Natural beekeeping varroa treatment

[Brosville]

I am utterly bowled over by "johnas" erudite, articulate and well-argued contribution to this thread - reflects well upon the sparkling intellect that came out with such a constructive post!

 

[Chris Luck]

Chris Luck are you a member of "the Flat Earth society" ?

Makes my point rather well about what to expect on here.....

....rather than addressing the fact that there is a substantial amount of assumption and speculation masquerading as fact surrounding this subject and that clearly not all colonies "die". Of course it could be possible, just to speculate myself a little, that the big "V" is just one of many factors that are weakening bees and making them vulnerable, various other strains and stresses in their lives.

Chris

 

[Skyhook]

I saw a greenfly spray in a shop the other day, advertised as not harmful to bees.

Has anybody ever bothered to find out if products of this type will kill varroa??

Head Lice sprays?

Spider repellant sprays?

Flea sprays?

Most of the 'harmless to bees' sprays are softsoap or fats, which work by either dessication or by clogging the spiracles. I dont think it would do the bees a lot of good if you sprayed it on directly, the point is if sprayed on the plant t does not come out of the nectaries.

Head lice sprays and flea sprays- pyrethrins, same as apistan, bayvarol etc.

 

[Dishmop]

"I think you'll find it's a bit more complicated than that"

but not sure!!

 

[tonybloke]

but not sure!!

are you sure, in your first season as a beekeeper?

 

[For want of a better word]

I've come into this thread rather late, but must remark that I'm finding the usual "brick wall" of refusal to begin to understand how other approaches work more than a touch evident.
"Orthodoxy" as represented by the BBKA and it's followers tend to be of the view that "the only way" is to "treat" in some way or another - Chris has reported that he personally doesn't find it necessary - I'm at a loss as to why people should make him into some hate bogeyman figure for daring to "do it differently" - personally, I find his approach to be at the very least interesting, possibly revolutionary, and perhaps a path worth following for those of similar inclination.

The other thing that obviously isn't being grasped is "holism" - we are very used to things being broken into pieces, each part analysed to death, and then assuming "we know all about it", whereas the complex interreactions of things (particularly in nature) show that when added together, all those disparate parts behave very differently.......

Which is a long-winded way of saying that perhaps these (more) natural beekeeping nutters have a point, and that if you allow your bees to have as natural a life as possible (minimal interference, no brood/queen culling, no foundation, leaving them their own honey for the winter etc etc) that they are perfectly able to deal themselves with what are viewed as utter disasters by orthodoxy - there are strong forces at work (habit and tradition particularly) to dissuade credence being given to such approaches, but as Chris is demonstrating "it works for him", so we are foolish to ignore or decry it.......

Reductionism in beekeeping?
Gaya Honey.... what next?

 

[mbc]

Reductionism in beekeeping?
Gaya Honey.... what next?

Dirk Gently's holistic beekeeping agency ?

 

[Dishmop]

are you sure, in your first season as a beekeeper?

My reply of "but not sure" was not an inference that I know better.

The reference was to "I think",

Makes a difference to "It wont", "It will", "You must", "You mustnt",

 

[Nellie]

Makes my point rather well about what to expect on here.....

....rather than addressing the fact that there is a substantial amount of assumption and speculation masquerading as fact surrounding this subject and that clearly not all colonies "die". Of course it could be possible, just to speculate myself a little, that the big "V" is just one of many factors that are weakening bees and making them vulnerable, various other strains and stresses in their lives.

Chris

There's a lot of cases of the pot calling the kettle black on this forum too.

More than happy to accept that Varroa is little more than part of a "perfect storm" of conditions and other factors affecting bees and should not be viewed in isolation, and I'll happily read and consider any studies that you can provide me with that suggest this, if nothing else it'll make a refreshing change to reading all the studies at the moment that all suggest the exact opposite of what you currently assert.

You're more than entitled to opine that it is not necessary at all to treat for varroa, but it is just that, opinion and opinion that would seem to fly in the face of most accepted logic and study.

Not suggesting that Varroa is Honey Bee domestos either, there's at least one, sorry Brosville, BBKA supported programme that appears to be having more than a little success with Bees that are able to cope/deal with varroa but for the vast majority of bee colonies, pulling treatment means dead bees.

If you want to argue that stopping treating for varroa and just letting colonies that fail to cope with it die off and take it from there is the way forward, that's a slightly different discussion altogether.

 

[Brosville]

"You're more than entitled to opine that it is not necessary at all to treat for varroa"
-the point is being missed again - Chris is not suggesting that anyone follow his lead - he is just reporting that he is not treating in the conventional way, apparently with success

"but for the vast majority of bee colonies, pulling treatment means dead bees"

the vast majority of bees in the UK are kept "conventionally", so that too could be playing a part too (not saying it IS, just "could")

 

[Dishmop]

Who remembers this photo entitled "What do you see"?

Without checking I seem to remember that the first answer was Varroa...

Can one therefore wonder why I, and others, are hesitant believing some of the answers given on here by people who obviously are never going to entertain any type of reasoning. Discussion is pointless if one side refuses to consider what the other side is saying.

"I have been doing this for 10 years I must be right"

My wife has been doing the decorating for 30 years but it doesnt mean that she is doing it properly.

What happens to a dead varroa mite? I assume that most if not all will fall to the bottom of the hive, yes?
Under my observation hive I have a plastic sheet that collects all the rubbish.

I have not seen one live dead or dying mite since I have had that hive.

I did very very briefly place a small piece of Apilife Var on the top on a vent.

The bees went bloody berserk. After about an hour I had to take it off because of the noise. Sounded like a vacumm cleaner with a piece of paper stuck in the pipe.

If any varroa were there then they would have been killed or thrown off by the bees throwing themselves about in the hive and not by the AV.

If you treat your bees every time you see a few mites, how are you ever going to find out if they will suvive without treatment?

Ok, so there are reports from experts that bees infested with varroa will die if you dont treat them... Now I feel that the word we need to consider there is "infested".

Did anybody look at the link I put up earlier regarding the fungus spores that will kill varroa? Of course you did...... No comment?

I am not saying that I know better or that I dont take in what I am being told.

I sieve what I am told and take an average from what is left.

================================

Bees that groom each other???????? Goody goody. Can I have a grant please because my bees groom each other.......... and I bet every other colony does the same....

What do you see?

 

[For want of a better word]

We shall build a bigger better beehive and the programme will run for 10,000,000,000 years


and the answer the the Varroh problem............................

.................42?

 

[Nellie]

"You're more than entitled to opine that it is not necessary at all to treat for varroa"
-the point is being missed again - Chris is not suggesting that anyone follow his lead - he is just reporting that he is not treating in the conventional way, apparently with success

"but for the vast majority of bee colonies, pulling treatment means dead bees"

the vast majority of bees in the UK are kept "conventionally", so that too could be playing a part too (not saying it IS, just "could")

You keep trotting out this conventional line, I'm not sure I could claim to know what is conventional and what isn't. The type of beehive is irrelevant unless perhaps you keep wasps or badgers in it to keep your bees company.

You can handwave all the reasons that you want. If you want to claim that ownership of a BBKA membership card is lethal to bees within a 5 miles radius, knock yourself out.

If you want to claim that top bar hives are magically better for bees, then go for it. I'll happily acknowledge that they're designed slightly more with bees in mind than the beekeeper and I certainly wont argue with you that foundation might not be the nicest thing that you can stick in a hive nowadays which is why I stopped using it. That's still my personal opinion though. I've seen plenty of studies looking at what, other than wax, is in Foundation, but nothing that actually supports my opinion that it might actually be harmful in the long term to my bees so I'm taking the better safe than sorry approach on that front. Doesn't magically make them immune to varroa though.

Other than foundation, until I stopped using it, I did nothing, and in some cases considerably less to my bees than the mainstream people posting as "natural beekeepers" on Biobees. I exclude the hardcore "hands off" and dancing round cow horns at midnight people, but there is a huge and frequently misguided air of superiority from many in the "natural" crowd about just how much better off their bees are for no other reasons than they've declared themselves "natural" beekeepers and eschewed joining the BBKA over the synthetic pyrethoid issue.

I don't clip, I don't inspect if I don't need to, my bees winter on honey and they're treated as minimally with thymol as I believe I can get away with while keeping them healthy. They can make all drone brood they want as far as I'm concerned, if the mite counts don't suggest they don't need it, then it doesn't get removed.

And funnily enough I'd consider that to be mainstream, conventional, beekeeping around these parts. For sure there are some who do clip and take honey off and feed sugar instead but they are very much the minority around here.

 

[Chris Luck]

You're more than entitled to opine that it is not necessary at all to treat for varroa, but it is just that, opinion and opinion that would seem to fly in the face of most accepted logic and study.

Very interesting Nellie, reading what people actually say not your strong point then?

Doh, it's a common problem with forums, the medium seems to lend itself to people putting words in other peoples mouths or simply thinking that what the person really meant was.......whatever....

....but in my case I know what I'm writing and I have made it quite clear that I'm not recommending any course of action or inaction to others, however the fact remains that not all colonies die without treatment BUT the problem is that the only way you can know this is not to treat, but whatever people decide to do they should take responsibility for it and not blame anyone else if things don't work out.

Chris

 

[Nellie]

Another common forum phenomena is to attack the poster rather than the point bring made.

Here's another thought. Stop treating and see what happens. If it becomes clear that they aren't coping you've got a choice, let them continue to suffer and die of their own accord or try and treat and hope It's not too late.

As a single colony beekeeper, which is the majority of people in the uk judging by the last survey, it's a tough choice to make. How many times are you prepared to conduct the experiment before you decide a fennecs worth of apiguard is a better choice than another £100+ on a nuc with no guarantee that it'll fare any better.

 

[Chris Luck]

Yup Nellie, it must be a real worry to have one colony, but then if you only have one you only have one to loose. Imagine loosing a hundred or two hundred colonies, in fact imagine trying to do a 9 day inspection on two hundred hives, it can't be done unless that's your only occupation.

I should add, although I've said this before, that I allow my bees to swarm, another luxury that comes with where I live apparently. Yes, I know this reduces the yield but if I was that worried about money I'd be somewhere else doing something else, (not that we have any money you understand).

So it clearly isn't the same everywhere and in all situations which is all I was drawing attention to in the first place - not all untreated bee colonies are doomed to die in 4 years.

Chris

 

[RoofTops]

Those with a view on this debate might like to remind themselves of the Swedish "Live and Let Die" experiment. This did produce bees which seemed to be able to co-exist with varroa left to their own devices on an island for a few years, but no race of super-bee was produced following the experiment.

There seem to be several mechanisms at work that make it hard to decide if there is a single policy which will work for all. Breeding from bees which seem to cope well without treatment could simply mean you are selecting for the least virulent strain of varroa. For example, whilst I have every respect for the work Ron Hoskins is doing, having met him and heard him speak, I still remain sceptical that what he is actually doing is not selecting for hygenic behaviour but varroa which reproduce at a slower rate. This is partly because these experiments have been done before and nothing came of them in the long term.

Those who are not to treating for varroa fall into several camps. The first are those who let the bees swarm naturally, as and when they wish. The break in brood rearing will hold the varroa in check so it is to be expected the bees will cope better under such a regime.

Another group will select using a Live and Let Die approach but the problem is are the resulting bees of any use to beekeepers in the commercial sense? Bees which reproduce at a low rate will supress the mite population so can live along side the parasite. This may be a way forward but so far attempts to propogate such bees have not been successful.

None of the above answers the question "shall I treat my bees for varroa" but if it highlights how little we fully understand the relationship between our bees and varroa it will perhaps help.

None of the arguments voiced so far on this thread are new. They have been thrashed to death before and tested in experiments but no "magic bullet" has been found so far.

 

[Poly Hive]

I completely agree Rooftops. Some years ago I heard that that large outfit in Devon decided to test an apiary by leaving it untreated. Now I hear they treat.

How on earth anyone can say they can leave the bees happily untreated and they are doing fine after one or two seasons is just silly talk.

As I have posted from research papers and from what I have been taught by those far better qualified than I am is it takes at least four years for serious trouble to appear.

Keep your bees any way you like except in concrete or fiberglass units please as they tend to die of condensation in them. But please have some consideration for your bees, they are after all your charges.

PH

 

[Chris Luck]

But please have some consideration for your bees, they are after all your charges.

Oh yes indeed, please have some consideration for your bees.

Chris

 

[Monsieur Abeille]

Went to a very interesting talk by Kim Flottam, the editor of Bee Culture, last night at Thornes new, as yet unstocked, premesis (very smart they are too!)

The talk was on the use of nucs, but one aside he mentioned that his bees were now pretty much bred to be varroa tolerant and he has been able to stop using chemicals for 6 years. BUT he said it was a long hard struggle ensuring that the right queens mated with the right drones.

He sited the example of a bee farmer who had 400 hives, then tried to stop treating and went down to less than 40, before turning the corner and sucessfully maintaining the right strain. He's now back up to 400, not treating and doing well.

So it can be done, however the time, skill and environment required is way beyond the reach of us hobbyists.