Nosema may well kill...

[susbees]

What help shaking makes when bees are sick. Nosema is in bees' stomack. Vain to shake them any more.
.

Quite. Shook swarm is no use. Will contaminate the new box and too weak at first to draw comb.

Sent from my GT-I9100 using Tapatalk 2

 

[itma]

Statistics aside - which is why we use 30...I'd argue that mashing up 30 abdomens is way quicker than setting up and scanning 10 slides or preps.

The point of examining 10 individual bees (rather than the usual mixture of 30) was to estimate the level of infection within the colony.
Because of the difficulty in controlling the dilution of the 30-bee-soup, its not easy to quantify the extent of the infection -- especially without a haemocytometer. Even then, it seems that the spore counts recorded from the same colony can be highly variable.
However, an individual bee with nosema generally either has lots of spores or very few.
Hence the lecturer's suggestion of the use of prevalence as an alternative quantification measure.

 

[itma]

...
It's going to be a difficult season and the goal of this year will be simply to take a number of healthy well-prepared colonies into next winter.

Amen to that.

 

[Ruary]

Incidentally ...

... I was recently introduced to a different way of doing microscopy testing for Nosema.

Squash an individual (sample forager, dead ... naturally!) bee's abdomen directly onto the microscope slide, (so the guts come out of the backside), add a drop of water, remove debris, place cover slip.
Per hive, check 10 specimens individually, and rate the hive on the number of bees with significant infection.

Something of a change from mashing up 30 bees together ...

Yes this method is used by Randy Oliver, but not to test for the presence of nosema but to determine whether the colony needs treatment. It is a form of sequential testing see his webpage for further details http://scientificbeekeeping.com/sick-bees-part-15-an-improved-method-for-nosema-sampling/

 

[Spadaman]

Thymol does not help. It should be give in autumn.

I don't doubt the words of Finman when he says that thymol should be given in autumn, however there has been research on the effects of thymol vs fumadil-B that suggests thymol is very good at supressing nosema and better than fumadil (was) as the effect is cumulative over the years.

The document I have is from 2005 and so was published before fumadil was banned. I know this subject has been discussed before on this forum but I cannot find the threads - I am happy to forward the doc to anyone who is interested. Not sure how to add it to a posting.

 

[itma]

... I am happy to forward the doc to anyone who is interested. Not sure how to add it to a posting.

Suggest you might search google for the title/content of the thing, then post a link to the source.

 

[Finman]

hfgkjhfkjhf

 

[Finman]

I don't doubt the words of Finman when he says that thymol should be given in autumn, however there has been research on the effects of thymol vs fumadil-B that suggests thymol is very good at supressing nosema and better than fumadil (was) as the effect is cumulative over the years.

.

Did you look when you should give the thymol or Fumidil?

cumulative effect over years? - that is new to me and I have read everything about nosema.

But if you read other reseachers, nosema goes over during spring and vanishes. Nosema does not sprad any more in spring when bees fly and can make poo every day.

 

[itma]

... We ran an adult diseases course the weekend before last; of the 14 hive samples brought by students, 12 had easily detectable nosema. Most of these were not brought due to concerns with the colony, but because they were told to bring samples to work with. Not unsurprising given the extended period of confinement; it'll be a season for viruses too on the same basis.

If this level of nosema is consistent across the country, then when (if?!) the weather improves we will not see colonies suddenly race away - nosema will hold them back. ...

At the Bob Smith class I attended last week, figures were produced (from an NBU survey 2009-11, covering 4600 apiaries with 13000 colonies) that showed that at least one hive with significant Nosema (either or both types) was present in about 45% (±10? depending on region, SE {mine} was highest) of all apiaries.
Its a high prevalence anyway. But Danbee's figures are worrying.



Dysentery. N Apis is said to be more associated with dysentery than N Ceranae, though it probably doesn't cause the extreme 'runs'.
I can understand how dysentery would spread Nosema throughout a hive. But I puzzle over the different relations to dysenery. Perhaps N Ceranae is effectively spread and able to run through a hive without requiring dysentery to spread it? Perhaps the dysentery and N Apis are acting to amplify each other, and this effect is missing from N Ceranae?

Certainly N Ceranae does look to be a Silent But Deadly threat. Apart from slowing build-up, and the colony simply not thriving, you might not know you had it.

 

[itma]

...
But if you read other reseachers, nosema goes over during spring and vanishes. Nosema does not sprad any more in spring when bees fly and can make poo every day.

Isn't that the case with N Apis, but not so with N Ceranae?

 

[Finman]

.
Here is something longer than hand

NOSEMA DISEASE: LACK OF KNOWLEDGE AND
WORK STANDARDIZATION 2009

http://www.coloss.org/publications/Nosema-Workshop-Proceedings.pdf

 

[Hivemaker.]

The document I have is from 2005 and so was published before fumadil was banned. I know this subject has been discussed before on this forum but I cannot find the threads - I am happy to forward the doc to anyone who is interested. Not sure how to add it to a posting.

There are umpteen threads on the forum about Nosema, and various links to research...is this the one your thinking about.

http://scialert.net/qredirect.php?doi=pjbs.2005.1142.1145&linkid=pdf

Sun is shining, off to shake more bees.

 

[Finman]

http://scialert.net/qredirect.php?doi=pjbs.2005.1142.1145&linkid=pdf

QUOTE]

That research has been made in Turkey.

Fumidil B is forbidden in EU.

I did not see, when thymol and Fumidil was give to hives in research.

I have used Fumidil 25 years ago and it had a good influence on wintering bees. It was promised that it gives 20% better yield in honey and it really did.

but... my age years seems to be more cumulative than nosema in hives.

.

 

[beekeeping4you]

Trickling oxalic acid shortens the bees life, and does wonders for nosemic bees as well, not so good after a poor season in 2012, followed by a long cold spring.

Hi Hivemaker,
Did you refer to the one below by Mariano Higes?
It's on page 98 of a PDF:
http://wcms.uzi.uni-halle.de/download.php?down=25488&elem=2595451


5th EUROPEAN CONFERENCE OF APIDOLOGY
3-7th September 2012
Halle an der Saale, Germany

5.12 Oxalic acid treatments decrease Nosema ceranae infections in honeybees.
Higes M, Nanetti A*, Martín-Hernández
Email: [email protected]

"Nosema ceranae (Microsporidia) is an obligate, spore-forming, intracellular parasite infec-
ting European and Asian honeybees. It attacks and destroys the ventricular epithelial cells,
harming individual adults and impairing the entire colony. However, the role of this para-
site on the colony losses is rather controversial. Indeed, connections between N. ceranae
infections and colony collapses could be found in warm regions, but experiments conducted
under other environmental conditions (e.g.: non-temperate areas) led to different conclusi-
ons. Our knowledge is insufficient to draw a complete picture of the environmental factors
involved in the evolution of N. ceranae infections, beekeeping practices included.

However, in this study we demonstrate for the first time that oxalic acid applications, often
used in the control of Varroa infestations, may reduce N. ceranae infections in Apis
mellifera iberiensis. In more details, Autumn administrations of oxalic acid solutions by trickling led
to a significant decrease of the parasitisation rate in old and young adult bees in comparison
to untreated controls, where increases were recorded. Further investigations are needed to
establish the influence of natural acaricides (like organic acids) on the long term develop-
ment of Nosema infections. Possible relationships between the use of these substances and
epidemiologic aspects of nosemosis type C must be studied in depth."

Regards
Reiner

 

[Black Comb]

Dysentery. N Apis is said to be more associated with dysentery than N Ceranae, though it probably doesn't cause the extreme 'runs'.
I can understand how dysentery would spread Nosema throughout a hive. But I puzzle over the different relations to dysenery. Perhaps N Ceranae is effectively spread and able to run through a hive without requiring dysentery to spread it? Perhaps the dysentery and N Apis are acting to amplify each other, and this effect is missing from N Ceranae?

Certainly N Ceranae does look to be a Silent But Deadly threat. Apart from slowing build-up, and the colony simply not thriving, you might not know you had it.

Cearanae is spread by trophallaxis. There was a paper published recently, can't find it at the moment.

 

[user 6228]

Both Noesema are associated in the scientific literature with confinement. Our observation of highly insulated hives is that they will fly and defecate outside in bright conditions at temperatures just above freezing(1c) in large numbers. i.e they will fly on more days than less insulated hives... Needs a proper study with controls etc..

 

[Finman]

.
What I understand about noserma research, they preventive key is good quality pollen for bees before winter.

Bad ventilation and excess moisture in hive makes colonies sick.

Nosema is common disease and 20% extra hives in autumn chould cover the winter losses . Life will quite nuisance if nothing evil can happen in life.

I have seen how most of hives recover from nosema. I am not going to loose my night sleep for that.

 

[mbc]

It's going to be a difficult season and the goal of this year will be simply to take a number of healthy well-prepared colonies into next winter.

Speak for yourself, my goal is to fill all my empty equipment, continue with breeding my bees, smashing all my previous honey crop records and going into winter with lovely healthy colonies.

 

[Finman]

.
What I do first is that I strengten my hive stands that the heavy yield will not collapse into bushes.

It is late when it has collapsed.

 

[mbc]

.


I have seen how most of hives recover from nosema. I am not going to loose my night sleep for that.

Quite.
All this shaking onto new combs, thymol, seaweed or tree bark, fumadil or as expensive as gold syrup additives, may or may not work, difficult to tell really as apparently suffering colonies may or may not recover naturally anyway.
There is a school of thought that nosema are endemic gut flora in bees similar to E coli in ours, causing no harm for the majority in most situations.
If colonies are susceptible, cull the queens so as not to propagate from them or their drones.