rHE BEE-KlEEPERS' Rb,VIi:W, 



309 



1 have seen some of my colonies, that were 

 decimated in the spring, apparently get well 

 when summer came on ; but the shiny bees 

 are now beginning to reappear in them all, 

 even among those requeened with queens 

 from the North, which I once thought could 

 resist the disease. 



In the light of what has lately been pub- 

 lished as to Cheshire's discovery of the bacil- 

 lus Gaytoni as being the origin of the mal- 

 ady, it seems doubtful whether there is any 

 hope of cure. I know the infection is borne 

 about on the body of the bee itself, as I have 

 seen an apparently healthy queen from an 

 infected hive carry the disease into an api- 

 ary hitherto wholly free from the trouble ; 

 and as I have seen the malady spread from 

 an infected hive to all those close by in a 

 short time. Now, foul brood can, it appears, 

 be eliminated, because the bacillus develops 

 only in the larvfe ; and when the infected 

 honey and infected combs and hives are got- 

 ten rid of, and the bees put into clean hives 

 and on clean combs, the bacilli are all got- 

 ten rid of, and the malady eradicated, as ap- 

 pears from what is said of the methods of 

 treatment that have been reported as suc- 

 cessful. But reasoning on principle, what 

 is to be expected of a disease propagated by 

 mere contact, and where, after you have 

 transferred the bees to clean combs and clean 

 hives, as I have done, and fed them on - ugar 

 syrup for a while and then transferred them 

 again, yet after all there are the seeds of the 

 disease in the shape of the bacillus lurking 

 in the body of an infected bee or queen, that, 

 under favorable conditions, propagates the 

 infection anew ? 



It seems that we need the scientist, with 

 his microscope, to take the matter in hand, 

 and hunt the bacillus down thoroughly, and 

 tell us whether the spores of this organism 

 are preserved in the honey, and thus carried 

 into the stomachs of the larvae ; also to let 

 us know whether it lurks in the combs and 

 on the walls of the hives. .Then, and not 

 till then, can the disease be treated scien- 

 tifically. 



But, after all, for one I utterly despair of 

 any means that will exterminate the disease. 

 Beyond all doubt it is infectious. My own 

 experiments have satisfied me that it is in- 

 fectious, and that the contagion is carried 

 on the body of the insect. Now, granting 

 that it is infectious, how can we get rid of 

 the bacillus by any method short of destruc- 

 tion of the individual that carries it about, 

 and perhaps of the hive, honey, and combs, 

 if they too contain spores of the bacillus ? 



Our doctors stop the spread of yellow fever 

 by drawing a cordon of quarantine around 

 the infected city. This being done, they do 

 not physic the whole city at once, nor do they 

 administer remedies to kill the yellow fever 

 germ in the sick person, because they know 

 that any remedy that will kill the germ will 

 kill the patient. May not this be true in the 

 economy of the hive ? We can not quaian- 

 tine the infected bee against his fellows, of 

 course, nor can we quarantine the infected 

 colony against the robbers from other col- 

 onies, which, just at the time when the dis- 

 ease is most virulent, and has overpowered 



the sick community, rush in and sweep away 

 the poison into their own homes. 



The two articles of Mr. Getaz, of Tennes- 

 see, published in the American Bee Journal 

 this year, and lately reproduced in the Bee- 

 Keepers' Review, have been read with great 

 interest by me, as showing that bee paralysis 

 has become endemic in the neighborhood 

 where he lives, doubtless by the very process 

 above indicated. The same thing has hap- 

 pened, it appears, in California, I believe in 

 Sm Bernardino Co., where it has destroyed 

 thousands of colonies, according to the 

 statement of Rambler, in Gleanings. What- 

 ever may be the result of bee paralysis in the 

 North, it is in this climate a disease that is 

 destructive to all prospects of honey produc- 

 tion for profit ; and it is my conviction that 

 the only method of dealing with it is to 

 promptly destroy every colony that shows 

 infection, and thus stamp it out. 



For the benefit of those wlio buy queens, I 

 think that the note of warning should be 

 sounded, and that often, against buying of 

 any breeder who has this disease in his api- 

 ary. How are the inexperienced to be pro- 

 tected against this danger ? 



Columbia, Miss., Oct. 27. 



The editor of Gleanings remarks as fol- 

 lows : 



[Mr. Ford has been having a very large, 

 not to say trying, experience with this 

 trouble. I have had considerable correspon- 

 dence with him, suggesting every thing that 

 might in the least abate the malady. J. A. 

 Golden, as well as Mr. Henry Alley, both felt 

 sanguine that the salt remedy, if properly 

 applied, would effect a cure, and at one time 

 I was in hopes it would help him out ; but if 

 any one has tried salt faithfully, and found 

 it wanting, I am sure Mr. Ford has. Noth- 

 ing is able to stay its progress among his 

 bees ; but it should not be forgotten that the 

 virulence of the disease is largely a matter 

 of locality. While it was fearfully destruc- 

 tive — far more so than foul brood — in Mr. 

 Ford's locality, in parts of California and 

 other warm climates, it is as nothing in the 

 North or colder climates. But its very in- 

 significance in the North makes it insidious 

 and dangerous for the South. Why ? The 

 Northern queen breeder, I am afraid, does 

 not always realize how dangerous a mild 

 case of palsied or swelled bees may be when 

 the queen of said bees is sent to the South. 

 No queen breeder, at least who advertises and 

 sells queens, should allow a case of bee paral- 

 ysis to remain in his yard one day after its 

 discovery. The bees ought to be entirely 

 destroyed, even though the case will appa- 

 rently cure itself, which in many cases it will 

 do in his own yard. 



It is positively settled now, that the queen 

 can and does transmit the disease ; yes, she 

 can carry it several thousand miles, from a 

 locality where it can do no harm, to one 

 where it will do fearful mischief in an api- 

 ary. 



Dr. Howard, the one who wrote that ad- 

 mirable work on foul brood, and a scientist 

 of no mean order, and a microscopist, is 

 about to turn his attention to it. I shall 

 await his investigations with interest.— Ed.] " 



