MRS. ALOIS AND BEE-KEEPING.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXV, Issue 9130, 11 August 1888, Page 3

MRS. ALOIS AND BEE-KEEPING.

TO the editor. Sir,—Mrs. Aldis has chosen to denounce the Foul Brood Act as a piece of impertinent and uncalled-for legislation, and compares it with the Codlin Moth Bill. The reckless nature of Mrs. Aldis' methods of interference with matters outside her domain was never more strikingly illustrated than in this, and the profundity of her ignorance never more clearly shown. The comparison of the Foul Brood Bill with the Codlin Moth Bill is absurd. In the latter case fruitgrowers do not want it, or were divided in opinion; on the Foul Brood Act beekeepers are unanimous in desiring its passage. As a beekeeper of considerable experience I can only compare foul brood amongst bees to smallpox or leprosy amongst human beings, and there is precisely as much sense in opposing the stamping out of foul brood amongst bees as there would be in opposing the attempts to extinguish smallpox. Foul brood is more deadly to bees than smallpox to human beings. If I had a case of foul brood in my apiary I should first sulphur all the bees in the infected hive or hives, and then burn up hive, comb, honey, and every appurtenance of that hive. That is my opinion of Foul brood and its deadly nature. In England, in the United States, in Australia, in New Zealand, and all over the world beekeepers are unanimous in their terror of this scourge. Mr 3. Aldis has never had any experience of foul brood, and does not understand what it is ; otherwise it would be utterly impossible for her to write as she has done regarding it.— am, &c., R. J. Kendall.