In late summer 2001 I discovered what is probably the worst disease my bees have ever had, American Foulbrood. Over the last several years, I've been preoccupied with the various forms of mites, starvation, and other ailments. I honestly haven't been watching out for foulbrood. I probably would have never recognized the disease if I had not had the chance to see it firsthand at EAS.
The "match stick" test in progress. In addition to the generally poor brood pattern, the surest sign is the sunken and leathery appearance of the cappings. Highlighted in the above photo, notice the perforations in the cappings. They're not in the center of the cells. Bees cap cells almost in perfect circles from the outside in. Since these holes are in the side of the caps, it means the bees are in the process of opening the cell. Most likely because the larva inside is dead.
Up close and personal. This is the definitive field test for American Foulbrood. The putrefied remains of the larva will rope out if it’s fresh enough. These combs hadn’t advanced to the stage where the dead larva had dried up to a scale.
The colonies that failed the test were placed in a hole and completely burned. The remaining ashes were buried to prevent other colonies in the home yard from scavenging the unburned honey.
All the remaining colonies got dusted with premixed Terramycin from Betterbee on the Saturday of the burning, the following Wednesday and finally Saturday. The shot above also shows plain grease patties, which I keep on the colonies all year.
This outbreak occurred at the end of the second summer after I stopped treating in the spring with Terramycin extender patties. My colony numbers have been so depleted, I will have no choice to treat in the spring until I can build the numbers up.
The picture above shows just one of the practices that have changed since the outbreak. All frames in every super have been marked as to which hive they came from. These same frames will now go on this colony from now on. If the colony succumbs to foulbrood, the super frames as well as the brood frames will be destroyed. About the only thing I'll be salvaging, will be the boxes themselves which will be thoroughly scorched before reuse.
In closing, the decision I'll have to make is weather or not to treat routinely .I've been so distressed by all this, I'm just not up to making that decision right now.