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40th YEAR, 



CHICAGO, ILL,, APRIL 5, 1900, 



No, 14. 



New York Bee-Disease or Black Brood. 



A NOTABLE contribution to the literature of bee-cul- 

 ture on its pathological side is to be found in Clean- 

 ing's in Bee-Culture for Feb. IS, written by Wm, R. 

 Howard, A.B., M.D., the man 

 to whom we were already in- 

 debted for his valuable work 

 upon foul brood and his inves- 

 tigations on pickled brood. 



The new disease, which for 

 want of a name was at first 

 called the New York bee-dis- 

 ease, because it made such rav- 

 ages in that State, is now called 

 black brood, the appropriate- 

 ness of the name coming from 

 the fact that the disease begins 

 with a dark spot on the larva, 

 which increases in size, be- 

 comes darker, and finally black. 

 In his introduction. Dr. 

 Howard says : " I have received 

 specimens from Messrs. George 

 W. York, of Illinois ; E. R. 

 Root, of Ohio ; N. D. West, a 

 New York State bee-inspector, 

 and P. H. Elwood, of New York. 

 All of these men have furnisht 

 not only material, but have 

 been active in getting data for 

 the investigation." 



Besides the specimens thus 

 obtained. Dr. Howard obtained 

 some bees and started the dis- 

 ease on his own account. In all 

 he made more than a thousand 

 microscopical examinations. 



Dr. Howard gives a detailed account of his laboratory 

 investigations, and also of his experimental investigations 



made with two nuclei into which he introduced Bacillus 

 tnilii, and then proceeds as follows : 



Here conclude my investigations, which have been care- 

 fully conducted ; altho under disadvantages as to season, 

 etc., they have in a great measure been satisfactory. Many 

 points of vital interest have been made clear, while others 

 of equal importance are necessarily obscure. It is clearly 

 not foul brood. It is clearly not pickled brood. It is 

 clearly something new. It is apparently a disease of the 

 pupa stage. The infection is clearly not in the pollen — not 

 due to a fungus but due to bacteria. 



All diseases, in animal and vegetal life, are due to the 

 results of parasitic invasion — some by their mechanical 

 presence, some by the ferments produced in the body, and 

 in plants by changes in or taking from them their lite 



juices, causing starvation and 



immature growth. 



In any given case of rotten 

 wood, dead from freezing, star- 

 vation, or other causes, being 

 allowed to remain in the cells, 

 much of the poison generated, 

 as well as the germs themselves, 

 or their spores, remain adhe- 

 rent to the sides of the cell. 

 These are like the seeds which 

 "fell on stony ground," and 

 will not grow until the proper 

 soil, such as is furnisht by the 

 rich nitrogenous substances 

 supplied to the brood by the 

 nurse-bees is brought in con- 

 tact with them, when a luxuri- 

 ant growth obtains. This pro- 

 duces a fermenting, decompos- 

 ing food unfit for the brood, 

 and sets up a ferment, a decom- 

 position within the bodies of 

 the bees, thus destroying their 

 lives. This might happen to 

 the host with any form of par- 

 asitic life, either animal or 

 vegetal. 



It might be said, specula- 

 tively, that the disease had its 

 origin in starvation, and that 

 in some cases several putrefac- 

 tive bacteria of similar biologi- 

 cal character were responsible 

 for this malady, which, when 

 once started and undisturbed, 

 becomes as destructive as the 

 old-fashioned foul brood. The 

 two germs isolated having sim- 

 ilar, or the same, biological 

 characteristics, especially an 

 alkaline medium in common, are both in a measure respon- 

 sible for this disease, and perhaps the variations, the malig- 

 nancy, etc., are due to modifications by their combined 



