Oxalic

[Little John]

How does it kill them?

I wish I knew. There have been reports of crystals of the acid 'clumping' on the mite's feet, so that they drop off the bees and starve - and yet others report a burning away of the mite's mouthparts. I think the jury's still out on that one.

Interesting link Finman, thanks. The author's way off with his figures though - OA sublimates at 157 deg C, not 190 as stated.
The only bit of that presentation which confuses me though, is the 'Risk of Contamination' mentioned on the last page or so. Contamination of what, by what ? Don't quite follow that bit.

LJ

 

[beeno]

Hi LJ,
I took the pictures to mean that there is risk to human health from all the crystals exhibited until bees have cleaned the hive out. I would not go near the state of hives like that unless I had full protection on! To worried about my membranes.

 

[Finman]

.
I have made several times interesting test. I have put oxalic acid crystals to the bleeding wound and it closes at once the bleeding vessel. C-vitamin/ascorbin acid does not affect similarly.


When I put more the acid, it clearly killed some tissue around the wound and I get a large black spot in the skin. Healing took quite a long time.

So, OA dust lungs may be very harmfull if affects directly into fine blood circulation.
If OA makes blood clots into lung vessels, that is bad....Just my opinion.

 

[TryingToLetThemBee]

.
I have made several times interesting test. I have put oxalic acid crystals to the bleeding wound and it closes at once the bleeding vessel. C-vitamin/ascorbin acid does not affect similarly.


When I put more the acid, it clearly killed some tissue around the wound and I get a large black spot in the skin. Healing took quite a long time.

So, OA dust lungs may be very harmfull if affects directly into fine blood circulation.
If OA makes blood clots into lung vessels, that is bad....Just my opinion.

Good grief, Finman! Fine scientific tradition of self-experimentation. You have proved you are not a mango fruit. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24001814

 

[farbee]

Good grief, Finman! Fine scientific tradition of self-experimentation. You have proved you are not a mango fruit. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24001814

I think it shows Finman is totally bonkers but a total legend.

 

[Gilberdyke John]

Good grief, Finman! Fine scientific tradition of self-experimentation. You have proved you are not a mango fruit. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24001814

Didn't Newton stick a needle into his own eyeball to find out if it had pain receptors?