Asian Hornet - Update

[Karol]

It honestly just wont work, well with the product I use "frontline" I've experimented so much with this, I'm guessing 1/4 of a drop is maximum, anymore and it kills them within 5 seconds. If you treat anywhere other than its posterior it dies too.

VV get up very early, many hours before the bees and go to bed late after the bees, as you say not nocturnal. Letting them off late isnt an option either as you need to catch so many. Not to mention all the time im treating them they are wriggling and trying to sting me with their 5mm stinger dripping with venum. Its a full time job and with feeding bees I'm shattered. Keep thinking though, I'll try anything you suggest.

I understand the handling issues that you have with stun, treat and release. If it were me I would probably adapt a small tapered butterfly net and fit a gated corral to the end of it. I would then use a small paint brush to apply the laced sugar paste. Once applied the corral is simply opened to release the hornet. That way there's no major handling issues save lifting the butterfly net by the corral so that the hornet climbs up and into the corral.

The thing is if you use a sugar paste which is wet but still viscous, you'll be able to use a stronger concentration of fipronil because the hornet will not be exposed to the full dose (contact surface area vs volume vs concentration) and what's more when the hornet gets back to the nest its colleagues will clean it thereby coming into contact with the fipronil.

As Karsal says, I'd use Fipronil ant powder in the sugar paste but you could also experiment with something like Maxforce Ant Killer Bait Gel which is ready made and paint that onto the hornet instead.

 

[Karol]

Because its already made it to the UK and thriving, they have built that nest in Tetbury. Here we only have one stream, everywhere else is burned with the sun. I think they are more versatile than you give them credit for. The other scary thing is the UK has a 100% record of not being able to control any invasive species, so once its here it is here. The NBU need to be pulling their socks up before its too late and relying on locating nests alone wont work for ever.

One nest is hardly thriving. We don't know the state or condition of the Tetbury nest. It certainly didn't sound like it was populated with circa 5000 workers which I believe is the norm for velutina given that only a handful of hornets were seen hawking at nearby hives. We don't know as yet whether the nest spawned any queens and if not then the nest didn't thrive quickly enough to generate its sexual progeny which again can hardly be described as thriving.

As for the hornets in Portugal then they are by and large confined to the north west and you might find this interesting: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26953252 which may explain why you have such a problem in Porto.

So, areas that are truly burned with the sun in inland Portugal (with lower insect populations) are free from the Asian hornet.

 

[Karol]

Yes, within 48 hours, these things are territorial and the vaccum I create brings in hornets from other nests in lower numbers im guessing. Its tough work. I'm emailing associations here to help.

OK, then I suggest that you try a campaigned approach. Catch and release fewer hornets but do so repeatedly every third day. You may at the moment be unnecessarily catching and treating too many hornets. Give the pesticide time to work and adapt your catch and release rates accordingly. Also and this is very important, make sure you start the programme as soon as you see hornets at the hive. Don't wait until their numbers build before you start. That way you will nip the nests in the bud before they get established but it's really really important that you don't stop for as long as even a single hornet comes to your hives.

 

[Karol]

I'm feeding and if I spill a drop of syrup they are heading that way instead of the front of the hive for protein.

The way these hornets work, from what I've seen after losing 3 hives to them this year, they eat the bees from the front of the hive, (Always the end hives) weaken it and then they enter it eating the honey and finishing off the bees, you can tell from the state of the wax its hornets raiding not bees robbing, huge holes in the wax. You also find lots of hornets inside the hive.

This is really interesting. What it tells me is that the hornets in your area are struggling to get sufficient insect food. I wouldn't expect hornets to divert to sweet feeding in preference to taking insect (honeybee) prey unless they weren't able to collect sufficient insects to keep the brood properly fed. That being the case you have another tool that you can use against the hornets and that's high efficiency wasp traps (not home made NBU recommended traps) which I would bait up with honey, lager and water. I'm afraid I can't say any more because forum rules prevent me from doing so. However, specifically for you I think this offer another method of control made possible because it doesn't sound as if velutina has quite enough insect prey to get by in the hunting phase.

 

[Millet]

Mazzamazda i think you are it seems theres a core here who dont think their will be Asian Hornets in the UK. Well they should think again.
They will establish in the uk, or if not they will be constant outbreaks.
The question is what will be the best way to deal with them in the UK as their dynamics and behaviour may be different slightly different to that neighbouring Europe. One cannot ignore the Tetbury and more recent outbreak as an example and these are only the ones that have been located. The Tetbury being an" A "typical example.

Theres no question that their might not be enough insects to support their rapid summer growth. They dont just take pollinators, were forgetting that. They take all sorts, caterpillars , spiders from webs, etc, etc. they are highly dynamic.

I still say that early highly selective trapping, with the right attractant and traps, combined with summer catch, treat and release will control the numbers, (once theres a core overwintering population of queens. otherwise it isn't really worth bothering about.)
Comercial beekeepers dont seem to be too worried at this stage, As they have hives in numbers. They can spring trap and catch and release, if numbers become a problem.
Its unlikely that bees on late summer heather will have an issue either, as hornets are more than likely to stick to their home range after getting established in a valley of wooded copse.

The added bonus you have in the uk is the same population of France but divide the surface area by four. This may make it easier to find nests with added foot soldiers as has already been pointed out by Karol.

I am sure in time, the Asian hornet will become "just another thing to deal with",
which indeed you will. I admit when we first started seeing them i was deeply concerned. Now well, we just get on with it!!

Just to add, that no invasive insect species in Europe has ever been successfully control. get used to the facts!!

I One Million percent agree.

 

[Chiangmai member]

I understand the handling issues that you have with stun, treat and release. If it were me I would probably adapt a small tapered butterfly net and fit a gated corral to the end of it. I would then use a small paint brush to apply the laced sugar paste. Once applied the corral is simply opened to release the hornet. That way there's no major handling issues save lifting the butterfly net by the corral so that the hornet climbs up and into the corral.

The thing is if you use a sugar paste which is wet but still viscous, you'll be able to use a stronger concentration of fipronil because the hornet will not be exposed to the full dose (contact surface area vs volume vs concentration) and what's more when the hornet gets back to the nest its colleagues will clean it thereby coming into contact with the fipronil.

As Karsal says, I'd use Fipronil ant powder in the sugar paste but you could also experiment with something like Maxforce Ant Killer Bait Gel which is ready made and paint that onto the hornet instead.

The way we 'dust' them in Chiangmai, is to stun them at the hive entrance with a badminton racket or equivalent. Pick up the dazed hornet with a pair of tweezers, drop it into a 500ml plastic water bottle, empty except for a small amount of insecticide powder, take the bottle well away from the hives, give the bottle a shake and then lay the bottle down horizontally. After a few minutes a white hornet appears which will then fly off. It seems that they can live for about 10 minutes after dusting in this way. That may be long enough for them to return to their home colony where we hope that grooming spreads the poison to others in the nest.

Does it work? After a few years of doing this, I am still not convinced. But a beek friend of mine recently received some complaints from local people who collect hornet larvae to sell at local markets, (50 satang each for those interested), who said that some hornet nests around his apiary were dead.

 

[mazzamazda]

One nest is hardly thriving. We don't know the state or condition of the Tetbury nest. It certainly didn't sound like it was populated with circa 5000 workers which I believe is the norm for velutina given that only a handful of hornets were seen hawking at nearby hives. We don't know as yet whether the nest spawned any queens and if not then the nest didn't thrive quickly enough to generate its sexual progeny which again can hardly be described as thriving.

As for the hornets in Portugal then they are by and large confined to the north west and you might find this interesting: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26953252 which may explain why you have such a problem in Porto.

So, areas that are truly burned with the sun in inland Portugal (with lower insect populations) are free from the Asian hornet.

I would say at a guess its an average sized nest. I have seen a few and some can be 30cm and others as long as a metre, one around 100m from my apiary.

The Portuguese authorities have given up on the VV, dont log nests or even destroy them. They once had 2 part time nest destroyers but they laid them off as couldnt get to the nests to destroy. VV has made it to the South of Porugal but again not documented. I have sold hives to people in the South and they tell me its a terrible problem for them. They give out terrible advice IMO like closing down entrances. This funnels the bees into a smaller area and makes for easier hunting. I dont actually have a problem in Porto, the problem area is north of Vila Verde (50 miles North) not near the sea, burned and hardly any water source. The insects they feed from there are my bees!

 

[mazzamazda]

This is really interesting. What it tells me is that the hornets in your area are struggling to get sufficient insect food. I wouldn't expect hornets to divert to sweet feeding in preference to taking insect (honeybee) prey unless they weren't able to collect sufficient insects to keep the brood properly fed. That being the case you have another tool that you can use against the hornets and that's high efficiency wasp traps (not home made NBU recommended traps) which I would bait up with honey, lager and water. I'm afraid I can't say any more because forum rules prevent me from doing so. However, specifically for you I think this offer another method of control made possible because it doesn't sound as if velutina has quite enough insect prey to get by in the hunting phase.

There was an old guy who I used to look after his hives for. He used honey cappings all year round to trap hornets when I couldnt find something they would go for. I didnt like his method as also used to catch bees. He had a 5 litre container and empty it with thousands of hornets in. The hornets must really like honey is what I think. Would honey mixed with lager keep away bees?

 

[mazzamazda]

OK, then I suggest that you try a campaigned approach. Catch and release fewer hornets but do so repeatedly every third day. You may at the moment be unnecessarily catching and treating too many hornets. Give the pesticide time to work and adapt your catch and release rates accordingly. Also and this is very important, make sure you start the programme as soon as you see hornets at the hive. Don't wait until their numbers build before you start. That way you will nip the nests in the bud before they get established but it's really really important that you don't stop for as long as even a single hornet comes to your hives.

Will try it!

 

[mazzamazda]

The way we 'dust' them in Chiangmai, is to stun them at the hive entrance with a badminton racket or equivalent. Pick up the dazed hornet with a pair of tweezers, drop it into a 500ml plastic water bottle, empty except for a small amount of insecticide powder, take the bottle well away from the hives, give the bottle a shake and then lay the bottle down horizontally. After a few minutes a white hornet appears which will then fly off. It seems that they can live for about 10 minutes after dusting in this way. That may be long enough for them to return to their home colony where we hope that grooming spreads the poison to others in the nest.

Does it work? After a few years of doing this, I am still not convinced. But a beek friend of mine recently received some complaints from local people who collect hornet larvae to sell at local markets, (50 satang each for those interested), who said that some hornet nests around his apiary were dead.

Ok, this is what I first started doing, you have to be stronger. Instead of a stun try a much smaller zap, it just holds the hornet long enough to grab a wing, keep the hornet very much alive, wear gloves, they go absolutely crazy, you have to be brave! Do your dusting and throw it into the air. I'll try and do a proper video today.

 

[mazzamazda]

Ok, this is what I first started doing, you have to be stronger. Instead of a stun try a much smaller zap, it just holds the hornet long enough to grab a wing, keep the hornet very much alive, wear gloves, they go absolutely crazy, you have to be brave! Do your dusting and throw it into the air. I'll try and do a proper video today.

Ok here is a terrible video of the catching process, apologies about the quality but as you can probably appreciate its tough getting volunteers.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DDf6apHpW_4&feature=youtu.be

 

[WoodenBeam]

Mazzamzda, what type of gloves are you wearing to protect against getting stung? V.brave by the way, I suppose practice makes perfect ��

 

[Erichalfbee]

Ok here is a terrible video of the catching process, apologies about the quality but as you can probably appreciate its tough getting volunteers.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DDf6apHpW_4&feature=youtu.be

Excellent.
Thank you

 

[mazzamazda]

Mazzamzda, what type of gloves are you wearing to protect against getting stung? V.brave by the way, I suppose practice makes perfect ��

They are thick yellow leather Simon the beekeeper gloves with latex ones over, brave or stupid, I'm not sure!

 

[WoodenBeam]

They are thick yellow leather Simon the beekeeper gloves with latex ones over, brave or stupid, I'm not sure!

Thanks

 

[B+.]

They are thick yellow leather Simon the beekeeper gloves with latex ones over, brave or stupid, I'm not sure!

Do you spray a particular part of the hornet? It looked to me that you were aiming at the thorax

 

[Torq]

Someone answer me this.

Why is the European Hornet just confined to certain areas of Britain and non existent here in Ireland?

Is it climatic conditions and could we expect the Asian Hornet to colonise only the same areas until such time that climate change makes the rest of the isles suitable for them?

 

[Teemore]

Someone answer me this.

Why is the European Hornet just confined to certain areas of Britain and non existent here in Ireland?

Is it climatic conditions and could we expect the Asian Hornet to colonise only the same areas until such time that climate change makes the rest of the isles suitable for them?

Been meaning to raise this question. We just don't get hornets over here although I know a couple of beekeepers who claim to have been called in to help deal with hornets nests in the middle of imported materials.... Does Ireland lack sufficient insect life to allow hornet colonies to build up in Spring?

 

[mazzamazda]

Do you spray a particular part of the hornet? It looked to me that you were aiming at the thorax

Really aiming at the abdomen, furthest part from its head.

 

[mazzamazda]

Excellent.
Thank you

Haha thanks!