60 . HISTORICAL NOTES ON BEE DISEASES. 
tures were made from the larve before feeding and after feeding. 
Bacillus alvei did not appear on the plates made before the colony had 
been fed the culture, while many appeared on those made after the 
cultures were fed. The culture therefore reached the larve and no 
disease resulted. While the negative results of these few experiments 
were not sufficient to disprove an etiological relation between Bacillus 
alvet and foul brood, it did cause those doing the work to question the 
experimental results which others had mopenrod 
The samples of American foul brood which were received and 
examined were labeled ‘‘foul brood.’ Six of the seven samples of 
this disease received gave no growth when cultures were made. 
Concerning the bacteriological findings in this disease the following : 
is written: 
Stained cover glass preparations made from the dried dead larve contained large 
numbers of spores, but they failed to grow in any of our media. 
Since the spores which were found in such large numbers in the 
larvee dead of this disease would not grow, no inoculation of healthy 
brood was attempted. The samples of this disease did not show, 
on examination, the presence of Bacillus alvei. This at once sug- 
gested the fact that the disease is not the one studied by Cheyne as 
foul brood. 
A study of five samples of the so-called pickled brood gave 
practically negative results both microscopically and culturally. 
The point to be noted here is that no fungus was found in this dis- — 
order corresponding to the one described by Howard (p. 42) as 
Aspergillus pollum. This fact very naturally suggested the proba- 
bility that Howard had made another error in the determination of 
the cause of a brood disease. 
The report included the study of brood from only three healthy 
apiaries. In samples taken from two of them, Bacillus alvei was not 
found, while a sample from the third apiary which was thought to be 
healthy but in a diseased district, showed the presence of Bacillus 
alver in considerable numbers. 
The following facts were learned in the investigations just reviewed: 
1. At least two infectious diseases affecting the brood of bees 
exist. This fact had been known, however, for some time by the 
inspectors of apiaries of New York State, and by Dzierzon (p. 18) 
and many others years before. 
2. Howard had erroneously reported European foul brood to be a 
new disease, which he named the ‘‘New York bee disease” or ‘‘black 
brood.” 
3. To produce foul brood in a healthy colony by feeding cultures 
of Bacillus alvei was by no means easy. | 
