Bees going crazy today

[pargyle]

A good post IMHO
There is a world of difference between making an informed decision based on observation and monitoring, and neglecting your duty of care without a clue whats going on with your bees.

Thanks MBC .. I recognise that I have much to learn and this forum provides rich pickings for experiences that I hope I never have to confront ... but it's just great to know that there are always going to be beekeepers who have faced and overcome some of the disasters that lay in wait for us ... prepared for them or not ! The advice provided, often very quickly, is appreciated by those of us humble enough to recognise that we only know a miniscule amount about beekeeping and understand even less !!

 

[TryingToLetThemBee]

I have bought the Thymol crystals in readiness for any signs of varroa. .....

I think it's worth the effort. One hive or not ...

I bought crystals as well, but in the end went Apiguard on the back of a couple of overdoses on the HM recipe. In home-brew, I am definitely following the newbie-take-care approach.

 

[rachann]

Like taking an aspirin every day in case you get a headache .... you might not get one if you don't, but you won't know until you stop taking aspirins ...

Schrodinger's cat

 

[Dusty Rhodes]

As a first year beekeeper and only 2 hives, I was in a quandry having read numerous posts of different views on whether to treat or not... my apparent drop was low but then i wondered about earwigs and ants and the rest of it and in the end i thought to myself, The treatment will not kill the colony, the varroa could well do, I can't afford to lose my bees so this year I will treat and when I am more experienced or can afford to make up losses or strengthen hives in the future I can go back to this debate then.

Well said, Roola.

Dusty

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

Schrodinger's cat

Did that get headaches?

 

[user 6228]

yet by treating and still not getting 100% eradication you are selecting the fastest breeding, strongest, hihest impact Varroa.
This selective breeding of Varroa develops aggressive traits more rapidly than the development of bees as the Varroa have many more sexual cycles per year.

 

[pargyle]

As a first year beekeeper and only 2 hives, I was in a quandry having read numerous posts of different views on whether to treat or not... my apparent drop was low but then i wondered about earwigs and ants and the rest of it and in the end i thought to myself, The treatment will not kill the colony, the varroa could well do, I can't afford to lose my bees so this year I will treat and when I am more experienced or can afford to make up losses or strengthen hives in the future I can go back to this debate then.

I don't see anything wrong in this as a philosophy ... you have considered the options and have done what you think was right for your colony and you.

So ... have you treated yet this year and if you have what was the drop when you did ?

 

[TryingToLetThemBee]

yet by treating and still not getting 100% eradication you are selecting the fastest breeding, strongest, hihest impact Varroa.
This selective breeding of Varroa develops aggressive traits more rapidly than the development of bees as the Varroa have many more sexual cycles per year.

Derek: I am NOT PROVOKING BUT AGREEING. I think the story is that by treating with Thymol, Formic, or Oxalic, it is harder for the mites to adapt because they are poisoned at a more fundamental level than the acaricides operate, and so it is harder for them to adapt. It seems to me that ANY treatment must carry the risks of the sort you describe given the reproductive cycles you describe. Given that and the possibility of knocking a Q on the head and I think we newbies need to learn the FULL implications of IPM, rather than simple rules. OK, so maybe it takes a season or two but it is clearly an urgent necessity.

 

[pargyle]

Did that get headaches?

No ... but if you read up about it then it will give you a headache thinking about it ... Is it alive, is it dead ... no - it's just at the cusp. Better try quantum physics - it's more understandable !!

 

[madasafish]

yet by treating and still not getting 100% eradication you are selecting the fastest breeding, strongest, hihest impact Varroa.
This selective breeding of Varroa develops aggressive traits more rapidly than the development of bees as the Varroa have many more sexual cycles per year.

I must be doing something wrong then as I have used thymol based treatments for 4 years and my mite counts have consistently fallen from hundreds to practically nil.

Unless of course I have bred a super resistant strain of varroa which don't die and hang on after death.

 

[pargyle]

I must be doing something wrong then as I have used thymol based treatments for 4 years and my mite counts have consistently fallen from hundreds to practically nil.

Unless of course I have bred a super resistant strain of varroa which don't die and hang on after death.

No ... you're doing something right .. the question now is ... having got them to that state of practically nil mites .... can they maintain that level without assistance from thymol.

If you hadn't treated this year would you have still the same result ? You are back to Schrodinger's cat ...

 

[Roola]

I did, Having attended a divisional meeting where it was discussed that Bayvarol had not been used locally for many years I thought i'd do an experiment and sling some in... well, from having no apparent drop prior i had a drop of around 90-100 in the first 12 hours which showed the Bayvarol to be doing its job... It has remained on subsequently and has had a drop of 5-6 per day as the brood cycle has continued and bees have hatched. Therefore I felt grateful I erred on the side of caution as those good few hundred mites that dropped could be other a thousand now if they had remained in the hive. I also don't feel guilty either as the bees were unbothered by the bayvarol. Obviously I know some areas there is significant mite resistance to that and Apistan but where I am it seemed to hit them. I'll use something else next year to mix it up and reduce resistant strains. I just feel better for sending my bees into winter in a healthier state.

 

[pargyle]

I did, Having attended a divisional meeting where it was discussed that Bayvarol had not been used locally for many years I thought i'd do an experiment and sling some in... well, from having no apparent drop prior i had a drop of around 90-100 in the first 12 hours which showed the Bayvarol to be doing its job... It has remained on subsequently and has had a drop of 5-6 per day as the brood cycle has continued and bees have hatched. Therefore I felt grateful I erred on the side of caution as those good few hundred mites that dropped could be other a thousand now if they had remained in the hive. I also don't feel guilty either as the bees were unbothered by the bayvarol. Obviously I know some areas there is significant mite resistance to that and Apistan but where I am it seemed to hit them. I'll use something else next year to mix it up and reduce resistant strains. I just feel better for sending my bees into winter in a healthier state.

You made the right choice and it was confirmed by the result ... nothing to hate there !!

 

[TryingToLetThemBee]

I did, Having attended a divisional meeting where it was discussed that Bayvarol had not been used locally for many years I thought i'd do an experiment and sling some in... well, from having no apparent drop prior i had a drop of around 90-100 in the first 12 hours which showed the Bayvarol to be doing its job... It has remained on subsequently and has had a drop of 5-6 per day as the brood cycle has continued and bees have hatched. Therefore I felt grateful I erred on the side of caution as those good few hundred mites that dropped could be other a thousand now if they had remained in the hive. I also don't feel guilty either as the bees were unbothered by the bayvarol. Obviously I know some areas there is significant mite resistance to that and Apistan but where I am it seemed to hit them. I'll use something else next year to mix it up and reduce resistant strains. I just feel better for sending my bees into winter in a healthier state.

I have some Bayvarol in my shed and am keeping it for trouble, not my current v light drop. It's (hopefully) a big gun that (undoubtedly) shrinks dramatically with each firing, and of course shrinks everybody else's gun as well.

 

[TryingToLetThemBee]

Back to the topic, in people's experience, how fast can a fairly-strong colony (bees on 9/10 FULL single-deep frames) fill brood-frames with ivy nectar?

 

[Roola]

I just think like anything else, it can be used but not every year... mixing up treatments is the best way to treat as no one strain of mite can get a resistnace foothold. As i said, next year if i choose to treat i'll use something else. I don't feel it is shrinking other people's guns at all... as long as it is used AS DIRECTED. Many people didnt follow the instructions for Bayvarol or Apistan and left them in the hive too long hence potency dwindled and resistance grew... that would be shrinking others 'guns'.

 

[TryingToLetThemBee]

I just think like anything else, it can be used but not every year... mixing up treatments is the best way to treat as no one strain of mite can get a resistnace foothold. As i said, next year if i choose to treat i'll use something else. I don't feel it is shrinking other people's guns at all... as long as it is used AS DIRECTED. Many people didnt follow the instructions for Bayvarol or Apistan and left them in the hive too long hence potency dwindled and resistance grew... that would be shrinking others 'guns'.

It wasn't meant as a direct criticism; just reflecting my own thought process. Agree on the leaving on too long; that certainly seems to have hurt. But developing resistance goes with the territory, unfortunately.

I'm actually a varroa optimist as I think collectively we are getting on top of it. Good luck over-wintering and with everything.

 

[pargyle]

I just think like anything else, it can be used but not every year... mixing up treatments is the best way to treat as no one strain of mite can get a resistnace foothold. As i said, next year if i choose to treat i'll use something else. I don't feel it is shrinking other people's guns at all... as long as it is used AS DIRECTED. Many people didnt follow the instructions for Bayvarol or Apistan and left them in the hive too long hence potency dwindled and resistance grew... that would be shrinking others 'guns'.

That's very true and if you read some of the articles from the early days of Varroa coming to the UK ... (we tend to forget that it was only 20 years ago) ... you find that there was little initial cognisance, of the potential for 'over treatment' and 'residual effects' of the pyrethrins and coumaphos. The products available were highly effective and it is clear that some beekeepers felt that, rather than follow the manufacturer's instructions, they were doing their colonies more good by keeping the varroacides in place on an almost permanent basis. Whilst this did not harm the bees it was the incredibly rapid onset of resistance to the chemicals that led, in part, to the disastrous years of 1995 to 97 where colony losses were immense. Even at this stage, there was some denial that it was resistant strains of Varroa that were spreading the fastest in the UK.

We have to be incredibly careful that the evolutionary trends we have seen in the past are not repeated. I know that everyone seems to be saying that thymol and organic acids cannot 'possibly' be treatments that varroa could become resistant to .... I hope so and that this proves to be the case.

In the meantime ... we should be working towards evolution of bees that can withstand the varroa mite. The bees found within their origin localities in Asia, Apis Cerana, are 'hygienic bee' and cope with Varroa; there is evidence that the Africanised bees in the USA & South America are also able to cope. Whilst I am not suggesting that any introduction of these species or cross breeding is desirable the fact is that their distant cousins, the European honeybee, should also, in time, be capable of evolving to a strain more able to live, successfully, alongside Varroa and the viruses they spread. Natural selection has a way of working things out and the evolutionary lifecycle of bees is relatively short ... not as short as varroa or fruit flies ... but short enough to alter within a reasonable time frame. Given the opportunity.

 

[Putnamsmif]

What is 'the evolutionary lifecycle' of the honeybee? How long did honeybees take to evolve to their current evolutionary niche? 5 years? 5000? 50000? 5000000? I'd suggest it's actually nearer the latter.

 

[TryingToLetThemBee]

Call it ten times varroa, and varroa were resistant in a couple of years. It's a matter of stress, and the stress on varroa was extreme. We could have hygienic bees in a heartbeat; there'd just be (by one estimate I've seen) 90% losses getting there. The hygiene breeding programs are isolated but v encouraging. Then there's the next pest of course; look at the history of the Buckfast. I worry about the AMM programs in that light, given the history.

<ADD> Which is why I REALLY disapprove of destroying wild colonies, let alone the nests</ADD>