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¥H^ BEE-KEEPERS' REVIEW. 



hatched out and soon thereafter all the 

 bees will be found in the prepared hive 

 — and no loss of either bees or labor. The 

 contents of the diseased colony may now 

 be taken to some proper place and l)e 

 disposed of by biiminj^^ the same. This 

 is best done in a room or Ijuilding to 

 which no outside bees can gain access and 

 get at the honey. But it is not necessary 

 that this should be a total loss. Such 

 combs as contain honey and are free of 

 diseased brood, may be extracted and 

 and saved for table use, and the empty 

 combs melted and made into wax — those 

 that contain brood may as well be burn- 

 ed up at once — frames and all — as the cost 

 of replacing them nowadays is but a 

 trifle anyway. 



By this time the prepared hive will or 

 should be full of both comb and brood 

 and without any foul brood or any trace 

 of the disease. In fact it will be and 

 remaiu a healthy colony. At least that 

 has been my experience. 



The now empty hive may, by simply 

 scraping it thoroughly, be used again 

 with no occurrence of the disease. At 

 lea,st that is mj- belief. But should the 

 reader believe otherwise, then the empty 

 hive mav be thoroughly disinfected by 

 simply boiling it in water or by heating 

 it with fire — and this can be done with- 

 out doing the wood any material injury. 

 "When done by fire, simply paint the in- 

 .side of the hive with kerosene oil and 

 then throw inside of it a burning paper, 

 then watch the fire closely, and when it 

 has done its proper work, cover the hive 

 with a board and .smother it out. The 

 inside of the hive throughout should now 

 be about as free of foreign matter as when 

 new. The di.sinfected hive ma}- now be 

 u.sed and with no danger of any germs of 

 the foul brood disease therein. 



The foregoing treatment of the foul 

 brood malady is based upon the generally 

 accepted theor}-, which I indorse, that 

 the honey in the combs of a foul-broody 

 colony is more or less impregnated with 

 the germs of the disease. The manipu- 

 lation given .simply but successfully 



transfers all the bees — nin-se-bees in due 

 time included — from the foul-broody col- 

 ony to another hive free from disease and 

 without any of the diseased honey in 

 their bodies, nor in the food the nurse- 

 bees may have in their stomachs. All 

 the nurse-bees by this plan remain in the 

 diseased colony until their baby- 

 food becomes exhasted, and the meth- 

 od outlined is the only one I am ac- 

 quainted with that secures this result 

 when the combs of the diseased colony 

 are filled with brood in all stages of its 

 growth. 



To conclude: As soon as foul-brood is 

 found to exist in an apiary please don't 

 get excited nor foolish and thereupon 

 burn or otherwise destroy the entire 

 apiary. The better way by far is first to 

 ascertain as speedily as possible how 

 many colonies are diseased, mark them, 

 and then let them severely alone until the 

 proper time arrives to treat them. Do 

 not open such hives nor handle the 

 combs unless absoluteh- necessarj^ and 

 then use care that no robber-bees get a 

 chance to steal and carry off more or less 

 of the honey. Besides, even though not 

 treated at all the first season the disease 

 begins, the profits of the apiary may not 

 be materially diminished. As a rule, 

 this disease makes but little headway 

 until after the first season. But it is by 

 no means pleasant to have foul-brood in 

 one's apiary and hence it is the way to 

 get rid of it the same season it is found to 

 exist. The disease does not seem to me 

 to be as dangerous or as virulent as when 

 it first became known in the I'nited 

 States, but this may be owing to the fact 

 that experienced bee-keepers discover it 

 sooner and know better how to manage 

 such colonies as become infected. The 

 main danger among novices is that the\- 

 do not know the disease and hence do 

 not discover it in its first stages, and 

 thereby scatter it among the healthy 

 colonies by changing the comlxs about 

 from one hive to another. 



St. CH.\Ki.t;.s. 111. 



Nov. 30, 1897. 



