178 



ftLEANIN(iS IN BEE CULTURE. 



Mak. 1. 



hive, and they would soon communicate the ba- 

 cilli to the introduced queen. 



Mr. C. W. Dayton, a correspondent of the Re- 

 ryiew, p. 272, from Florence, Cal.. observes, when 

 speaking of queens in hives affected, that " in 

 every case I have seen, the queen was an unu- 

 sually prolific layer.'" Mr. O.' O. Poppleton 

 says, "My nuclei with young perfect queens 

 have suffered much more than old colonies with 

 old queens." Now, how can the idea be enter- 

 tained that a queen whose ovaries are infested 

 and swarming with Jxiclllus Oaytonl — whose 

 vitals are being continually preyed upon by mi- 

 crobes — can be " an unusually prolific layer " ? 

 The idea is absurd. It would be just as ration- 

 al as to suppose that a person Infested with the 

 spores of yellow fever, cholera, consumption, 

 etc., would be physically able to perform a full 

 day's work. 



Mr. Poppleton says, " It is an exceedingly er- 

 ratic disease. At times it seems to follow no 

 rules; at other times it works in well-defined 

 limits." Mr. Getaz remarks, in American Bee 

 Journal, that " the malady is much worse some 

 years than others, and generally much worse in 

 the spring." Mr. Diyton says, " It usually at- 

 tacks a colony about the time it gets populous 

 enough for the surplus-receptacles." Mr. T. S. 

 Ford observes, in Review, p. 240, that " the dis- 

 ease does no harm except in the spring and dur- 

 ing the honey-flow. At that period the bees die 

 in such quantities that I have seen as many as 

 a peck of dead ones in front of a single hive. 

 When warm weather sets in during June it dis- 

 appears in nearly all the colonies, and only an 

 experienced eye can detect it." 



Sifting the various reports of the disease as 

 given in the bee-periodicals, they all show that 

 the symptoms of the disease vary very much 

 during the season — at one time being very 

 prominent; at another, scarcely if at all percep- 

 tible. These erratic conditions of the disease 

 are incompatible with the theory of bacillus 

 Gaytoni, and we must look elsewhere for a 

 cause. 



Mr. Shuck, the gentleman already quoted. 

 says that, from his observations, he concludes 

 " that, in some instances, this disease is the re- 

 sult of a poisoned condition of the honey.'" and 

 that the poisoning results from incipient fer- 

 mentation — not that all honey with a slight 

 tendency to ferment is injurious to bees, but 

 that honey in this condition will readily absorb 

 the poisonous effluvia from dead and decaying 

 bees or other decaying matter in the hives. 

 Then, too, I believe that, in many instances, the 

 honey actually becomes sour enough to cause 

 the disease; and I fear that this is the trouble 

 in warm climates such as that of California and 

 the Southern States." These conclusions of 

 Mr. Shuck are worthy of some consideration by 

 the scientific bee-keeper; for. if the symptoms 

 of this disease are carefully studied, they seem 

 to point to some poisoned condition of the food 



taken by the bees — it might be either honey or 

 pollen, or both — rather than to the theory of 

 bacillus. 



We know that every kind of plant and vege- 

 table, when in certain condition, is liable to be 

 attacked by the spores of fungus. We know 

 that the grape, the peach, the potato, etc., are 

 more subject to rot in some seasons than in oth- 

 ers. In favorable atmospheric conditions of a 

 week's duration the fungus may develop, and 

 the disease show itself; while with a change of 

 conditions the disease may check or disappear. 

 In the Report of the Department of Agriculture 

 for 188(5 the mycologist of the department ob- 

 serves, when speaking of fungi, that " the fun- 

 gi which infest our cultivated plants, and not 

 infrequently cause their total destruction, vie 

 with the insect tribes in numbers as well as in 

 the extent of the losses they occasion; and in 

 the transformations they undergo in their de- 

 velopment they are equally complex and often 

 more difficult to follow. They are. for the 

 most part, so small, and the metamorphoses 

 they undergo are so obscure, as to call for the 

 greatest amount of patience, and the closest 

 study, in order to obtain any satisfactory knowl- 

 edge of their natural history; and in spite of all 

 our efforts there will frequently remain many 

 points which must be left to conjecture. That 

 these fungi which make themselves manifest in 

 the plant-diseases known as ' rust,' ' smut,' " mil- 

 dew,' ' blight,' etc., are true vegetable para- 

 sites; that they are governed by the same laws 

 which control all living organisms; and that 

 they are propagated by specially developed re- 

 productive bodies called spores, are fundamen- 

 tal truths to be kept constantly in mind in 

 studying this subject." 



These spores are conveyed by the air, and 

 only await congenial conditions for develop- 

 ment. They would be as liable to attack the 

 pollen or nectar secretion as any other part, if 

 the conditions favored, and then be carried by 

 the bee to the hive, in the shape of diseased 

 food, to breed sickness to the inmates. 



In many portions of the South there are large 

 plantations of melons that are grown for the 

 northern markets. It is not unusual to find on 

 these grounds hundreds of broken, rotten, and 

 decaying melons, swarming with bees sucking 

 the fermenting juice that is teeming with the 

 spores of fungi. The effects of such rottenness 

 on a hive of bees I can only conjecture. To say 

 that the instinct of the bee is always sufficient 

 to discriminate between what is wholesome for 

 it and what is prejudicial, is all nonsense. They 

 often visit places that are not overly nice. They 

 will often visit poisonous flowers, for instance, 

 the Oelserniurii scnipervlrens. In Gleanings 

 for Jan. 1.5, Prof. Cook refers to a tree in Cali- 

 fornia— BucaZy/^tus rostrata — that is very fatal 

 to bees. I admit that the bee will swerve from 

 the dictates of its instincts only from necessity 

 and not from choice. 



