18 BULLETIN 804, U. S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE 



On June 25 an Italian queen was introduced in a cage with candy 

 even though a few scales were still present. This was fully 10 days 

 after the colony had lost its queen, if not a little longer. On June 

 27 the queen was out and laying in one comb. Eight days later, on 

 July 5, a recurrence of disease was noted, one larva being discolored 

 and sunken, showing Bacillus pluton on microscopic examination. 

 From that time on, for about 20 days after the first eggs of this 

 queen were noted, one or two new diseased larvae appeared at each 

 observation, the number decreasing, however, until about the twenty- 

 sixth day when they had all disappeared. As the new young Italian 

 bees increased, the disease decreased, until a point was reached where 

 they were in the predominance and had eliminated the disease by 

 their activity. This was also observed in colony F. 



COLONY K 



Race. — Hybrid. 



Queen. — 1917. Dark hybrid of their own raising, probably from diseased 



stock. 

 strength in spring. — ^^Veak. 

 Strength at time of treatment. — Eight frames of scattered brood and 



hardly enough bees to cover them. 

 Approximate date of disease first noted. — May 31, 1918. 

 Date of start of treatment observations. — June 20, 1918, at which time 



the queen was removed. 



Colony K, when it was brought to Ithaca, was so weak that it 

 would soon have died. The bees made no attempt to clean out larvae 

 that had been partially pulled out of the cells with forceps and 

 crushed. On June 26, six days later, they were still showing freshly 

 diseased, moist, melting larvae from eggs laid by the old queen, just 

 before removal. At this time five frames of emerging brood and 

 Italian bees were given this colony. On the 2Tth a new Italian queen 

 was hung in with the cage closed. The presence of the new queen, 

 however, seemed to give added impetus to the house cleaning so that 

 by July 1, 11 days after removal of the queen, they were prac- 

 tically cleaned up and the cage was opened with candy in the open- 

 ing. Further observations on this colony were ended because they 

 refused to accept this queen. By the time another queen finally was 

 accepted and was laying on July 18, it was too late, as the season's 

 work was closed by the 23d. 



BEHAVIOR OF BEES IN CLEANING CONTAMINATED CELLS 



On June 6, 1918, a sample was received for diagnosis (No. 5898), 

 consisting of an entire brood comb, containing quite an area of 

 capped honey. About one-half of each side of the comb contained 

 a large number of dead and diseased European foulbrood larvae, in 

 stages varying from the yellowish, moist, melting larvae to dried 

 rubbery scales of which there was quite a large proportion. This was 



