AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



715 



about the immunity of his bees while 

 inspecting his cakes of wax, and while 

 nuzzling among the skimmings from his 

 tank ; and it answers all that has been 

 written about the universal spread of 

 foul-brood, if it is true that foundation 

 may contain live spores. 



But, while voluntarily making this 

 admission, I wish to say that I think it 

 reasonable to believe that, when bees 

 are drawing out foundation, or during 

 some of the numerous changes of form 

 which wax undergoes in the hive, spores 

 may occasionally become stripped of 

 their coating of wax, and, being expossd 

 to moisture, perhaps in the saliva of the 

 bees, or in the food of the larva?, may 

 start the disease. The probability of 

 this taking place is so great that bee- 

 keepers would hardly venture to use 

 foundation knowing it to contain fertile 

 spores. 



There is probably nothing more to be 

 added to our present knowledge of the 

 subject by further argument. What we 

 now, require is e:s;periment to determine 

 the death point of spores of foul-brood 

 in melted wax. When this is known we 

 shall probably require , to know the 

 length of time a temperature of say 180^ 

 must be applied to have the same effect 

 as the temperature causing sterilization. 

 If these facts were known I am sure the 

 manufacturers would willingly make the 

 necessary changes in their processes to 

 meet the new requirements. 



To have the confidence of all con- 

 cerned,- such experiments should be made 

 by Dr. Sternberg, or some one equally 

 competent. This will cost money, which 

 at present is not in sight. 



The interests of manufacturers of 

 foundation, and the interests of bee- 

 keepers who use it, run ^parallel in this 

 matter. If foul-b'rood is more prevalent 

 now than it was fifteen years ago, which 

 is the opinion held by many, and if this 

 increase is attributable to the almost 

 universal use of comb-foundation of late 

 years, which I believe is the case, it is 

 only a question of time till bee-keeping 

 .will become unprofitable, and foundation 

 will not be . in demand. We are all in 

 the same boat, and we should all be 

 equally desirous to -know the whole 

 truth. 



Lindsay, Out.. Nov. 17, 1891. 



[We have given the foregoing article 

 exactly as it was written, in order to try 

 to satisfy our correspondent. 



In reference to the error made in our 

 remarks on page 804, we would say 

 that we made a correction on page 39, 



but it seems that we did not quite cover 

 the whole ground. The second and third 

 lines of paragraph (3, of the foregoing 

 , article (page 713) should read thus: 

 "The wax is heated to 212^, and kept 

 liquid for at least 24 hours." By an 

 oversight in quoting from Mr. Dadant, 

 the sentence was incorrect. But this 

 does not at all interfere with the argu- 

 ment, which it seems to us is unanswer- 

 able, and it matters not whether it is 

 made by a scientist or not. It may be 

 true that we "rush in where angels -fear 

 to tread," but the argument is just as 

 strong as if made by a scientist. That 

 it may not be lost sight of, we give it 

 again in its entirety, as corrected above, 

 Here it is : 



On page 448, Mr. Corneil approvingly 

 quoted this remark : " An exposure of 

 l}i hours to a temperature of 212^ 

 appeared to be equivalent to an expo- 

 sure of 15 minutes at 228^" — just one- 

 sixth of the time. The difference be- 

 tween 212^ and 257^, the point at 

 which spores are surely killed, is 45". 

 If that 1)4 hours are reduced to one- 

 sixth of that time by the increase of 15^ 

 in temperature, then IX hours at 212^ 

 equals 5 minutes at 257^ And Mr. 

 Corneil affirms that "it has been ascer- 

 tained that a long exposure to a lower 

 temperature produced the same effect 

 as an exposure to a higher temperature 

 for a shorter time." 



Dr. Sternberg shows that the death 

 point in micro-organisms was from 122° 

 to 212^, and that 5 out of 37 of the 

 strongest of them required 4 minutes of 

 moist heat to cause death, and one of 

 that five was bacillus alvei (foul-brood 

 microbes). 



Now, instead of merely subjecting these 

 microbes for 4 minutes to 212^ in mak- 

 ing comb-foundation, the wax is heated 

 to 212^ Fahr., and kept liquid for at 

 least 24 hours, as shown by Mr. Dar 

 dant's statement on page 470. Surely, 

 this is more than sufficient to take the 

 life out of even the strongest microbes ; 

 as they are for many times the length of 

 the time exposed to the temperature re- 



