ILLINOIS STATE BEE-KEEPERS' ASSOCIATION 



87 



one to discover it. A veterinary sur- 

 .geon said to me: "I wish you would 

 look at a colony of bees; they are do- 

 ing no good." As soon as I opened the 

 hive, I discovered foul brood, because 

 there is an odor about it that if you 

 •ever get the scent, you will never for- 

 get; that is, American foul brood. Eu- 

 ropean foul brood I know nothing 

 about, except as I hear. 



Different persons who purchased bees 

 from this man had foul brood, and I 

 told them so. We have a foul brood 

 law in the State of Kansas. 



The man who sold these bees came 

 up to me, and said: "You are doing 

 me a great injury; unless you take 

 it all back, and quit circulating such 

 reports, we intend to prosecute you." 

 "All right, sir," I said. "I would like 

 to have you do that right away, and 

 if you don't, I will commence on you. 

 I will prove, now that we have got 

 the law on our side, that you have 

 loul brood among your bees, and it has 

 got to be cured." 



Immediately I sent an inspector to 

 Ms apiary, and he pointed out to him 

 where the foul brood was. "You have 

 mot cured it at all; you have taken out 

 those dead larvae, but it is a fact, 

 which no one has a right to dispute, 

 "but what it is in the honey of that 

 hive, and the honey has to be taken 

 away, and the wax." 



I make it a point not only to take 

 lioth away, but to disinfect the hivea 

 completely. 



As to the method of treatment: Mr. 

 Baldridge has a system I like very 

 much, if the bees were all of a size, 

 and theji never slipped past the bee- 

 escape. I can save more brood by that 

 method than any other, provided the 

 iDees don't go in there and come out 

 again and carry the diseased honey 

 into the hive you put the bees in that 

 belonged to that hive. 



He takes his hive and turns it 

 square around, and all the bees that 

 usually leave the hive, within a given 

 length of time (I suppose it is about 

 twenty-four hours), the bees that leave 

 the hive will go out and come into the 

 hive that you put on the old stand, 

 then the young bees that hatch out, 

 as they come out, you can turn them 

 in, and the disease is undoubtedly 

 cured, but we don't know when they 

 get down; twenty-four hours may be 

 long enough for all the bees to come 

 out. 



I have tried the McEvoy. system and 

 found it good. He takes the position 

 that if the bees are put into the hive 

 and given foundation, and shut them 

 up in the cellar for, say from twenty- 

 four to forty- eight hours, they will 

 consume all the honey that is in the 

 hive. I have put them in a new hive, 

 and then have put coal-oil or kerosene 

 into the hive and set fire to it, so as 

 to destroy everything of living kind 

 inside, and put them back. 



I have taken the top bar door of 

 the frame, leaving off the end and bot- 

 tom, and simply fastened a strip to 

 the top bar of the frame, turning the 

 bees loose on that and let them stay 

 there from twenty-four to forty-eight 

 hours, and then take that away from 

 them and give them sheets of comb 

 foundation, and they will consume all 

 the honey that may have been spilled 

 in the interior of the hive. 



One of my largest colonies got foul 

 brood. To illustrate, I will put three 

 chairs in position, to represent three 

 hives. That gentleman represents one 

 stand; here is the diseased stand, and 

 here is another one, six feet away. I 

 did not want to take it away from the 

 auiarv; that would have been die most 

 satisfactory method of treating it if 

 one could adopt it, but I could not at 

 that time. Now here was thlfe colony 

 within six feet of it. I took the bees 

 out, lifted the hive down by the side 

 of the stand, put a new hive on it, 

 and brushed the bees off; I kept the 

 honey from going on the ground to 

 prevent other bees gathering it up; I 

 took the precaution of spreading a 

 sheet down in front, so that every 

 young bee would have an opportunity 

 to crawl up that sheet into the hive. 

 I brushed the bees ofE. I would not 

 risk shaking them, because more or 

 less honey would fly out and be scat- 

 tered and the disease be spread; I 

 didn't want to do that. I felt sure 

 that almost every bee went into the 

 hive. 



Well, in about two w^eeks, I was 

 crestfallen, to find that foul brood had 

 crept into this hive (indicating), which 

 hive had been entirely free before. 

 What caused it? A bee or two went 

 into that hive and carried some honey 

 with it. I have made up my mind 

 to this: The safest way to rid a col- 

 ony of foul brood is to find some lo- 

 cation remote from your apiary, and 

 take that hive away, beyond the reach 



