478 DISEASES OF BEES. 



Some apiarists insist that the only way to get rid of ropy 

 foul-brood is to entirely destroy the colonies suffering from it, 

 hives, bees and combs, by fire. This is wanton waste and 

 quite unnecessary. 



In spite of Cheshire's assertion that no spores are to be 

 found in the honey of diseased colonies, practice has sufficiently 

 proven that Cheshire's assertions on that score were erroneous. 

 The honey, in this disease, is the main source of transmission. 

 Schiraoh, the man who discovered that a queen may be reared 

 from any egg that would produce a worker (109), in his 

 " Histoire Naturelle de la Reine Aheille" (The Hague, 1771), 

 recommends the removal of all the combs, starving the bees for 

 two days, then giving them fresh combs with a remedy composed 

 of diluted honey with nutmeg and saffron. 



792. Following this advice, D. A. Jones of Canada, and later, 

 Wm. McEvoy, then inspector of apiaries for the Province of 

 Ontario, succeeded fuUy in the method which we here give 

 and which is now recommended by all authorities, with slight 

 variations. Mr. N. E. Prance, for a long time inspector of 

 apiaries for Wisconsin and former General Manager of the 

 National Beekeepers' Association, who has had a most exten- 

 sive experience in the matter of foul-brood, gave the method 

 in the following words : 



McEvoy treatment: . "In the honey season, when the bees 

 are gathering honey freely, remove the combs in the evening 

 and shake the bees into their own hives; give them frames with 

 comb-foundation starters and let them build comb for four 

 days. The bees will make the starters into comb during the 

 four days and store the diseased honey in them, which they 

 took with them from the old comb. Then in the evening of the 

 fourth day take out the new comb and give them comb founda^ 

 tion (fuU sheets) to work out, and then the cure wiU be com- 

 plete. By this method of treatment aU the tainted honey is 

 removed from the bees before the fuU sheets of foundation are 

 worked out. All the old foul-brood combs must be burned or 

 carefully made into wax after they are removed from the hives, 

 and aU the new combs made out of the starters during the four 

 days must be burned or made into wax on account of the 



