§ IX.] DISEASES OF BEES. 313 



distasteful to the bees and therefore should not be dis- 

 posed, to advise its use. The best thing to do is to 

 break the hive up at once. The bees may be saved by 

 being put in quarantine a short time, and the hive 

 cleansed as before mentioned; but if the hive be a 

 valuable straw one, after cleansing and scraping, the 

 interior should be coated with shellac dissolved in spirits 

 of wine. If a frame hive it will be best to have new 

 frames rather than to attempt to cleanse the old ones. 

 To allow a hive to die out is very dangerous, because 

 the bees from other hives will rob and carry the infected 

 honey to their combs, and thus every colony within bee- 

 flight is liable to be polluted. 



It may be well to give a hint about using old combs. 

 Any that is very black should be rejected, because the 

 disease is sometimes present in old hives, and also 

 because each maggot leaves behind a silken film which 

 lines the top, sides, and base of the cell, also a slight 

 deposit of excrement which the bees do not clear away ; 

 thus the cells grow smaller and the bees reared in them 

 are also diminished in size, although the bees do add a 

 little to the mouth of the cell. On this account we would 

 recommend all when purchasing stocks to see that they 

 are not very old. The combs of a hive may be said to 

 be the furniture and storehouse of the bees, which in long 

 service wear out and to some extent become after a lapse 

 of years unfit tenements for use. To remedy this, Nature, 

 always true to het laws and careful to make provision for 



