Nosema, Thymol and Fumudil-B

[jenkinsbrynmair]

Just read a very interesting paper on nosema treatment by scientists from Ege and Thrace universities in Turkey.
The study took place between 2002 and 2004 with 162 colonies 55 being treated with Fumidil, 55 with Thymol syrup- both treated autumn and spring and 52 untreated as a control.
To cut to the chase, although Fumidil was effective in controlling nosema, thymol came up tops in all the test parameters.
Winter casualties were much lower with thymol,4 over 2 winters compared to Fumidil :23 failures with Fumidil, 4 with thymol and 37 with the control.The thymol concentration used was 66 micrograms thymol per ml of syrup
Adult bee population and brood production was higher with thymol and honey production was slightly higher too.
Fumidil Kills the active stages of nosema but not the spores and even with successive treatment infection levels can still be harmful.
Thymol syrupwas also most effective for controlling nosema in overwintering bees - all these finding were corroborated by other studies.
I'll quote the last paragraph (the dubious English is not mine for a change but the translated paper)
'Thymol could be suggest to beekeepers as cheap,practical and safe biochemical for against Nosema infection instead of Fumidil-B in temperate climates for providing residue-free bee products.'

According to the report -'thymol is not detectable in honey at concentrations of less than 1.1mg/kg'
All in all another reason not to pump our bee full of antibiotics I think

 

[Tom Bick]

Very interesting can you link the paper

 

[Hivemaker.]

Very interesting can you link the paper

There are several nosema threads already on the forum with all this imformation,and links.

 

[Tom Bick]

Yes HM but I was asking about that paper in question.

If it is amongst all the hits thrown up through the search facility on this forum it will be a late night for me to go through it all lol

 

[bees4u]

I've been using thymol for years for nosema and I have seen that or acarine since I've added it to the syrup

 

[Hivemaker.]

Yes HM but I was asking about that paper in question.

If it is amongst all the hits thrown up through the search facility on this forum it will be a late night for me to go through it all lol

Tom,the link to the research paper is in this thread from about two weeks ago,and in several others as well,some linked.

http://www.beekeepingforum.co.uk/showthread.php?t=13897

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

Thanks HM I was just sent it as a PDF by a fellow BKA Member after i had been pointed out in our last meeting by our SBI as one who was using thymol as a nosema treatment, just thought it was an interesting paper with all the discussions that have gone on lately

 

[iand]

Hi
I think the paper being referred to was some work done by a guy called Yucel. Google works for that I think " Yucel bees nosema "

cheers Ian

 

[Tom Bick]

Tom,the link to the research paper is in this thread from about two weeks ago,and in several others as well,some linked.

http://www.beekeepingforum.co.uk/showthread.php?t=13897

Thanks HM its appreciated and very interesting.

I confirmed a colony this week with nosema and decided not to go with the fumudil-B and to stick with the thymol in the syrup, not an exact scientific test but I will retest in the spring.

 

[Skyhook]

The thymol concentration used was 66 micrograms thymol per ml of syrup

Hivemaker, can you confirm if this is the same concentration as you recommend? There may have been a time 30 years ago when my chemistry was up to providing the answer, but not now!

 

[victor meldrew]

Nothing New

J.G.Digges advocated the addition of thymol to syrup in 15th edition of the practical bee guide(1946)
VM

 

[jakethedog]

J.G.Digges advocated the addition of thymol to syrup in 15th edition of the practical bee guide(1946)
VM

I'm pretty sure that r.o.b manley had already revised the Digges book by 1946 which would explain the addition of thymol to syrup being recommended. Was it mentioned in the earlier editions?

 

[victor meldrew]

I'm pretty sure that r.o.b manley had already revised the Digges book by 1946 which would explain the addition of thymol to syrup being recommended. Was it mentioned in the earlier editions?

I only have the 15th edition
VM

 

[alanf]

Hivemaker, can you confirm if this is the same concentration as you recommend? There may have been a time 30 years ago when my chemistry was up to providing the answer, but not now!

For what it's worth my back of the envelope calculation shows the thymol concentration to be lower than Hivemakers. In a previous discussion I did a quick sense check of the concentration of thymol in Hivemakers presevative syrup recipe and one in Beebase using only alcohol as a carrying solvent. Both came out as 0.5g of thymol crystals in 4.5 litres of syrup.

The thymolated syrup in the Turkish paper has no preparation details but it does cite an Australian paper (Rice 2001) working on Nosema apis which might be the source. The paper is available but chargeable as far as I can see. The quoted concentration in the Yucel paper is 0.44 milliMolar or 66 micrograms per millilitre, which checks ok for a molar mass of 150g. Scaling up that's 66 milligrams per litre or 0.3 grams in 4.5 litres.

The Turkish results suggest that the anti Nosema properties of thymol are effective at lower concentrations (0.066g per litre) than Hivemaker or Beebase suggest as a preservative level (0.110g per litre) and not much more than one third of what Hivenaker suggests as a treatment level (0.185g per litre).

Re-reading the Yucel paper, I see the quantity of syrup fed is actually quite small. The syrup contains fumildil B or thymol for two of the experimental groups. There may be some ambiguity in the wording, but I read it as application of only 150 millilitres of 30% sugar syrup per colony per week for 4 weeks spring and autumn. That is a total of only around a twenty fifth of a gram of thymol per colony twice a year.

 

[drstitson]

The HM recipe is of the order of 200-250mcg per ml.

that is assuming 0.2g thymol per ml of master mix.

5-6ml added per gallon.

 

[alanf]

The HM recipe is of the order of 200-250mcg per ml.

I should have shown some working and checked for typos in the previous post (now done):

Hivemaker wrote on 11th April 2010 (to quote only the numbers): "30g thymol crystals... add 5ml of isopropyl alcohol... (to) 140 ml of boiling water and add 1 teaspoon of lecithin granules... add the dissolved thymol to this mix...
To use add 5ml to each gallon of syrup" in http://www.beekeepingforum.co.uk/showpost.php?p=49691&postcount=44

So, approx 175 millilitres of solution containing 30 grams of thymol will treat 35 gallons of syrup. 0.85g per gallon or at 4.5 litres to the gallon 0.190g in a litre (previous 0.185 had rounding in different places). To a kitchen approximation that's 0.2g in a litre of syrup, or if you prefer the units that medicines are packaged in, 200 micrograms per millilitre as DrStitson says.

What surprises me, at risk of labouring the point, is the quantities that were found effective in the Turkish study. They added only 0.01g of thymol per colony per week for 4 weeks twice a year. That's an equivalent weekly dose of only 50 millilitres of Hivemaker's syrup, or making up 30g of thymol twice year would be enough for 750 colonies. Yucel found that feeding thymol is effective for Nosema control at doses way below what many are accustomed to use.

If I've miscalculated or misread I apologise in advance but these are the numbers as I find them.

 

[Hivemaker.]

About 1g of thymol per gallon or 5 litres of syrup,or 3x Manley,also now add tea tree and lemon grass eo.

 

[Skyhook]

The Turkish results suggest that the anti Nosema properties of thymol are effective at lower concentrations (0.066g per litre) than Hivemaker or Beebase suggest as a preservative level (0.110g per litre) and not much more than one third of what Hivenaker suggests as a treatment level (0.185g per litre).

About 1g of thymol per gallon or 5 litres of syrup,or 3x Manley,also now add tea tree and lemon grass eo.

Thanks everyone. The interesting thing is- that suggest Manley was pretty much on the money.