G. W. BULLAMORE 57 



of the nineteenth century. The organism found in bees was named Nosema apis 

 and Zander looked upon it as the cause of heavy losses in Bavaria. The essen- 

 tial feature of the trouble was a sudden and extensive mortahty among the 

 bees inside and outside the hive. Dysentery was an occasional accompaniment. 

 Berlepsch's description of the epidemic of 1859 (see p. 54) is considered by 

 Zander to be a typical description of the ravages of unchecked Nosema 

 disease. 



The discovery attracted considerable attention. Maassen (1911) found 

 Nosema to be widely prevalent in German apiaries, but although he looks 

 upon the parasite as pathogenic he considers that unfavourable conditions 

 are necessary for the manifestation of disease. 



Nussbaumer (1912) found Nosema in association with heavy losses in 

 Switzerland. 



Beuhne (1916) states that Nosemn was first discovered in Austraha in 

 1909, but that observation showed that it was 



doubtful whether the presence of the parasite is in itself necessarily fatal, or that it greatly 

 interferes with the productiveness of the hives excepting under certain conditions due to 

 climatic influence.... In fact under ordinary conditions the disease is endemic, and becomes 

 epidemic only when the vitality of the bee is impaired by the malnutrition during the bees' 

 larval development which is caused by a dearth, or the inferior quaUty of the nitrogenous 

 food which bees obtain solely from the pollen of the flowers of plants. 



As the result of investigation at Cambridge (Graham-Smith, Fantham, 

 Porter, Maiden, and Bullamore 1912) a report was issued showing that Nosema 

 was present in a large percentage of stocks affected with Isle of Wight disease 

 and the disease was attributed to the presence of this parasite. 



Later, Anderson and Rennie (1916) working on the Isle of Lewis took up 

 the question of Nosema and Isle of Wight disease. They were unable to cor- 

 roborate the findings of the Cambridge investigation and state that Nosema 

 was found to be present in stocks without disease symptoms appearing. They 

 did not find Nosema distributed in the bees of all the stocks but only in a 

 few stocks at any one time, and when it occurred "Isle of Wight disease was 

 not present." 



The result is somewhat surprising as, assuming that Nosema is a com- 

 paratively harmless parasite, its non-occurrence in stocks suffering from Isle 

 of Wight disease seems to require some explanation. 



While the work on the Isle of Lewis was being carried on, continuous 

 importations of bees were being made from all parts of the country. Bees, 

 assumed to be healthy, were introduced into the apiary from Scotland, Eng- 

 land, Wales, Ireland, America, Switzerland, Austria, and Holland. These bees 

 developed crawhng symptoms at periods varying from a week to a month or 

 more after arrival. Consequently it is difficult to determine the disease with 

 which Anderson and Rennie were actually working or to feel sure that im- 

 portations of other diseases were not being made. The following are the 

 particulars of what is described as a spontaneous recovery. 



