AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



241 



the symptoms of the disease ejected 

 from a queenless hive, the same as dis- 

 eased workers. Frequently I have had 

 queens not more than one or two years 

 old, disappear during the honey-flow, or 

 at some other unexpected time. I sup- 

 pose they were superseded when found 

 too sick to do their duty. 



The first spring that my bees died in 

 considerable numbers, I thought they 

 had been poisoned by somebody spraying 

 his trees too soon. A year or two later 

 I fed outside, and concluded that the 

 shiny bees, dying around the feeders, 

 had been daubed in the syrup, and the 

 others had pulled their hair in trying to 

 lick the syrup. 



It is a fact that the diseased bees will 

 hang around the feeders longer than the 

 others, but perhaps it is because they 

 are not strong enough to fly in the fields. 



My first eye-opener on the question, 

 was during a honey-flow. I had acci- 

 dentally left some honey from burr- 

 combs close to the hive, and when I 

 came back I found the pretended rob- 

 bers trying to get into the hive, and the 

 burr-combs untouched. 



Well, what is the disease? Cheshire 

 says it is a bacillus much smaller than 

 the one that produces foul brood, and of 

 a much slower growth. It is found in 

 the grown bees more than in the brood, 

 and more in the queen than in the 

 workers. Cheshire calls it Bacillus 

 Oaytoni, his attention having been called 

 to it by, a Miss Gayton. Miss Gayton 

 thought the disease was connected with 

 the queen, and had succeeded in curing 

 it by changing of queens. 



Somebody may ask here what a bacil- 

 lus is. 



Bacilli a,re microscopic "critters" in 

 the shape of a stick. These sticks grow 

 rapidly under favorable circumstances, 

 and when they reach a certain length, 

 break into two or more pieces. These 

 pieces grow as well as the first ones, and 

 break also, and so on as long as there is 

 plenty to eat, and the other circum- 

 stances are favorable. 



When the feed is about to give out, 

 the last "sticks," instead of growing 

 and breaking, contract themselves into 

 egg-shaped "spores." These spores are 

 to the sticks exactly what the seeds are 

 to the plants. They can be kept like 

 seeds perhaps for years, under certain 

 circumstances, without any change, and 

 then when placed in the right condi- 

 tions, develop into sticks again, and 

 these sticks multiply like the original 

 ones as long as they are favorably 

 placed to do so. 



Foul brood is caused by a bacillus 



called Bacillus alvei, which develops 

 rapidly in the brood, but seemingly un- 

 der difficulties in the body of the grown 

 bees, though it is found there also. The 

 spores are transported from one cell to 

 another, also from one hive to another, 

 by the bees, and even the apiarist. The 

 disease can be prevented from spreading 

 to the healthy hives by spraying the dis- 

 eased bees with some antiseptic (phenol 

 or salicylic acid). The operator is also 

 to wash his hands and instruments care- 

 fully. 



But these spores. cannot live exposed 

 to the air very long, some say not more 

 than a few hours. On the other hand, 

 they will keep their vitality almost in- 

 definitely in honey, and when honey con- 

 taining spores is fed to larval bees, the 

 " sticks " develop at once with an aston- 

 ishing rapidity. 



Owing to the impossibility of reaching 

 everywhere into the hive, and in all the 

 honey, with antiseptics, the treatments 

 with such have generally (not always) 

 failed. 



There is a similar disease attacking 

 the silk-worms, but of a more slow 

 growth, and developing itself in the 

 moth as well as in the worm. If the 

 attack is strong, that is, if the bacilli 

 are numerous, the worm will succumb 

 before spinning its cocoon, but usually 

 dies in the cocoon. Often the silk-moth 

 comes out of the cocoon and lays her 

 eggs as usual. In such cases spores are 

 found not only in the body of the silk- 

 moth, but also in the eggs ; and of 

 course these eggs hatch diseased worms. 



Generally, the spores come from the 

 excreta of the diseased worms, or the 

 putrefied bodies of the dead ones, and 

 are swallowed by other worms when 

 eating. 



By what proceeds, it seems as though 

 bee-paralysis is much more like silk- 

 worm disease than foul brood. Like 

 silk-worm disease, bee-paralysis develops 

 itself gradually, and attains its full de- 

 velpment in the grown insect. I have 

 never seen any brood that did not look 

 perfectly healthy, but for all that it 

 might be diseased already — only on ac- 

 connt of the slow development of the 

 Bacillus Oaytoni, the disease would not 

 show itself until much later. 



The silk-worm disease is disastrous ; 

 bee-paralysis comparatively not. This 

 may be due to the fact that as bees void 

 their excrements, and also die outside of 

 the hive (except in winter), the spores 

 contained in their bodies are generally 

 carried out. I do not know whether the 

 queen transmits the disease to the brood 

 by her eggs or not, but the fact that re- 



