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STATE BEE-KEEPERS ASSOCIATION. 155 



foul brood. The dead bee will be at first swollen, with a 

 black head, dried to a hard bunch and often turned up — 

 Chinaman-shoe like. The skin of the dead bee is quite tough, 

 and, if punctured, the thin, watery fluid of the body will flow 

 as free as water, often a little yellow or brownish-colored 

 from the dissolved pollen from the abdomen of the bee. It 

 has very little or no smell, does not at any time stick to the 

 walls of the comb, is easily pulled out of the cell, is never 

 ropy or sticky, and if the colony is properly cared for, the 

 bees will take care of themselves. Plenty of liquid, unsealed 

 honey and pollen near the brood, and hives so protected as 

 to keep bees and brood comfortable on cold days and nights. 

 Never put bees on old black brood-combs, or those with 

 dead brood in; better make wax of the combs and give the 

 bees full sheets of brood-comb foundation. 



'V TREATMENT. 



Keep all colonies strong, with plenty of unsealed honey 

 near the brood, and if hives are properly sheltered so as to 

 be warm on cold days and nights there will be little or no 

 pickled brood. If the Queen is old, shows weakness by put- 

 ting several eggs in one brood-cell, and nursing several others, 

 so that the brood is patchy, I would kill such a queen, fe^d 

 the bees a little, and when queen-cells were started, remove 

 them all and give them a queen and bees, between two of her 

 own brood-combs from a hive where she had lived. I do not 

 think pickled brood is often the fault of the queen, but rather 

 a lack of proper food and heat in the hive. In most cases a 

 shortage of liquid honey, or moldy pollen, even in hives with 

 plenty of sealed honey in the outer combs. There is a time 

 in spring in Wisconsin between dandelion and white clover 

 bloom when there is no honey coming in from flowers and 

 often cold days and nights so that the live bees consume the 

 liquid unsealed honey first, and cluster in a compact body to 

 keep warm, the result often is the larval bee just changed 

 from the egg to a tender little grub, is either starved, half- 

 fed or chilled so that it grows slowly and too often dies, 

 and we first notice this about the time white clover honey begins 

 to come in. In other parts of the State, where pickled brood 

 appeared it was from the same cause, and at other dates, 

 which was due to a difference of time of honey bloom. 



Wherever I fed daily some honey or even sugar syrup, 

 and kept the hive warm, all dead brood soon disappeared ; 

 while in the same apiaries other colonies affected and not 

 so treated, continued bad for some time, but got rid of it as 

 soon as treated. 



Strong colonies of bees in the fall with a young laying 

 queen, and an abundance of good honey sealed or capped 

 by the bees, if properly cared for during winter whether in 

 the cellar or in chaff hives, wintered out of doors in sheltered 

 location, seldom have pickled brood, chilled or other dead 

 brood, or dysentery, and are the colonies that give their 

 owner profit. 





