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28 



EIGHTH ANNUAL. REPORT OF THE 



Black Brood. 



Black brood is another fatal and 

 contagious disease among bees affect- 

 ing the old bees as well as the brood. 

 In 1898, 1899 and 1900, it destroyed 

 several apiaries in New Tork. Last 

 year I found one case of it in Wiscon- 

 sin, which was quickly disposed of. 

 Dr. Howard made more than a thou- 

 sand microscopic examinations and 

 found it to be a distinct form of bac- 

 teria. It is most active in sealed brood. 

 The bees affected continue to grow 

 until they reach the pupa stage, then 

 turn black and die. At this stage there 

 is a sour smell. No decomposition 

 from putrefactive germs in pickled 

 brood. In black brood the dark and 

 rotten mass in time breaks down and 

 settles to lower side-walls of the cell, 

 is of a watery, granulated, syrupy 

 fluid, jelly-like, is not ropy or sticky 

 as in foul brood, and has a peculiar 

 smell, resembling sour, rotten apples. 

 Not even a house-fly will set a foot 

 upon it. 



Treatment. 



Best time is during a honey-flow, 

 and the modified McEvoy plan, much 

 as I have treated foul brood, by 

 caging the queen five days, remove the 

 foundation starters and giving full 

 sheets, keeping queen caged five days 

 longer. As great care should be taken 

 of diseased hives, combs, honey, etc., 

 as in foul brood. 



Dysentery. 



Dysentery among bees in Wisconsin 

 in the spring of the year is often quite 

 serious. Many colonies die with it. 

 Dysentery is the excrements of the old 

 bees; it is of brownish color, quite 

 sticky, and very disagreeable-smelling 

 and is sometimes mistaken for foul 

 brood. 



Causes. 



1. Bees confined too long in the 

 hives, so that they can no longer with- 

 hold their excrements, and are com- 

 pelled to void the same on the other 

 bees and combs. 



2. Poor winter stores gathered in 

 the fall from honey-dow, cider-mills, 

 sorghum-mills, rotten fruit, also some 

 kinds of fall flowers. 



3. Old and especially moldy pollen 

 or bee-bread. 



4. Hives too cold or damp. If mois- 

 ture from the breath of the bees is 

 not carried out of the hive by some 

 means, such as through a deep cushion 

 of some kind over the bee^ that will 

 absorb moisture and at the same time 

 retain the heat, or by some means of 

 ventilation so that all is dry and com- 

 fortable. If mold forms on the combs 

 or cellar so damp as to form mold, 

 there is great danger the bees will 

 have dysentery and die. 



Treatment. 



1. First of all, have an abundance 

 of combs of sealed clover or basswood 

 honey in brood-frames carefully saved, 

 and see that each colony is wintered 

 on such food. Three or four such combs 

 will winter a fair colony safely if con- 

 fined on those combs late in the fall 

 and the hive contracted to fit the same. 

 This is one of the most important con- 

 ditions for success in wintering. 



2. If in the fall the bees have gath- 

 ered this unwholesome honey from the 

 above-named sources, it should all be 

 extracted and either exchanged for 

 those honey-combs, or feed the bees 

 good honey or sugar syrup until win- 

 ter stores are secured. This should 

 be done before cold weather in the 

 fall. 



3. Hives contracted and made com- 

 fortable, whether in cellar or outdoors. 



4. If wintered in chaff hives out- 

 doors with feed as above directed, and 

 there come one or two warm spells 

 during winter so that the bees can 

 have a cleansing fiight, they will not 

 have dysentery or dead brood, and will 

 be much stronger when clover opens. 



If wintered in the cellar the bees will 

 not need as much honey, and if the 

 winters are generally long with doubt- 

 ful warm spells, the cellar will be best. 

 But to keep the bees from dysentery 

 so often fatal to cellar -wintered bees, 

 they should have such winter stores as 

 above spoken of, then the cellar kept 

 at a uniform temperature, about 42 

 deg. F., ventilated so the air is fresh, 

 and no mold w^ill form in the cellar. 

 Fresh air-slaked lime on the bottom 

 of the cellar may help if it is damp 

 or has poor air. 



5. Dysentery will not appear if beea 

 are kept on sugar syrup, or best-grade 

 white clover or basswood honey, and 

 are in a dry place, either sheltered by 

 cellar or chaff-hive. 



