256 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



May 



were cured to keep them cured. She is excellent in 

 prescribing for the bee-fever; perhaps she can give 

 a remedy for "small sections on the brain"— the 

 prevailing disease among some bee-keepers at the 

 present. My remedy is a warm bath, followed by 

 three grains of good sense, hourly, if the patient 

 can stand it; if not, all he can stand. 



E. B. SOUTHWICK. 



Mendon, Mich., Apr. 9, 1883. 



I really beg pardon, friend S. It must 

 have been my absent-mindedness that made 

 me mention only Ohio. I commend your 

 remedies, especially the last ones. 



SENDING FOUL BKOOD TO MICHrGAN, ETC. 



Page 171, April No., contains the request that you 

 please keep I'ruf. Cook reminded that infected bees 

 will be sent him, etc. Allow me, as a Michigan bee- 

 keeper, to solemnly protest against sending foul 

 brood to this State on any pretense whatever. I 

 trust Prof. Cook won't be the first to allow our law 

 against the spread of foul brood to be broken. 



Abronia, Mich., April 9, 1883. T. F. Bingham. 



I agree with you in the main, friend B. ; 

 yet if, by letting a single colony of foul 

 brood come into the State of Michigan, to be 

 used only by a careful man like friend Cook, 

 for the purpose of getting a perfect remedy 

 for foul brood, it seems to me the good would 

 overbalance the evil. Would this not be 

 copying the law in spirit, not in letter ? 



Here is a line from Prof. Cook himself 

 on the matter : — 



Dear Mr. Editor:— Upon further consideration I 

 think it would be unwise to have foul brood sent to 

 me here. It is not a good material to send about the 

 country. So I have written to Mr. Muth not to send 

 it. Practically this will make no difference; for, 

 like Mabomet and the mountain, if the mountain 

 won't come, Mahomet will go. I can go where foul 

 brood is, and try the experiment. A. J. Cook. 



Lansing, Mich., Apr. 11, 1883. 



HONEY-DEW, NOT ALWAYS DAKK HONEY. 



Let us look at our bees. They did very well for mo 

 last season, and went into winter quarters in extra 

 good shape, I thought, for they were very strong, 

 and had plenty of honey. I went into winter with 32 

 or 33 swarms, and at the present writing they are 

 half of them dead, and I do not know what to think. 

 I have heard people talk about honey-dew, but I 

 never " swallowed " any of that until last fall, and 

 then I had to give it up, for we had considerable of 

 it. I could not see what my bees went to the woods 

 so early in the morning for, so I followed, and found 

 the maple leaves wet with dew; and it was sweet, 

 and the bees busy gathering that sweet. This was 

 after the honey season was over with us, or nearly 

 so, and they made a nice lot of honey; but it was not 

 as thick and heavy as clover honey. My cousin, 

 some three miles from me, noticed the same thing I 

 did. The honey was very fair and clear. Could that 

 have any thing to do with my bees dying. There are 

 others who are losing as well as myself. All of 

 those colonies that have died have left plenty of 

 honey. I do not take Gleanings now, but I get it 

 to read, and I prize it very much. The Homes are 

 worth all the book costs. 



RASPBERRY HONEY; IS IT POOR? 



I saw an article in a Cincinnati paper, calling the 

 honey that the bees get from the raspberry blossom 

 not very good, being dark, and, I think, bitter. There 



are a good many raspberries cultivated in this neigh- 

 borhood, and everybody wants a section or two of^ 

 the honey. We thiak it very clear and thick, and I 

 think there must be a mistake about its being poor. 



Z. D. St. John. 

 Gustavus, Trumbull Co., O., April, 1883. 



I think it is a mistake about raspberry 

 honey being poor, friend S. I think it quite 

 likely that the one who wrote the article had 

 got some apple-tree or dandelion honey in 

 place of It, as raspberry blooms at the 

 same time as apple-tree anddandelion. That 

 from the latter is always dark and poor, if I 

 am correct. I am glad to have you bring 

 out the point, that honey-dew is not always 

 dark and bad, and very likely it had some- 

 thing to do with your loss of bees. 



ANOTHER DISEASE OF THE BROOD. 



I should like to call attention to a brood disease 

 that has nearly ruined bee-keeping in this part of 

 the countrj'. It is so insidious and obscure that it 

 has not been noticed by any one else, so far as I 

 know, till I called attention to it. The young bees 

 die in every stage, from the egg to the perfect bee 

 just emerging from the cell. But I am not aware 

 that the adults are affected by it. It seems to be 

 very slow in its progress; and as I noticed it for the 

 first only last summer, I can't tell yet how long a 

 colouy may be affected and survive. 



In the early stage of the trouble, the dead seem to 

 be promptly removed; but after the worker fore 3 

 becomes much reduced, the dead can be found in all 

 parts of the brood-nest. But .'•II do not die; even to 

 the last, some come out ; pparently healthy, till 

 eventually the stock is weakened so that it is de- 

 voured by the moth, or perishes of cold in the win- 

 ter. So far as I have been able to observe, it is at- 

 tended with very little, if any, offensive odor. I 

 have tried starvation, salicylic acid, salt, sulphur, 

 etc., without any apparent effect. I also quarantin- 

 ed an affected colony for 36 hours, as recommended 

 for foul brood, and then put them on new founda- 

 tion with pure surroundings, and fed with syrup of 

 granulated sugar; but they carried the plague with 

 them in its most virulent form. 



I am now satisfled that I have had it amongst my 

 bees for more than twenty years, and that it has re- 

 duced my apiary from more than sixty strong col- 

 onies to three weak, worthless hives. I have no 

 doubt it is one of the types of foul brood of which 

 you speak, page 93, in the ABC. I think I have 

 reason to believe that this trouble prevails to a great 

 extent in Western Pennsylvania and Eastern Ohio, 

 and perhaps elsewhere. But it is so obscure that it 

 would hardly be noticed, except by the most careful 

 observers. I wonder if it would surprise my old 

 friend (and your correspondent), D. Binny, Esq., of 

 Addison, Michigan, to inform him that this disease 

 is what destroj'ed his apiary when he resided in these 

 parts. Has friend Muth, Jones, Cook, or any other 

 of your readers, noticed this form of "Blasted 

 Hopes " ? If any one is acquainted with it, and can 

 give a remedy, or any information on the subject, I 

 shall be pleased to hear from him. 



Milton Hewitt. 



Perryopolis, Fayette Co., Pa., April 6, 1883. 



I do not think I have ever met any thing 

 quite like the above, and hope it is confined 

 to one locality, and not contagious. Can 

 others throw any light on it V 



