FOUL BROOD THE WAX MOTH. 113 



however, be present when no foul brood exists; but if, upon opening 

 some of the cells whose caps are sunken or slightly punctured, a brown, 

 ropy, putrid mass is found, which, when lifted on the end of a sliver of 

 wood, glides back into the cell or strings down from the mass like thick 

 sirup, it is pretty certain that foul brood is present. Caution is neces- 

 sary or it may be spread all through the apiary. The hands, as.well as 

 all tools used about the infected colony, should be cleansed by washing 

 in a solution of corrosive sublimate (one-eighth ounce dissolved in 1 

 gallon water) before going to another hive. If but few are found dis- 

 eased they should be burned at once at night, when all the bees are at 

 home. If all or nearly all are affected, or if the disease does not seem 

 virulent and other apiaries in the neighborhood are not endangered 

 thereby, a cure may be attempted. Removal of all of the combs and 

 confinement of the bees in an empty box, obliging them to frst until 

 some drop from hunger, followed after releasing them by liberal feed- 

 ing, will frequently effect a cure, as indicated many years since by 

 Mr. M. Quinby. The hives may be disinfected by washing in carbolic- 

 acid water and used again. A second removal of the bees and fasting 

 may be necessary in some cases. It will also be well to feed medicated 

 sirup 1 part of carbolic acid, or phenol, to GOO or 700 parts of sirup. 

 Many omit the fasting, but destroy all combs and frames and supply 

 comb-foundation starters, removing four days later all combs built and 

 giving a second lot of starters. It is well to supplement this treat- 

 ment with feeding of medicated sirup. Phenol having been suggested 

 to Professor Cheshire as a remedy, he experimented until he found 

 that if a sirup containing 1 part of phenol to 400 or 500 parts of the 

 food be poured in the cells adjacent to the brood, and the diseased 

 brood, after brushing off' the bees, sprayed with a solution of 1 phenol 

 to 50 water, a cure was speedily effected. The great risk of spreading 

 the disease, as well as the time and expense which a cure by drugs or 

 by the fasting process involves, will cause immediate destruction to be 

 resorted to as the cheapest in the end if taken in time. 



Bacillus gaytoni, also described by Professor Cheshire, is character- 

 ized by loss of hairy covering on the part of the workers and their 

 crawling out of the hives over the ground, constantly wriggling their 

 bodies until death occurs. It yields, according to Professor Cheshire, 

 to the same remedies as Bacillus alvei, but having been less destructive 

 and being far more likely to disappear without effort to cure it, less 

 attention has been given to it. Lately, however, it has been alarmingly 

 destructive in some of the extensive apiaries of California, Colorado, 

 and Texas, so that some simple remedy would be very welcome. 



THE WAX OR BEE MOTH. 



The larva of a moth known to entomologists as Galleria mellonella 

 Linn, gnaws passages through the combs of the bees, especially those in 

 or near the brood nest, often proving very destructive in weak or neg- 



