Conditions could not be worse than 

 they have been here this summer, the drouth 

 at this date (Aug. 29) being still unbroken. 

 We have not had a good rain since May. 

 After extracting the white-clover honey the 

 extracting-combs were drained dry and the 

 honey taken below. If it were true that I 

 have been working under a delusion, and 

 the once foul-broody combs have not been 

 cleaned up, can any one imagine the condi- 

 tion my colonies would be in? The word 

 " rotten " would not express it. However, 

 I have just inspected each colony in my 

 home yard, and out of two hundred I have 

 found but six new cases, and these probably 

 came from my neighbors' foul-broody hives, 

 and not from the cleaned-up colonies. 

 Prophetstown, 111. 



[Mr. Stewart is not only an extensive 

 bee-keeper but an expert. What he can 

 , and has done, others might fail in. It is 

 our opinion that the average bee-keeper had 

 better not try to save combs of American 

 foul brood. There is too much risk. — Ed.] 



ELIMINATING THE SWARMING IMPULSE. 



What may be Accomplished in Other Animals by 

 Careful Breeding. 



BY W. E. FLOWER. 



On page 529, August 15, is an article by 

 M. E. Pruitt on hereditary influences, and 

 I wish to take exception to some of the de- 

 ductions made. In my opinion the swarm- 

 ing impulse can and will be eliminated just 

 as soon as we can control the mating of the 

 queen and drone. Cutting off lambs' tails 

 is not breeding, neither does it come under 

 the topic "heredity." Jonas Webb, by 

 careful breeding, eliminated the horns from 

 the Southdown sheep, securing a superior 



