FOt'Ii-BROOD. 473 



weather is not the originating cause. The disease is not com- 

 monly dangerous, and does not seem to propagate itself from 

 one colony to another, but in some seasons, during the month 

 of May, it has caused great ravages in some apiaries. In the 

 province of Ancone, Italy, during the years 1901-05, entire 

 apiaries were depopulated just at the opening of the honey 

 harvest by this strange malady. This is a disease of the adult 

 bees and not of the brood. 



Mr. 0. 0. Poppleton of Florida recommends the jprinkling 

 of the bees and combs in the diseased hives, with powdered 

 sulphur. But as this seems to stop the disease m.'jinly by 

 destroying all the sick beesj and as it also destroys the im- 

 sealed brood unless this be removed, we do not recommend it. 

 An Italian, Mr. A. Belluci of the province of Ancone, suc- 

 ceeded in entirely preventing the disease in his apiary, while 

 his neighbors' bees were suffering heavily, by feeding them a 

 preparation made by boiling lavender, garden ginger, rose- 

 mary, savory and other aromatic plants and flowers in wine 

 mixed with honey. Since the wine was evidently added as a 

 tonic but lost all its alcohol by boiling, we judge that it did 

 but little good, unless it be from the tonic properties of the 

 grape. He also added a very small quantity of salicylic acid, 

 about one per thousand, which would be ample. Until more 

 positive experiments are made, we would recommend the use 

 of a similar preparation, for the cure or prevention of this 

 disease, which is riot usually injurious. 



Foul-Brood. 



786. There are other unimportant diseases, which have 

 not yet been studied, but all are nothing, when compared to 

 the dreadful contagious malady, already known thousands of 

 years ago* and commonly called foul-brood, because it shows 



* As Aristotle (.History of Animals, Booh IX., Chap, ■l^0^ speaks of a 

 disease whicli is accompanied by a disgusting smell of the hive, there 

 is reason to believe that foul-brood was common more than two thou- 

 sand years ago. 



