Question about varroa mite treatment this time of year

[BumbleBoy]

Hi,
We received our first Nuc two weeks ago and they were homed into the brood box of our new national hive.
The bees seem to be doing great. When we inspected them a week ago, they created comb and honey on the remaining frames of the ten in the broodbox.
We placed a super with another 10 frames on top with the queen excluder between them.
However, we checked the tray below the mesh two days ago and found >25 varroa mites (a corner of which is shown below)



We cleaned the tray and left it for the last two days and found ~10 or so mites.

We were wondering, have we missed the Spring window to do a Apiguard varroa mite treatment and will have to wait until August now?
If we haven't, does the addition of the Super along with the honey it will capture complicate things?

Thanks for your help!

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

how much actual brood is in the hive? do you actually need the super?
regardless, there are treatments available that you can use with supers on.

 

[BumbleBoy]

Thanks for the reply, jenkinsbrynmair. We added the Super as we were following the advice that if >75% of the previous box space was used (in this case, the brood box), we should add another?
We have apiguard sachets as we bought them to have them when we got set up first a month ago. However, we can look into other treatments if that is a better path to take.

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

we were following the advice that if >75% of the previous box space was used (in this case, the brood box), we should add another?

it's not quite that straightforward, the usual advice is, wait for them to draw out all the frames, and when they have seven or eight frames full of brood, then super.

We have apiguard sachets as we bought them to have them when we got set up first a month ago. However, we can look into other treatments if that is a better path to take.

yes, you need to look at something else, maybe formic acid based such as MAQS which you can use with supers on - or if you know of beekeepers who use Oxalic Acid sublimation, ask them for help.

 

[BumbleBoy]

Thanks. OK, with this information, I think we have a plan.
I will check the brood box again and see if we were premature in adding the Super.
If we were premature in adding the Super, I will remove it along with the queen excluder for now.
Since we do not have a Super in place then, we can use the apiguard.
We will add the crown board to give room for the apiguard, and then add the apiguard for the next four weeks.
Then hopefully, the brood will be at 7-8 frames full in the brood box so we can remove the crown board, remove the apiguard, add the queen excluder, add the super, add the crown board and lid.

If it turns out that we were not premature in adding the Super, we will investigate using MAQS or Oxalic Acid.

 

[BumbleBoy]

We had a look at the hive tonight and it doesn't look healthy :-(
Many of the cells are very dark in color. Many cells contain black shriveled up larvae. We could not find the queen even though we found her when we first moved the Nuc into the Hive two and a half weeks ago. We could not find signs of fresh eggs. There seemed to be less bees and activity overall in the hive since we last checked it a week ago. We removed the super for now until we figure out what to do next.

Is this recoverable?

 

[E&MBees]

Do you have a mentor or a local beekeeper who would be able to have a look with you? There appears to be some runty looking queen cells on the frames in the second and fourth photos. A disease check would be a good idea too. In the first photo some of the black larvae on the right hand side appear to have slumped in the bottom of the cells. If these are scales, they are associated with a disease called Foulbrood and your local bee inspector needs to be contacted to come and assess the situation.

 

[JamezF]

I agree. I think the queen is gone. Looks like they've tried to make an emergency queen cell in several places.

I've never seen a "live" case of EFB, only in photos, but I'd be concerned that's what you might have from looking at the first photo.

James

 

[JamezF]

If they do have EFB then I'd also be concerned that the supplier may be distributing affected colonies.

James

 

[rusper]

Where were all the bees when you took the photos? It may be chilled brood if there are not enough bees to cover the brood and keep the temperature up

 

[Eyeman]

As others have said get help. Looks like parasitic mite syndrome. Last photo shows DWV, bee centre frame.

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

looks more like chilled brood than EFB, seems most of the workforce has absconded and the remainder couldn't cover the brood.

 

[Curly green finger's]

I agree, that’s chilled brood alright!
I also see pin holes in some of the capped worker brood which would suggest high mite levels.
They need a round of vaping or strips added.
Also maybe swap positions with a stronger hive to bolster that colony with bees

 

[BumbleBoy]

Thanks for the responses folks. They are very helpful. The suggested issues so far are EFB, parasitic mite syndrome/DWV from varroa and chilled brood due to hive absconding. We are currently contacting the local associations and where we did a course to see if we can get some advice. For the time being, we will add the Apiguard to try and reduce mites if they are the cause. We are surprised and disappointed at how fast it deteriorated from only getting the Nuc two weeks ago. Ive added more photos if it helps with the suggestions. The help is appreciated.