Cleaning poly nice?

[Smudger55]

I have some poly nucs to clean, do I use soda crystal solution first then bleach or is just bleach ok ?

 

[Finman]

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What is that bleach?

 

[Finman]

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I use hot 3% lye water. Hot melts the wax and turns the wax to soap.

Lye sterilize everything.


Killit Bang sterilize and loosens/melts the wax in room temperature.

Cloride based bleaches sterilize, but as far as I know, it does not loosen wax.

If you only soak poly into hot water, wax attaches again on surfaces. Lye makes wax to water soluble soap.

 

[Erichalfbee]

I have some poly nucs to clean, do I use soda crystal solution first then bleach or is just bleach ok ?

I just use hot washing soda to dislodge the propolis and wax. As for bleach or Cillit Bang what's to sterilise? If you have a problem then bleach is fine. There is a ratio somewhere but I just use a decent slosh of thin bleach in half a bucket of water after cleaning with washing soda....only ever had to do that once

 

[Finman]

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I cleaned 25 y old poly boxes with boiling lye water by dipping then into container. Then I noticed that the whole box had a thin dirt layer, and It does not go away without brushing.(with car brush).

IT is difficult to get off propolis from corners and so on without boiling.

To two hive owner boiling lye is not an alternative. Boiling containers and their storing need room. One way is that somebody has cleaning service. Or beekeeping society arrange common happening to clean furnitures. With same containers society can boil the frames and recycle them.

In Finland we have frame & box cleaning services.
IT is quite expencive, but it works.

The boiling water I put into compost

In London back yards these things will be difficult. But Killit Bang works there.
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[Finman]

? If you have a problem then bleach is fine.

Bleach does not clean. Chloride only kills microbia. I have tried many kind of stuffs.

Poo is common thing what you must clean off. Spray first with Killit Bang. Then let it be couple of hours, and then wash with hot water.
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[Erichalfbee]

Finman
I have already cleaned the "dirt" with hot washing soda.
The bleach is to sterilise a clean box as per NBU recommendations

Sodium hypochlorite is present at a concentration of about 3% in household bleach. Research has shown that immersion for twenty minutes in a solution of 0.5% sodium hypochlorite kills AFB spores and other bacteria. In this case you therefore need to make a solution of one part household bleach to five parts water.

 

[Finman]

Finman
I have already cleaned the "dirt" with hot washing soda.
The bleach is to sterilise a clean box as per NBU recommendations

Sodium hypochlorite is present at a concentration of about 3% in household bleach. Research has shown that immersion for twenty minutes in a solution of 0.5% sodium hypochlorite kills AFB spores and other bacteria. In this case you therefore need to make a solution of one part household bleach to five parts water.

I think that very few are killing AFB, because it is very rare in UK. And AFB is in combs and in old honey, if you doubt, have you?

What means cleaning of poly is get rid of wax and propolis.
Bleach do not help in it.


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It better the to write "how to treat furniture after AFB". Cleaning is cleaning. And sterilizing is sterilizing.
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[Finman]

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Most common cleaning job is cleaning nosema poo after winter: Bottom, box and inner cover.

What ever, in Finland we clean and strelize with boiling lye solution. Hot melts wax and propolis away.

100C water is as dangerous to you as boiling lye solution, when you pour 50 litres boiling water on your legs or into your boots.
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It depends what are you doing and how much you have furnitures. I have done these things and I do not need to read these thing from articles.
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But you do out there what you do. I just wrote about my knowledge.
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[Finman]

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http://www.nationalbeeunit.com/downloadDocument.cfm?id=1069

 

[Erichalfbee]

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http://www.nationalbeeunit.com/downloadDocument.cfm?id=1069

Ye....that's where my quote comes from.
And my point was that as you rightly said I think that very few are killing AFB, because it is very rare in UK. And AFB is in combs and in old honey, if you doubt, have you? there isn't usually much to sterilise so a clean is sufficient

 

[welshgirl]

I soak mine in a large container of water / soda crystal solution and leave it for several hours/over night and rinse with bleach solution before rinsing again.

 

[Finman]

That is sterilizing. Not cleansing.

I mean with cleansing, how to clean burr and propolis off from furnitures. In wooden material flame is good tool.


Scrabbing is practical, if you have few boxes to clean.

Surface of poly is easy to violate. Pressure sprayer starts to destoy poly at once. But it destroys wooden surface too. .
Black mold in poly surfaces.

It comes sooner of later and I have wondered, why. In feeding box it comes in one year.

But then I cleaned with boiling lye water the boxes and I noticed that poly wall has quite thick layer dirt. It comes from bees toes. Boxes were 30 y old.

That dirty layer must be brushed off. It does not loosen with rinsing.

It took 30 years to understand that and no one has told it to me.

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[pargyle]

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It took 30 years to understand that and no one has told it to me.


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Slow learner then ?

I clean my poly boxes (when they really need it) with hot washing soda and a rinse off - I have only occasionally bothered with bleach - it does not seem to me to be needed. The only propolis I try to remove is the chunky bits -bees seem to like a layer of propolis on the hive walls and I don't get too excited about trying to clean it off. Burr comb gets scraped off.

I rather think that there are a lot of people that think that hives need to be scrubbed and cleaned every year - from what I have seen the bees tend to keep the inside of the hive pretty near spotless and they don't need a lot of help to maintain their home.

Clearly, any signs of Nosema are something that need to addressed as the spores will survive -the foulbroods are notifiable so, in the UK, the Bee Inspector will guide you in cleansing or destroying equipment.

 

[Finman]

Slow learner then ?

I clean my poly boxes (when they really need it) with hot washing soda and a rinse off - I have only occasionally bothered with bleach - it does not seem to me to be needed. The only propolis I try to remove is the chunky bits -bees seem to like a layer of propolis on the hive walls and I don't get too excited about trying to clean it off. Burr comb gets scraped off.

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You do not even have polyboxes and you do not have diseases, and you are master in cleaning them.
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Clearly, any signs of Nosema are something that need to addressed as the spores will survive -the foulbroods are notifiable so, in the UK, the Bee Inspector will guide you in cleansing or destroying equipment.

OH DEAR! What a hive terminator!

Keep your finges off from disease advices when you have no idea what to do.

Nosema is one kind of disease, Nothing to compare to others.

EFB ... change the queen.

AFB.... clean the furnitures in boiling lye and burn the combs. Do not feed uncapping honey to the bees. But as said, ABF has its own procedure and vain to mix to the normal poly hive cleansing[/B].

I remember when this forum discussed how broken or dirty polyhives must be destroyed in hazard chemical incinerators. It was 5 years ago And it will cost £ 1000 / box.

.1920 ? My father got birth that year. I do not remember that old things.
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[jenkinsbrynmair]

I rather think that there are a lot of people that think that hives need to be scrubbed and cleaned every year - from what I have seen the bees tend to keep the inside of the hive pretty near spotless and they don't need a lot of help to maintain their home.

See the obsession amateur beekeepers have with 'spring cleaning' a phenomenon noted far back in the 1920's by ROB Manley

 

[Erichalfbee]

See the obsession amateur beekeepers have with 'spring cleaning' a phenomenon noted far back in the 1920's by ROB Manley

My boxes have a clean floor when I remove any nadired supers...only because it's easier just to lift the brood box onto a new floor.
Even the NBU suggest giving bees anew brood box in the spring. Total waste of time IMO

Slow learner then ?

I clean my poly boxes (when they really need it) .....................................from what I have seen the bees tend to keep the inside of the hive pretty near spotless and they don't need a lot of help to maintain their home.

Yes they do and when you look at a used poly box there is that lovely sheen of propolis over the entire surface