New bees - would you feed them, treat with Apiguard, or both??

[fred scuttle]

Hi Folks,

Having had my bees just over a week now I've been feeding them sugar syrup as I was advised to so that they can build up their strength from the nuc. Reading all the books and the net this is also one of the prime times of the year to be treating against varroa as well....

I only have a brood chamber with about 5 frames of brood and little stores, and given the state of the weather have been feeding them with a jumbo rapid feeder since I got them last week. Should I continue this feeding, or remove the feeder for a couple of weeks and start the Apiguard treatment, and then start feeding them again..... or should I be doing both???

Sorry to be asking basic questions but I'm a bit confused and just want the best possible start for them. Any advice would be greatly appreciated indeed, thanks.

 

[Mellifera397]

Im no expert but I was in your position last week. I overfed my nuc so just watch out and make sure the queen has enough space to lay in. Im not going to start my treatment until next week and many other beekeepers have not started yet either. Im expecting warm weather next week so feed hopefully will not be required as long as they have enough stores to last til then. Hope this helps

 

[Mellifera397]

See this thread about overfeeding
http://www.beekeepingforum.co.uk/showthread.php?t=20263

But dont get spooked because this only my limited experience and I fed quite a lot.

Wait for other replies before doing anything.

 

[fred scuttle]

Thanks for this advice Mellifera397 - I've read the forum post you sent and it seems ok to insert another new frame into the middle of the brood chamber so it can be drawn out and the queen can continue laying whilst feeding - I'll wait though like you say until others (hopefully) reply as well. Still confused as to feed / no feed / feed & apiguard options for my new girls?

 

[Mellifera397]

Ive read on the forum that you can feed whilst treating. Ive found that if I keep commenting on a thread then it stays at the top of the list then more people see it and more replies and subsequently advice arrives and more quickly

It is a little cheeky though

 

[Finman]

Hi Folks,

Having had my bees just over a week now I've been feeding them sugar syrup as I was advised to so that they can build up their strength from the nuc. Reading all the books .

your have summer in BRITAIN. You cannot accelerate brooding with feeding syrup.
Bees do not act like aquarium fishes that when feeding they multiply themselves.

When you have a nuc, the size of colony and number of nurser bees rules, how much the colony can make new brood.
Feeding syryp now fill valuable celss and nurser bees keep warm store cells.


If you give thymol in this situation bees are quite uppset for odor and the result is controversy.
Bees run away from thymol pad and leave larvae unfeeded.

When you have winterfeeding and larva rearing almost gone, then thymol treatment is ok.
This happens at the end of September in Uk.

Just now we give in Finland winter feeding. At same time we use thymol pads in hives to kill mites.
Feeding gives so much heat that thymol works fine. Brooding is over here and thymol works with about 70% efficacy. So say the thymol seller which have 1000 hives too.

.

 

[Cazza]

When you have winterfeeding and larva rearing almost gone, then thymol treatment is ok.
This happens at the end of September in Uk.

.

Sorry Finman but you are a little late. Most in the UK will be treating and feeding well before the end of September.
Cazza

 

[Luminos]

I have Apiguard on two of my hives and I'm well south of the UK...

 

[BeeNice]

No one has mention the varroa count, do a count and go from there, you don't say whether the nuc comes from a split or a swarm. Don't get rushed into treating unless you have a high varroa count. All my hives still have a very low count ie: 0 to 5 over a 10 day period. I think the most important thing this year is getting up the winter bees and stores, you can always treat with OxAcid in the winter.
Steven

 

[whoosling]

I've just stopped feeding and put apigaurd on mine - still confused about feeding at the same time as treatment - mine have very little stores - were a new nuc end of may

 

[itma]

No one has mention the varroa count, do a count and go from there, you don't say whether the nuc comes from a split or a swarm. Don't get rushed into treating unless you have a high varroa count. ...

Thing is, you only need to treat IF there is a need for treatment.
You need to put the inspection board in, and measure the varroa natural death rate averaged over a few days, like 4.
For a small colony at this time of the year, if the count is less than maybe 5 per 24 hours, then I'd say you can have other priorities. If its anything like 10/day, you have a more tricky situation.

If this is a recently taken swarm, you can pretty much assume that it won't have much varroa, but it does no harm to check.


The more beekeepers you ask, the more the opinions multiply -- but this is often because they are assuming different (untold) bits of background. But they do tend to like to do things their own way!

A fresh swarm is a comb-drawing machine. But once they stop, they can't be turned back on to the same extent. So for a fresh swarm, keep feeding while they continue making wax. If they have taken a break from wax-making, and you restart feeding, that's where you have the risk of storing so excessively as to cramp the queen's laying.

For a nuc, right now, I'd say the thing was to get wax drawn, and get the queen laying lots of new bees. Bees being laid as eggs now will have to survive all through the winter. The more the better.
Once you have new bees being made in quantity, then you can worry about stores for the winter. There's time yet. For now, if they have some stores (a couple of 'heavy' frames), that's fine.
Wax drawing needs warmth (which needs bees!)
It actually needs the most warmth of any of their processes, so for now, warmth is the priority, to enable wax-making, so as to allow colony expansion.
You can increase the warmth by -
- insulating the hive (stick a super on top of the cover board, fill with insulation, roof on top)
- reducing draughts (inspection board in, reduced entrance* ...)
- keeping the bees together (give only a few frames of foundation, and bookend the colony with a dummy board. If you can fill the void beyond with some blocks of insulation, so much the better.)
- or even by adding more bees. Be open to the idea of combining another late swarm with your colony.

*There are other good reasons for reducing the entrance size now - notably to deter robbing and to reduce the number of bees wasted on guarding an excessively large entrance.

Personally, I'm not too sure about putting a frame of foundation in the middle of the brood for a nuc. For a bigger colony, with lots of bees that is going to be able to draw it out quickly, then I'm sure its fine. Just not so sure about doing it with a nuc. If they don't (or can't) draw it quickly, the very minimum harm is that with brood in two separate bunches, the small number of bees can raise less brood - so the colony expands slower -- the opposite of what you want!
The safe place to get a sheet of foundation drawn pretty quickly is between the brood and the stores.

Don't forget that bees are made of protein. Pollen is the bees protein source. So without pollen, you can't have more bees. If yours are failing to find lots of pollen locally, and you don't see stored pollen on the frames, then consider a pollen supplement or substitute as being a likely valuable form of 'feeding' for you to do.

 

[Luminos]

I've been monitoring varroa all season, and have not seen any varroa mites on the varroa trays...(they are coated with petroleum jelly)

...put Apiguard on two hives last Friday evening...

One hive still shows no varroa drop.
The other, however, has dropped 170 mites since Friday...
This has been in conjunction with Varroa Gard each week and drone culling.
So I'm not convinced that "monitoring" gives a realistic indication of varroa infestation.

 

[Moggs]

Should I continue this feeding, or remove the feeder for a couple of weeks and start the Apiguard treatment, and then start feeding them again..... or should I be doing both???

Thymol has been known to take the edge of their appetite - they may ignore the feed.

 

[itma]

If there is a severe infestation, it would be remarkable if you saw no evidence whatsoever of it on the board.
There would have to be some additional problem, like the mesh floor being obstructed with hive debris and/or prop.


Let me put it this way - if you see lots of naturally (not from treatment) dead mites on the board, then you know for sure that you definitely DO have a problem.
However, if you don't see them, you don't definitely know that you don't have the problem, but you probably don't.

170 mites? About 1000 in the colony is considered the threshold level for needing 'proper' treatment. That's not too terrible.

 

[itma]

Thymol has been known to take the edge of their appetite - they may ignore the feed.

I reckon that with a small colony, the principal downside to Apiguard treatment would be the risk of the queen going off lay for a while.
He needs all the bees he can get!


Unless there is some evidence of a problem, my call would be that Varroa treatment could come later, but colony growth can't.
Where it gets tricky is if there is any evidence of a significant varroa level - because he needs not just winter bees, but healthy winter bees - and varroa in their brood cells is rather detrimental to the bees long term prospects.

 

[CB008]

I agree. I have had completely "free" hives until I put the Api on. My theory is that ants etc eat them from the tray

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

I reckon that with a small colony, the principal downside to Apiguard treatment would be the risk of the queen going off lay for a while.
He needs all the bees he can get!


Unless there is some evidence of a problem, my call would be that Varroa treatment could come later, but colony growth can't.
.

had a nuc from a Late August A/S which didn't work (queen swarmed anyway but I caught them so hive ended up split three ways) and the queen didn't mate until early September SBI happenned to call for an inspection and advised as the varroa level wasn't critical that I should forego the Apiguard and rely on Christmas OA treatment. She's now going great guns

 

[fred scuttle]

Thanks for all the great advice folks, I think I'll lay off starting the apiguard treatment for now and keep feeding them the syrup so the colony can continue to build up. I'll also do a varroa count as suggested to see if there is a problem or not just to be on the safe side.

 

[JohnF]

So I'm not convinced that "monitoring" gives a realistic indication of varroa infestation.

 

[Finman]

Don't get rushed into treating unless you have a high varroa count.

That is really a wrong advice.
.