THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



297 



bees by express, and have never had a 

 comb break down. 



Sii far as my experience goes as to the 

 strength of combs, wired frames are need- 

 less. Tlie expense of wiring them is a 

 useless expense. Somebody in his ex- 

 uberant praise of wired frames, said that 

 he could tlirow tlie combs across tlie 

 hoiiey-liouse without brealtiug them. But 

 why sliould anybody want to throw combs 

 across tlie lioney-liouse? Auotlier said 

 that he could dance on the frames witliont 

 breaking them. Again, why sliould any- 

 body want to dance on the frames ? 



The other claim in favor of wired 

 frames is, that foundation in such frames 

 do not sag or stretch, and hence that no 

 cells become enlarged into drone-cells. 

 For seven years I have had ail my combs 

 built on full sheets of foundation, using 

 several hundred pounds of foundation 

 each year, ami I have now in my apiary 

 about 3,000 combs built on foundation ; of 

 the combs built on foundation there are 

 very few indeed that liave any drone- 

 cells — not enough to do any harm at all. 

 By a very little care in the use of combs, 

 drone-cells are kept out of every colony 

 that ouglit not to rear drones. 



If it were necessary for me to wire 

 frames in order to prevent the appearance 

 of drone-cells, or in order to make the 

 combs strong enough to bear the strain 

 that naturally comes on them, I should 

 wire them. My experience proves that 

 for me it is not necessary, and 1 there- 

 fore decline to wire them. 



Iowa City, Iowa. 



Farmers' Home. 



The Little " Busy Bees." 



EDWARD GRIMES. 



Ever work the busy bees, 



In the fields of clover ; 

 Toiling from the morning hoiu's 



Till the day is over ; 

 Oft they sip the honey pure 



From the snow-white chalice : 

 Then they linger for awhile 



In a lily palace. 



In a little yellow cup, 



Witli the greatest angle. 

 There they put carli lioney-drop. 



Shining lil<('. a sjiangle ; 

 Then tlicy ilosp each tiny cell 



Till tlic (hivs arc coUler, 

 For the little Ijues to eat. 



While they're growing older. 



Every lovely day they fly 



Till the summer's over, 

 Either in a butter-cup 



Or upon the clover ; 

 Either in a nodding-tree 



On a mellow- apjSe, 

 Or they rest upon a bud. 



Opening white and dapple. 



For tbe American Bee JonmaL 



ftueens Conveying Foul Brood. 



W. H. STEWART. 



Those engaged in apiculture are, as 

 in other branches of business, only 

 successful when their energetic and 

 well-directed labors bring success. 

 The pathway of progress is ever beset 

 by obstacles which must be overcome 

 ere we reach the goal of success that 

 lies beyond. The overcoming of many 

 serious obstacles is what has elevated 

 bee-keeping of the present day, far 

 above that of 40 years ago. There are 

 yet. liowever, obstacles which must 



be overcome, or disaster will come 

 after all the advancement we have 

 made. 



How to dispose of our honey at r e 

 munerative prices ; how to success- 

 fully winter our bees in our Northern 

 climate ; and how to preserve the 

 general health of our bees at all times 

 or seasons of the year, are questions 

 that should command the attention 

 and eidist the labors of every bee- 

 keeper. In giving my views on the 

 last of these important questions, I 

 am well aware that I shall incur the 

 displeasure of many bee-keepers ; 

 however, I will endeavor to meet 

 what objections may be raised. 



In reading the many books and 

 periodicals publislied in the interest 

 of apiculture, we notice a general 

 fear in regard to that disease often 

 found among bees— improperly called 

 foul brood— which often sweeps away 

 whole apiaries, leaving in its wake 

 nothing but the dead and rottenness; 

 not only so, but in many instances it 

 strips the poor bee-keeper of his only 

 means of support. Now, it is quite 

 clear that two things must be done, 

 in order to secure safety ; viz : First, 

 we must be able to cure or weed out 

 the disease where it now exists ; and 

 second, we must prevent its being 

 spread in such a manner as to reach 

 those colonies which are, as yet, in a 

 healthy condition. 



Mr. Cheshire, on pages 1)44 and 740 

 of the Bee Journal for 1884, seems 

 to feel quite certain that by supersed- 

 ing the diseased queen, and properly 

 using phenol, all colonies suffering 

 from the dreadful disease may be 

 effectually cured. If this be true, 

 and Mr. C. or some other expert could 

 have the management of all the dis- 

 eased colonies, and it were not al- 

 lowed to spread, then we might rea- 

 sonably expect to "stamp it out;" 

 but here is where the trouble comes : 

 There are many who keep their bees 

 in a sort of " slipshod " way, and 

 when the bees become diseased, they 

 let them light it out in their own way 

 as best they can, and in warmer 

 climates a disease may linger for 

 years. From such apiaries the dis- 

 ease may be spread to others which 

 are more carefully managed ; and as 

 many of these apiaries are used for 

 the production of queens for the 

 market, thousands of young queens 

 may become fertilized by diseased 

 drones, as proven by Mr. C's discov- 

 ery ; and as such queens begin to lay 

 they are pronounced ready for the 

 market. As the apiarist has no means 

 of knowing whether the germs of 

 destruction are in the queens' bodies, 

 he mails them to his customers, and 

 foul brood is scattered in every direc- 

 tion ; and a single queen introduced 

 to a colony, would soon spread death 

 and destruction throughout a whole 

 apiarian district. All reasonable bee- 

 keepers will readily see that just so 

 long as the trade in queens and nuclei 

 is kept up, just so long will foul 

 brood be found cropping out here and 

 there wherever bees are found. 



It is true that many queen-breeders 

 are honest, and doing all they can to 

 improve the stock of bees ; yet it is 

 also just as true that many bee-keep- 



ers are like men in other business- 

 making financial success paramount 

 to all other considerations. Again, it 

 is true that it makes but little differ- 

 ence whether we purchase a queen 

 from a careful or from a careless 

 dealer. Mr. C. has proven that no 

 dealer in queens can know positively 

 that all the queens which he sells are 

 free from the germs of foul brood. 

 Only last year we read in the Bee 

 JouKNAi, that foul brood had been 

 shipped, and it turned out that both 

 parties may have been innocent. 



What are we to do ? Abandon the 

 business and get out as nearly whole 

 as we can V or agree on some plan to 

 protect the apiaries that are yet in a 

 healthy condition V I propose that we 

 continue in the business, and that we 

 purchase no bees or queens from 

 abroad, and in every proper manner 

 discontinue the shipping of bees from 

 place to place by bee-merchants, and 

 that we require that the carrying of 

 queens in the mails be discontinued 

 by law. We have often been told 

 that we would be just as well off to 

 breed our own queens, as to send 

 away for them. We could easily try 

 the experiment of receiving no bees 

 from abroad for five years, and where 

 the disease is found to exist, cure it if 

 possible. 



Some have proposed that laws be 

 enacted that would authorize certain 

 persons to visit all apiaries and ex- 

 amine all the colonies to ascertain 

 whether foul brood is present. Let 

 us suppose that a committee had thus 

 found foul brood in one apiary, and 

 had handled it while disposing of it, 

 and then goes on twenty miles and 

 reaches my place ; they inform me of 

 their business, and what they had 

 just been doing; do you suppose that 

 I would allow them to begin to 

 overhaul my colonies ? Not much ; I 

 would not allow them to remain in 

 my house or on my premises for a 

 moment ; and I would resort to any 

 lawful means to get them out of the 

 community as soon as possible. All 

 reasonable bee-keepers would justify 

 me when they once understood the 

 nature of the case. Such committees 

 would only be another vehicle for the 

 spreading of the disease. 



Mr. Doolittle, on page 245, seems to 

 partially quiet his fears by a kind of 

 an uncertainty whether Mr. Cheshire 

 has been treating the same disease of 

 bees that is known here as " American 

 foul brood." His article leads to 

 some important questions: I. Was 

 not Mr. D. as liable to labor under a 

 mistake in regard to the real foul 

 brood as was Mr. Cheshire V 2. Does 

 he know that the spores of the dis- 

 ease do never adhere to the feet or 

 bodies of the bees ? 3. If the spores 

 carried on the bees, or in the honey 

 that the bees carried with them when 

 driven from the filthy hive to the 

 new one, would die and never develop 

 the disease in the new hive, then why 

 burn the old hiveV Why not wash 

 and paint it, and conclude that the 

 spores left behind were just as harm- 

 less as those carried into the new 

 hive V 



If I understand the many bee-books 

 that I have read, and which are writ- 



