GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE 



sealed stures. This slow i'c'ediiig with its 

 regulated supply is withdrawn from the 

 hive, and a rapid feeder substituted. A 

 large one is best because then the shortage 

 of the 30 lbs. necessary to supply the winter 

 stores can be given quickly, thus avoiding 

 the agitation consequent on rapid feeding 

 for any lengthened period. What we have 

 secured is a powei-ful stock, the majority of 

 the bees being young and full of energy 

 when genial spring calls them forth after 

 their long period of semi-hib6rnation to 

 profit by each shining hour when nectar is 

 to be had. 



Experience teaches me more and more, as 

 the years flit by, that it is a " faithful say- 

 ing," and worthy of universal acceptation, 

 that we should do all our spring feeding in 

 autumn. " Millions of honey in our house," 

 as Doolittle puts it, is the very best guaran- 



tee that tlie bees will breed up in late spring 

 and early summer to take full advantage of 

 the clover or other main flow during June 

 and July, when flowers yield most copiously. 



In very many districts the season is over 

 by the end of the latter month, and then 

 comes the period when we can best and most 

 profitably stimulate. Here is where I find 

 myself in most divergent difference with the 

 genial doctor, which leads me to dissent 

 from his " ever " profiting by stimulation. 

 It will also be seen that this development 

 considerably differs from the " only way " 

 in the Alexander book. I agree it is a way — 

 not the only way — but the time makes a 

 vast difference because there is not che great 

 loss of bee-life almost certain in most 

 springs, which, in the majority of seasons, 

 more than counterbalances the gain. 



Banff, Scotland. 



HOW EUROPEAN FOUL BMOOD SPREADS 



BY DR. C. C. MILLER 



Dr. C. C. Miller: — I am having an experience 

 with European foul brood which isn't agreeable. It 

 isn't my first, but it is my worst, because it is knock- 

 ing such fine crop prospects. If I were a beginner 

 I should expect to be puzzled ; but having made nu- 

 clei by the hundreds, and having been a shipper of 

 bees by carloads for years, I must admit that trouble 

 witli disease knocks my conceit considerably. 



The ortliodox method of cure is requeening with 

 Italians. But I have some Italians purchased of an 

 excellent breeder last August, and the samo per cent 

 of them contract disease as the others. Now, my 

 question is. Do any of your hybrids or Italians, actu- 

 ally prove immune? and did you try shaking as a 

 cure ? 



I believe I know the way it spreads. My bees are 

 in pairs; and if one of a pair shows disease, the 

 ones on the corresponding side of each adjoining 

 pair soon show it lightly, and then it starts down 

 a row. Now, I believe the nurse bees lick up the 

 larval food from dead larvje, go out to play, enter 

 the wrong hive, feed larva?, and start disease. 



I put a very yellow Italian queen into a weak 

 colony that had been queenless for more than three 

 weeks without strengthening the colony, so as to 

 observe results. All colonies on either side weie 

 dark bees. Within seven days after the Italian bees 

 began to hatch I found yellow bees in hives on each 

 side of the colony as far away as three hives. This 

 bunch wasn't placed in pairs, so I missed part of the 

 experiment. 



Another question: Can you kill the queen in a 

 fairly strong colony containing disease not too bad, 

 give an Italian cell the same day, and expect good 

 results ? I am shaking all foul colonies, and carry- 

 ing away the brood to avoid spread of disease. I 

 really don't shake, but allow the flying bees to return 

 to the queen and leave the rest with the brood. 

 When I have worked out my experiments I'll wrtie 

 them up in GLEANINGS if they are successful. 



California. 



To say that " the orthodox method of cure 

 is requeening with Italians " is putting it a 

 little too strong. To be sure, at least one 



writer has reported a large per cent of cure 

 as a result of requeening with young Italian 

 queens, and some seem to talk just a little as 

 if one doesn't need to entertain the unwel- 

 come European guest at all if one only has 

 ]iure Italian stock ; yet I think the most that 

 is really claimed in general is that with 

 Italian stock the disease is easier to keep at 

 bay, and easier to cure when acquired, than 

 it is with black or hybrid stock. And I 

 believe that is in general true. 



IMMUNITY. 



You ask the straight question whether 

 any of my hybrids or Italians prove im- 

 mune. I don't know. Some of both kinds 

 have remained free from di.sease; but how 

 do I know that they have had a fair chance 

 to become infected? Take the best of them, 

 and introduce a frame of diseased brood, 

 and I don't know whether or not they would 

 become diseased. I suspect they would. 

 Still. I have had them lightly affected, and 

 then become sound without any treatment 

 that I know of. That looks just a bit like 

 bordering on immunity. If European foul 

 brood should rage in a certain locality a few 

 millenniums- — possibly a few decades — I 

 should expect the survivors to become near- 

 ly if not quite immune. And I should ex- 

 pect Italians to be more nearly immune than 

 hybrids. One reason for that is that Italians 

 are in general more vigorous than blacks or 

 liybrids. It is just possible that is the only 

 reason. It is also possible that Italians are 

 more nearly immune independently of the 



