MARCH 1, 1916 



179 



grades to extremely low figures. The heavy 

 inward movement of foreign honey shows 

 no present signs of abatement and must be 

 accepted as a probable factor for some time 

 to come." 



Before hasty proposals to raise the tariff 

 on foreign honey are broached, it should be 

 remembered that Porto Kico and Hawaii, 

 insular possessions of the United States, 

 together exported to this counti-y during 

 the fiscal year of 1915 more than the total 

 imports from foreign countries combined. 

 Consequently any tariff legislation directed 

 against foreign honey could not affect the 

 larger jDart of the imports. The imports 

 from the island possessions have arisen so 

 high during the last two years that, even if 

 practically all foreign honej^ were shut out, 

 it would be impossible to reduce the total 

 imports to what they were in 1912 or 1913. 



The new bulletin will be found of inter- 

 est to beekeepers generally, and may be 

 obtained from the Superintendent of Doc- 

 uments, Washington, D. C-, at five cents a 

 copy. 



The Lament of Job, Again; What is 

 the Matter with the Alexander Treat- 

 ment for the Cure of European Foul 

 Brood ? 



The following letter, received from Mr. 

 Pressler, of Pennsylvania, will explain : 



Mr. Editor: — In your editorial, page 89, 

 entitled "Lament of Job," you wish to 

 know if there is any one who has been able 

 to stamp out absolutely European foul brood. 

 Then you say, "How about it, Dr. Miller?" 

 I believe that precludes all but the old 

 Nestor of bee lore. What is the matter with 

 hundreds of men like Dr. Alexander, scien- 

 tific in more than one of the many branches? 

 If Dr. Holtermann wants to know if "any 

 one ' ' ever succeeded, let him come right 

 here to Williamsport. I can take him 14 

 miles east of here, where the first beekeep- 

 ers' association was organized in this state 

 for the purpose of checking the spread of 

 this disease. This culminated subsequently 

 in the formation of the state organization 

 here in our court-house, with the writer as 

 presiding officer. At that time every yard 

 was infected in this county, including thou- 

 sands of colonies, and now I am satisfied not 

 a cell abounds. All were cured absolutely, 

 and without the loss of a single dollar other 

 than labor, and at first a few dollars for 

 experimenting on formaldehyde gas. 



Ellis E. Pressler. 



Williamsport, Pa., Feb. 8. 



No, Di\ Miller is not the only one who is 

 invited to tell how we can cure European 

 foul brood absolutely, without leaving a 

 trace of the disease behind, Tf we are cor- 



rectly informed, some who have tried the 

 Alexander plan have found that the disease 

 came back again. Others report that it 

 worked successfully. This treatment as Mr. 

 Alexander gave it out a few years ago, and 

 that proved to be such a great success with 

 him and many of his followers, was as 

 follows : 



Go to every diseased colony you have, and 

 build it up either by giving frames of ma- 

 turing brood or uniting two or more until 

 you have them fairly strong. After this go 

 over every one and remove the queen; then 

 in nine days go over them again, and be sure 

 to destroy every maturing queen-cell, or vir- 

 gin if any have hatched. Then go to your 

 breeding queen and take enough of her 

 newly hatched larvae to rear enough queen- 

 cells from which to supply each one of your 

 diseased queenless colonies with a ripe queen- 

 cell or virgin just hatched. These are to be 

 introduced to your diseased colonies on the 

 twentieth day after you have removed their 

 old queen, and not one hour sooner, for on 

 this very point your whole success depends; 

 for your young queen must not commence to 

 lay until three or four days after the last of 

 the old brood is hatched, or 27 days from the 

 time you remove the old queen. If you are 

 very careful about this matter of time be- 

 tween the last of the old brood hatching and 

 the young queen commencing to lay, you will 

 find the bees will clean out their breeding- 

 combs for this young queen, so that she will 

 fi'l them with as fine healthy brood as a 

 hive ever contained. This I have seen in 

 several hundred hives, and have never seen 

 a cell of the disease in a hive after being 

 treated as above described. 



It is not necessary to remove any of the 

 combs or honey from the diseased colony; 

 neither is it necessary to disinfect any thing 

 about the hive. Simply remove the old 

 queen, and be sure the young queen does not 

 commence to lay until three or four days af- 

 ter the old brood is all hatched. This treat- 

 ment with young Italian queens is a perfect 

 cure for black brood. 



In addition to the foregoing letter we 

 have received a large number of other com- 

 munications — ^so many, in fact, that we are 

 not able to give space to many of them; and 

 what we do publish will have to be con- 

 densed. We may say, in the mean time, 

 that one of our correspondents in Canada 

 believes that European foul brood is one of 

 the worst scourges that ever visited this 

 country. He says he has had extended ex- 

 perience with it, and thinks the only way 

 to get rid of it is to burn every colony- 

 hives, bees, combs, and all. If it get? a 

 start in the apiary he would burn the whole 

 yard. He would favor legislation to com- 

 |)el every beekeeper to exterminate colonias 

 affected with this scourge. 



