n8 A Modern Bee-Farm 



3. — The disease is probably never communicated without 

 direct contact. 



I now come to a proposition that probably does set 

 forth a new theory, which however I trust has already 

 been reduced to fact by my own practice. During 

 my severe trial of many years since, for two to three 

 seasons in succession I had several hives standing 

 within a few feet of others diseased, but for the reason that 

 the combs of the former were built across the frames, 

 having been purchased in that condition,' they escaped 

 ordinary manipulations, and were simply supered each 

 year. Strange to relate, these stocks quite escaped infec- 

 tion, and the fact largely helped me in finally clearing the 

 apiary, because I quite saw I had previously been the 

 means of infecting further hives by not being sufficiently 

 careful. I then had no hesitation in saving all the brood 

 combs but slightly diseased, during the gradual decline of 

 the malady, and I began to get the upper hand of 

 it. Thus one or two queenless stocks were made to 

 take such brood combs as another stock would be com- 

 pletely renovated, and when all the living brood had 

 hatched, those stocks were finally renovated and the combs 

 destroyed. Then at last I knew once more the true 

 pleasures of bee-keeping, and enjoyed the sight of all 

 healthy stocks with the combs occupied by larvae of the 

 usual pearly whiteness, which denotes health, vigour, and 

 an end to the long period of anxiety and losses. 



I am convinced that the spores of the disease need cause 

 no anxiety just because it is considered they may float 

 in the air and would naturally adhere to one's clothing. 

 I had another apiary some two miles from the one then 

 suffering from the disease, and I would go straight from 

 the infected stocks to this apiary, and make the usual 

 examinations. My hands only had been cleansed, but 



