THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



647 



have starved had he not fed them, his 

 Syrians liave laid by considerable 

 surplus. This Association can do no 

 wiser tliinf; than to encourage, in 

 every possible way, tlie improvement 

 of our strains of iSees. 



Owing largely to tlie stimulous given 

 by your action last year, the exhibi- 

 tions at our annual fairs have been 

 better, more general, and better re- 

 warded than ever before. Let us con- 

 tinue to urge separate buildings for 

 the exhibition of bees, honey, etc., 

 larger premiums, and then work to 

 make them in the best degree success- 

 ful. 



Your committee on fertilization in 

 confinement have all been at work to 

 succeed in this important but difficult 

 matter, yet in every case, if we except 

 Prof, llasbrouck. "without any signal 

 success. I have succeeded in having 

 one queen mated in the hive, as she 

 was clipped as soon as she left the 

 cell, and there was perforated zinc at 

 the entrance all the time, and upon 

 trial we found that the queen could 

 not crowd her thorax through the 

 openings. She positively could not 

 liave been mated on the wing, as she 

 never could Hy. It seems as certain 

 that she could never have been ferti- 

 lized outside the hive. Several other 

 experiments have all failed. Surely 

 this matter is too important to be 

 abandoned till we gain a method, if it 

 is possible (and there is great reason 

 to hope), that shall succeed in the 

 hands of all. 



During the year our attention has 

 been called to several matters that are 

 well worthy of mention liere. The 

 value of the perforated zinc in the 

 apiary is assured. The desirability of 

 an inclosure of wire gauze, and cloth 

 to surround us and the bees as we are 

 called to work with them when they 

 are not gathering, is also established. 

 This not only prevents the robbing 

 mania, but we tind that even Syrian 

 hybrids will not sting in such a tent. 

 We value ours very highly. Perhaps 

 the greatest discovery that has been 

 given widely to the public is the 

 method discovered by I. R. Good, of 

 Kappanee. Ind., to prepare food to be 

 used in shipping queens. It is simply 

 granulated sugar, moistened with 

 honey just so the latter will not run, 

 and yet so as to keep the sugar moist, 

 and do away with the need of water 

 in the shipping cages. Experience 

 seems to have proven tlie value of this 

 food beyond question. Is it not possi- 

 ble that this may give a hint to a lirst 

 class food for winter y 



With these preliminary remarks. I 

 will conclude this address with the 

 details of some investigations which 

 I have made to determine the nature 

 of the so called •• dry feces."' 



[The investigations will be found in 

 the Bee Journal of last week, page 

 626.— Ed. 



Mr. C. F. Muth gave the following 

 address on '• Foul Brood." 



Foul brood among bees, as the name 

 denotes, is a disease of the bee while 

 in the larsie state. It does not effect 

 the bee after it has attained its growth. 

 The disease originates, in this coun- 



try, from infection only, and spreads 

 rapidly because of its very insiduous 

 character. Brood may die in the 

 hives from chilling, smothering, starv- 

 ing, or other cause, decay and create 

 an unbearable stench at a time when 

 colonies are too weak to remove the 

 dead bodies. It will never create the 

 disease ■' Foul Brood." We may 

 hang these combs containing decay- 

 ing larvie in strong colonies, where 

 they will be "cleaned out" without 

 theleast bad result. 



Among the hives of my country 

 apiary I found, about the middle of 

 last August, 2 colonies with fertile 

 workers, which I Inoke up by remov- 

 ing the hives and giving the brood 

 combs to a young swarm a short dis- 

 tance off. I went out to the farm 

 again about 4 weeks afterward, ac- 

 companied by a bee-keeping friend. 

 While I was otherwise engaged, my 

 friend, who is a good bee-keeper, over- 

 hauled a number of colonies and 

 found one with "foul brood." He 

 had seen the disease at my home api- 

 ary, and knows chilled brood as well 

 as any of us. 



In this case, however, I doubted my 

 friend's judgment. Not having sali- 

 cylic acid at hand, we got brimstone 

 ready and deferred looking at the 

 colony until evening, after we had 

 finished the balance of the bees. I 

 was surprised at the sight ; about 4 

 weeks previous I had put 6 combs full 

 of drone and worker brood, from fer- 

 tile colonies into the second story of 

 tliis rather weak one, with all the 

 bees adhering to the combs, and shak- 

 ing all the bees of both hives in front 

 of this one. The bees had all left to 

 join their old hives ; the brood was 

 exposed thereby, and all had died. 



It bore a striking resemblance to 

 '• foul brood." but the brood, although 

 in an advanced state of decomposi- 

 tion, pulled out whole from every cell 

 with the head of a pin. This is hardly 

 ever the case with foul brood, where 

 the skin appears to decay at the same 

 time with the body, and the dead 

 larvie appears to be only a soft mass 

 without any cohesion. In order to 

 convince my doubting friend. I placed 

 the combs in second stories of strong 

 colonies, and buried only the most 

 offensive ones. I am certain I made 

 no mistake in the matter, and men- 

 tion the above in order to bring more 

 light on the suliject of " foul brood.'" 

 and to contradict and put on their 

 guard those of our friends who still 

 claim that chilling creates •' foul 

 brood," or that a good or bad season 

 has something to do with it. 



So many sample combs infected 

 with the disease, sent me for exam- 

 ination last summer from different 

 parts of the country, convinces me 

 that the knowledge of foul brood is 

 one of the most important subjects to 

 bee-keepers. Many are aware that my 

 home apiary has'been troubled more 

 or less with foul brood for a number 

 of years. I never made it a secret, 

 but showed the disease to every visit- 

 ing friend for his own information, 

 whenever it was in my power. Foul 

 brood never made any headway with 

 me, and, in no case, was it spread by 

 me, although I sold hundreds of colo- 



nies of bees, and a large number of 

 queens. My apiary was free from the 

 disease sometimes, for a year or more, 

 with no sign of foul brood anywhere 

 until the following fall or spring, I 

 would discover again a cell of foul 

 brood, or a number of them in one or 

 more hives. Whenever I noticed 

 those diseased cells in time, before 

 they had thrown out their infectious 

 spores, I made them harmless by 

 means of an atomizer, and succeeded 

 in the majority of cases. The hives 

 with which I failed kept me in "hot 

 water " for months, and sometimes 

 for all summer, and then, when " pa- 

 tience had ceased to be a virtue,'' they 

 were subjected to tlie radical cure as 

 given in ray pamphlet, " Practical 

 Hints to Bee-Keepers. "" 



It was a mystery to me what caused 

 the occasional reappearance of foul 

 brood in my apiary. I know that 

 spores of the disease may be hid for 

 years in crevices in or about the hives, 

 that a diseased larvaj pulled out and 

 dropped anywhere may infect a bee 

 accidentally alighting on it. but I was 

 so particular to removeall such causes, 

 aided by the peculiar location of my 

 apiary, that I could not believe a 

 friend correct, when he claimed that 

 I infected my bees by the use of sali- 

 cylic acid. 



Light was thrown on the subject 

 last spring and summer. A party 

 about a mile from my house (bee line 

 perhaps I4 mile) kept 12 colonies or 

 more of bees for several years, and 

 lost the last one last spring. I was 

 well acquainted with iiim, but his 

 black bees and old fogy style of keep- 

 ing them had never excited my curi- 

 osity. He came to me about the lat- 

 ter part of May and related that he 

 had kept bees now for 10 years, that 

 he got less bees every year, and that 

 the last colony had died this spring, 

 that a live'y robbing had taken place 

 when his hist colony fizzled out. and 

 that the robbers were my yellow bees ; 

 "and now," he concluded, can't you 

 buy my hives and combs," etc. I 

 went out and found him in possession 

 of about 600 combs ; every one of his 

 colonies had died 01 foul brood. The 

 combs showed it satisfactorily, and 

 ray bees.no doubt, had "saved the 

 pieces," whenever any one of the colo- 

 nies had given out. 



Three of my colonies apparently, 

 had been participating in the last 

 feast, during the beginning of that 

 beautiful spell of pleasant weather in 

 March. Two of them were put on 

 foundati(m. and were cured in the 

 same month, while the bees of the 

 third were sold to a druggist (for 

 medicine), and the combs burned. I 

 did not know the source of my trouble 

 until my neighbor saw me in the lat- 

 ter part of May. 



If I here give my experience in de- 

 tail, it is done because I think that in 

 this manner it is more likely to 

 "stick'' with the majority of bee- 

 keepers. I purchased the hives re- 

 ferred to above, with the proviso that 

 they be scraped off nicely, and the 

 conibs and frames burned before the 

 hives were delivered. This was done. 

 The hives were placed against a dark 

 wall in my stable, until I should have 



