BEEKEEPERS’ ASSOCIATION.

Manawatu Standard, Volume LX, Issue 129, 1 May 1940, Page 8

BEEKEEPERS’ ASSOCIATION.

At tho first meeting in the winter session of the Manawatu branch of the National ’ Beekeepers’ Association, held at Massey College, on Monday evening, Mr F. J. Lew-in presided. Mr W.: G. Short, of Feilding, delegate to the National Beekeepers’ Association, in an address to the meeting, covered .many important decisions relating to marketing, disease control, etc. Mr E. A. Field, of Foxton, was congratulated on being re-elected for a further term as Dominion president. The apiary instructor (Mr H. F. Dodson, of the Department of Agriculture) gave a lantern lecture dealing with the life-cycle of the bees’ larvae. After discussing the various characteristics associated with this, Mr Dodson showed some remarkable pictures of the hatching of the bacillus from a spore after it had been introduced into the bee larva. He also enumerated, various infection points for a hive, from which microscopic tests had been made. The results of these presented considerable evidence that the infective possibilities of foul brood tendered to increase in ratio to hive disturbance, thus considerably strengthening the case for the destruction of diseased colonies as opposed to thentreatment. The technique w-hereby the infection points w-ere microscopically.examined created a good deal of interest, bringing into question as it did the desirability of using queen hives in the apiary or saving valuable queen bees from diseased hives for re-intro-duction. Since the conclusion of. the infectious tests indicated the desirability of destroying diseased hives, Mr Dodson concluded his lecture with illustrations of the best methods of destroying and burning them. A vote of thanks to the speaker was proposed by Mr Field.