THE DISEASES OF BEES. 159 



CHAPTER XXXI. 



THE DISEASES OF BEES. 



Amongst the few distempers of Lees, dysentery may be 

 named. It is of very rare occurrence ; but doubtless it 

 is caused by un-wbolesome food, or a cold damp dwelling- 

 bouse in winter. Damp hives are very destructive of 

 the lives of bees in weak bives during the winter months. 

 To-day (January 17th) some of our hives were examined. 

 All were found quite dry save a few that were eked with 

 riddle-rims. Even the hives of these were perfectly dry ; 

 but the insides of the wooden ekes were as wet as water 

 could make them. How strange it is that some men will 

 recommend wooden domiciles for bees ! 



For dysentery, loaf-sugar and water boiled is a safe and 

 certain cure. 



rouL-BEOOD is the great and incurable malady of bee- 

 hives. From some cause or other, and in some seasons 

 more than others, larvae, or half-hatched bees (or brood), 

 perish in their cells, and become a putrid pestilential 

 mass in a hive. Prosperity departs from a hive when- 

 ever this happens, and sometimes the stench of it has 

 driven the bees whoUy out of the hive, and made them 

 buUd fresh combs underneath their boards; and some- 

 times they have gone off as swarms, abandoning their 

 hives in utter despair and detestation. An experienced 

 bee-keeper can smell this disease outside the hive, long 



