1895 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



175 



which we suspected also. The bees now seem 

 too weak to keep the hive tidy. They empty 

 their fteces in the hive. I transfer them to a 

 fresh hive — bees, frames, and all. About noon 

 I counted 30.1 dead bees, inside and outside; 

 from noon to nightfall, only 7, having no more 

 honey. I presume the disease germinated in 

 the food. 

 April 27. Cold and windy; 35 dead bees. 

 April 38. Again I change the hive; found in- 

 side about 385 dead bees; fed them honey and 

 salt and naphthol, just enough to give the hon- 

 ey a taste; took again 38 dead bees. 



April 29. Found 23 dead bees this morning. 

 The bees seem vigorous, the disease going; at 

 noon, 97 dead ; evening, 25, thus making 145 

 dead to day; fed again naphtholined honey. 

 April 30. Counted 33 dead to-day. 

 May 1. Counted 165 dead to-day. The dis- 

 ease is not going at all. 



May 2. About 20 dead this morning; is it in- 

 creasing? 143 by night; exchanged two frames 

 of brood with No. 106, Algerian, to see if the 

 disease is contagious or in the brood. 

 May 3. Counted 43 dead bees. 

 May 4. Counted 35 more dead bees to-day. 

 May 5. Counted 53 dead bees. 

 May 6. Counted 54 more dead bees. 

 May 7. Mortality is going on. The mother 

 is laying, and is a beautiful insect, still keeping 

 up her six frames— no progress and no decrease; 

 fed2lbs. of salted honey— boiled; counted again 

 254 dead bees strewn about, not counting the 

 numbers the bees carry away without control; 

 bees hatching in No. 106; no disease spreading; 

 in No. 85, given April 20, the bees are healthy; 

 took away the mother of hive No. 1. 



May 8. Counted 240 dead; May 9, 27; May 

 10, 54; May 11, 63; May 12, 20; May 13, 15. Di- 

 vided the hive in two; plenty of cells. May 14, 

 counted 10 dead. Bees build a piece of drone 

 comb. May 15, counted 10 dead bees; May 16, 

 9; May 17, 5; May 18, 4. 



The divided colonies seem better than before. 

 Is it because of the division ? Bees of both 

 hives are gathering orange-blossom and pollen. 

 Tne bees given as brood to No. 85 on the 30th of 

 April are at work, without having communi- 

 cated the disease up to date; bees at work there 

 several days. Hive 106, which received two 

 frames of brood May 2, which has been work- 

 ing since the 16th, show no disease ; but the ex- 

 changed bees of 106, in the diseased hive, have 

 been at work since the 14th of May, and show 

 signs of the disease — consequently I can say 

 the disease is contagious, but only from adult 

 and field bee to adult and field bee. 



I received Gleanings for May 1, 1894. Ram- 

 bler relates, on page 371, very much the same 

 thing I experienced here. Mr. Douse says that 

 there the yellow bees are apt to have the dis- 

 ease. He is right so far. A Palestine colony 

 far away from the diseased one and from the 

 experiment hives has the disease, but to a very 



slight extent. Mr. McFatry believes that the 

 drones propagate the disease. I have not tried 

 that. The diseased hive had drones in March, 

 but has lost them all now. They died almost 

 immediately after the division of the hive, on 

 the 13th and following days. I read in Glean- 

 ings that it is worse than foul brood. The dis- 

 ease is disease is different with us. I tried eve- 

 ry way to communicate it to other hives. It is 

 not contagious. The four hives standing a few 

 feet apart have had nothing, and they have 

 been standing side by side for more than a 

 month. 



May 19. Young queens hatch in both hives; 

 the bees kill them all but one; no dead bees in 

 either hive. 



May 20. About a dozen dead early this morn- 

 ing; about 11 o'clock, rain; afternoon, gathered 

 about 40 dead bees. 

 May 21. Counted 54 dead bees. 

 May 22. Counted 25 more dead ones. 

 May 23. Rain; no control. 

 May 25. Counted 25 dead bees to-day. 

 May 28. Counted 30 more dead bees to-day. 

 May 29, 30; June 1, 2 — four days, no time to 

 l3ok after the bees. 



June 3. Counted .50 dead bees; June 4, 25; 

 June 5, 25; June 6, 15. 



June 7. No more dead, and now the hive is 

 finally rid of disease; took the hive up the 

 Alps with the others. The bees in it could get 

 some honey, but did not build up; still, it is 

 well, and I sent it back to its owner in Novem- 

 ber. In December I revisited the hive; found 

 it all right, in good condition; three frames of 

 brood, and about 7 lbs. of honey; a population 

 of about 10,000 bees. 



The Palestine hive had the same, but much 

 less extensively. I fed it with salt and naph- 

 thalined honey. It did not seem to affect it, 

 either for good or bad. Not being at the house, 

 I could not follow hive No. 1 daily; and, be- 

 sides, the business of counting bees was next to 

 impossible, as the ground round about was un- 

 even, and covered with bush and herbs; but 

 what I did, perhaps saved the hive. I picked 

 all I could see — every diseased bee; for, be- 

 sides the drowsy appearance and swollen body, 

 the fuzz on the thorax falls away or is pulled 

 off; anyhow, it was quite black, and the sick 

 bee is easily distinguished. I kept picking them 

 out every time I visited the hive, till there were 

 no more left. The hive is again thriving with 

 the others. With the same mother, they too 

 gathered only their winter stores. 



In conclusion, this is what I found: It was 

 not the quality of the honey gathered in the 

 fall; it was not exposure toward the sea; for 

 another hive, placed near there, with the same 

 plants to visit, and the same exposure, did not 

 have any trace of disease. It was not want of 

 food, as they always had plenty; the queen has 

 nothing to do with the disease; the disease is 

 confined to adult bees and fielders; they do not 



