I was reading Peter's article "A Brief History of Honey Bee Disease" in the June ABJ and saw in 1878 Pastor Dzierzon lost a number of stocks from mad sickness, bees tumbling about as if intoxicated. I just had some one email the other day with these symptoms in her hive. Here is what she wrote: "My colony which came out of winter seeming populous, still heavy, and apparently amply fed (they didn't touch the candy board I gave them at the end of winter, even though they were bubbling up to the top of their deep + deep + medium 10-frame hive). With the warming of spring, their flying activity looked good. Upon doing a full hive inspection two weeks ago, however, I found that there were only two frames of bees, which included all stages of healthy-looking brood, healthy-looking brood cappings (though a little spotty), and a healthy-looking queen. No poop in the hive. I centered them up and surrounded them with their pollen and honey resources. With the dandelions and trees in bloom, I thought I just needed patience for them to strengthen and grow. A week ago, to make them feel less overwhelmed in their space, I reduced the hive down to their deep brood chamber + their medium honey box. I also removed their screened bottom board insert (only 2 varroa) to increase ventilation. What I started seeing, a few days after, looking up through the SBB: - several tumbling bees—casually wandering, seemingly jumping, maybe falling back down onto the SBB on their backs, and then buzzing back onto their feet - another day, many (50-ish) dead bees on the SBB, plus a crew of tumbling bees - another day, more dead bees, plus the tumblers...you get the picture In front of the hive on any given day: 5-ish "tumbler bees" in the grass." I looked some more about mad sickness and found some older books, 1800's, relating it to when Mountain Ash and Apple trees bloom. It is a little early for mountain ash here and apple just have king blossoms. There is no fermented honey in the hive and no syrup. So what is mad sickness? Karen T-K *********************************************** The BEE-L mailing list is powered by L-Soft's renowned LISTSERV(R) list management software. For more information, go to: http://www.lsoft.com/LISTSERV-powered.html