XIV 
LIVERPOOL BIOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 
It is probable that young, growing, and 
multiplicative stages (the trophozoite and 
pansporoblast) of Nosema apis are capable of 
killing bees before the formation of spores has been 
attained, for dead bees were often found in which 
only young stages of the parasites could be 
detected. 
Like Nosema bombycis, the bee-parasite was 
possibly capable of hereditary infection, as 
infected bee larvae and a dead infected queen had 
been found and examined. Maassen had recently 
found infected drones in Germany, but the 
infection in drones was stated to be limited to the 
intestines. 
That Nosema apis was fatal to bees and allied 
Hymenoptera had been shown by feeding healthy 
hive bees, mason bees and wasps with honey 
infected with Nosema spores; also by placing hive 
bees dead of the disease among healthy hive and 
mason bees and wasps, and by direct contamination 
of healthy bees with infected faecal matter. In 
each case the insects experimented upon succumbed 
to the effects of Nosema apis. 
It should be noted that the virulence of the 
parasite appeared to vary in bees at different times 
of the year and in different localities. The bees 
were especially prone to the disease after bad 
seasons, such as had occurred in recent years. 
Some bees became chronics, forming reservoirs of 
spores, and so acting as parasite-carriers. 
The only certain destructive agent of the 
Microsporidian spores is fire, and all infected bees 
and hives, and any débris therefrom should be most 
carefully burned. 
