VOL. II. 



JUNE, 1892. 



NO. 6, 



The Cause of Foul Brood. 



BY JOHN F. GATES. 



The foul brood question may ap- 

 pear to be worn out, but it will not 

 be until we have conquered the thing 

 and put it away forever. This can 

 never be done by curing the disease 

 any more than you could bring about 

 a temperance reform by buying rum 

 continually and burning it. 



There is a first cause of foul brood. 

 This no one will attempt to deny, and 

 though wise men shake their heads at 

 this or that theory of its origin, it 

 looks strange that they are able to 

 tell what don't cause it, but are pro- 

 foundly silent when asked what does 

 cause it. I venture to say that no 

 reasonable man can be with his bees 

 almost continually as I have for the 

 last 23 years, making the apiary their 

 specialty, and study deeply every- 

 thing connected with the welfare of 

 his bees, and not know pretty nearly 

 what is the matter. I speak thus be- 

 cause I am possessed of holy wrath at 

 the thought that after being faithful 

 in a specialty and digging deep in the 

 problem of cause and effect, and 

 writing the best I could concerning 

 these things, that men with gold pens 

 and high literary aspirations, and not 



much faith in others, should retain 

 their high position by the proverb of 

 "silence on great questions," looking 

 down on others that cannot explain 

 things with their pen, saying, '' You 

 go away. What do you know, who 

 have been sitting on the grass watch- 

 your bees, while my manuscript is 

 piling up and my students do the 

 drudgery iu the apiary?'' 



With this prelude I will try and 

 get my back clown again to its natural 

 elevation and run my lead pencil 

 smoother. I will try and tell you 

 what I know of foul brood. It is 

 caused by chilling the brood. This I 

 have said in the past, and am now 

 more convinced of its truth than ever, 

 after my experience the past year. I 

 have not been contented to know that 

 we simply have a cure for the dis- 

 ease, nor yet was I satisfied to stop 

 after finding beyond doubt that brood 

 was first chilled before it became foul. 

 The question in my mind has been, 

 how does the brood become chilled? 

 There is no doubt in my mind thai 

 a greater part of the chilling is done 

 by careless or thoughtless operations 

 in early spring, yet I feel sure that 

 there is a greater cause even than 

 this, I saw that the disease was most 



