Queen cage - varroa management

[North End Bees]

The method Ralph Bulcher uses on his own bees (the 'caging' of the queens mentioned here is a popular Italian tactic with their bee farmers) is to allow the queen to continue laying on a single frame (usually just the one) in a QE covered frame. When capped he removes and replaces another to be laid up. He then does it a third time (about 1 week each frame) by which time there should be no other open brood in the hive. All 3 frames are removed and frozen, fed to chickens etc as soon as capped. His findings are its as effective as best commercial treatments and if done at the right time the lack of brood being fed can actually increase yields.
I haven't tried it yet but intending to 'blank off' 1 frame space at edge of BB with slide in QE this season.
The removed capped brood could be used to make up new colonies with a one time treatment when all emerged as there should be no brood present.
Please forgive my rambling explanation - I have no doubt you could have explained it with 1/4 of the words
Richard

This method was mentioned earlier in the thread. However it requires the destruction of very large numbers of brood for which many wouldn't consider the end justifies the means.

If the Queen is given an empty drawn caged frame and lays 2000+ eggs per side, that's 12,000+ larvae being sacrificed over 3 consequetive frames. 12,000 larvae which have been intensively fed by nurse bees who, as we've seen earlier, shorten their own lives by putting everything into the next generation.

Would you intentionally kill 12,000 adult bees as part of any other varroa treatment?

 

[North End Bees]

All 3 frames are removed and frozen, fed to chickens etc as soon as capped. His findings are its as effective as best commercial treatments and if done at the right time the lack of brood being fed can actually increase yields.

No, the brood is being fed intensively until it's sealed. It's the other method of queen caging (i.e no brood at all) which potentially increases yield by sparing nurse bees.

 

[elainemary]

This method was mentioned earlier in the thread. However it requires the destruction of very large numbers of brood for which many wouldn't consider the end justifies the means.

If the Queen is given an empty drawn caged frame and lays 2000+ eggs per side, that's 12,000+ larvae being sacrificed over 3 consequetive frames. 12,000 larvae which have been intensively fed by nurse bees who, as we've seen earlier, shorten their own lives by putting everything into the next generation.

Would you intentionally kill 12,000 adult bees as part of any other varroa treatment?

One other option Ralph Buchler talks about in the Honey show video is rather than destroy the brood, is to move the brood to a Nuc with some nurse bees, wait for it all to emerge, treat the phoretic mites with a one time OA, this way you save the brood. Can then unite it back or to another hive.

 

[polomadh]

Having seen the Honey show lecture we trialled the whole frame cage this year on a hive in our club apiary as a demonstration to a reduced audience during COVID.

I have to admit I was impressed with the results, despite starting it a little late in the season.

This year we should do it a little earlier, to ensure we have a strong hive going into the HB flow.

Finding the Queen on the trapped frame and putting her onto the new frame was a little scary initially, as so much could have gone wrong, but became routine by the last cycle.

I couldn’t bring myself to destroy a whole frame of brood, so popped them into a Q+ nuc. Interestingly that nuc hasnt made it through the winter, despite normal varroa treatments.

I would say that a single hive in a small apiary is far from scientific proof, but anyone really wanting to be low/zero chemical intervention this has to be the way.

The purpose of the demonstration in the club apiary was to trial for our members in our location, and whilst I am not quite ready to try this on my own hives yet, I will be tempted if the results are repeated this season

 

[North End Bees]

One other option Ralph Buchler talks about in the Honey show video is rather than destroy the brood, is to move the brood to a Nuc with some nurse bees, wait for it all to emerge, treat the phoretic mites with a one time OA, this way you save the brood. Can then unite it back or to another hive.

That doesn't achieve any significant benefit.
If you're practising brood breaks to avoid the use of chemicals, fair enough. But this way the bees are still getting the chemical treatment, just in another hive.

 

[elainemary]

That doesn't achieve any significant benefit.
If you're practising brood breaks to avoid the use of chemicals, fair enough. But this way the bees are still getting the chemical treatment, just in another hive.

He wasn’t advocating complete non use of chemicals - using OA once at the end of the brood break process to remove any phoretic bees, is v effective and there’s lots of other research which shows using it once esp by sublimation, does no harm to the colony and there are no resistance issues. Also timed before winter break production - normally not possible in July / Aug as colonies not broodless. His main argument is against the use of synthetic hard chemicals (Apistan, bayvarol, Amitraz) and repeated use of others. He believes the evolutionary process to VSH bees will take much longer whilst we use those. You’re right in the case of the purist who wants to completely give up any form of chemicals, they would have to destroy the brood.

 

[Erichalfbee]

He wasn’t advocating complete non use of chemicals - using OA once at the end of the brood break process to remove any phoretic bees, is v effective and there’s lots of other research which shows using it once esp by sublimation, does no harm to the colony and there are no resistance issues. His main argument is against the use of synthetic hard chemicals (Apistan, bayvarol, Amitraz) and repeated use of others. He believes the evolutionary process to VSH bees will take much longer whilst we use those. You’re right in the case of the purist who wants to completely give up any form of chemicals, they would have to destroy the brood.

So it comes round again. OAV does no harm to the bees. So why not abandon the manipulation and simply vape?
Thus whole thing looks like something for a bored academic to do.IMO

 

[North End Bees]

He wasn’t advocating complete non use of chemicals - using OA once at the end of the brood break process to remove any phoretic bees, is v effective and there’s lots of other research which shows using it once esp by sublimation, does no harm to the colony and there are no resistance issues. His main argument is against the use of synthetic hard chemicals (Apistan, bayvarol, Amitraz) and repeated use of others. He believes the evolutionary process to VSH bees will take much longer whilst we use those. You’re right in the case of the purist who wants to completely give up any form of chemicals, they would have to destroy the brood.

But you're still not gaining anything, having the brood breaks and still giving OA.

The majority of beekeepers don't use synthetic hard chemicals (Apistan, bayvarol, Amitraz) and those who do would be unlikely to switch to this method.

(And of course there are TF beekeepers who completely give up any form of chemicals, without having to destroy any brood but that's a separate subject!)

 

[elainemary]

So it comes round again. OAV does no harm to the bees. So why not abandon the manipulation and simply vape?
Thus whole thing looks like something for a bored academic to do.IMO

To reduce the reliance on uses of chemicals multiple times, to practise IPM as an alternative. To assist the evolutionary process to VSH bees.

 

[elainemary]

But you're still not gaining anything, having the brood breaks and still giving OA.

The majority of beekeepers don't use synthetic hard chemicals (Apistan, bayvarol, Amitraz) and those who do would be unlikely to switch to this method.

(And of course there are TF beekeepers who completely give up any form of chemicals, without having to destroy any brood but that's a separate subject!)
[/QUOTE
The main thing you’re gaining is getting the colony to a broodless state in the summer ahead of winter bees production so if you choose to you can vap just once rather than multiple times. The other advantages are in my reply to Dani our posts crossed. The issue with using synthetics late in summer is they take several brood cycles to work whilst varroa is doing damage to the winter bees.

 

[North End Bees]

To assist the evolutionary process to VSH bees.

This method doesn't assist the evolutionary process to VSH. If anything it hinders it as evolution requires exposure to a situation for a change to take place.

 

[elainemary]

This method doesn't assist the evolutionary process to VSH. If anything it hinders it as evolution requires exposure to a situation for a change to take place.

If it reduced the use of synthetics significantly it will help. That would require a complete mind shift change and the only thing that will do that is when varroa develops resistance to them all so there are fewer alternatives.

 

[North End Bees]

If it reduced the use of synthetics significantly it will help. That would require a complete mind shift change and the only thing that will do that is when varroa develops resistance to them all so there are fewer alternatives.

I'm not saying that forcing brood breaks isn't a viable alternative to chemical treatments and, who knows, they may in some future scenario be the only treatment option available.
But it can't expedite the evolution of VSH. For that to come about the bees have to be exposed to varroa.

 

[Erichalfbee]

If it reduced the use of synthetics significantly it will help. That would require a complete mind shift change and the only thing that will do that is when varroa develops resistance to them all so there are fewer alternatives.

OAV has been used for decades. There is no sign of resistance.

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

Never heard such rubbish spoken in a long time on here

 

[RichardBeeW]

Looking back over my notes from the lecture some other insights, some obvious you may know already, others perhaps new:
-it’s normal biology to have one brood break a year, queen caging attempts to use this especially if you’ve avoided / managed brood breaks to maximise honey or minimise swarming
-it’s natural for beekeepers to have concerns about any effects on the queen but it is harmless to the queen - the trials showed the odd queen failure but no difference across the 300 colonies vs normal supercedure rates
-it’s key to keep mite levels below a threshold for this method and any other controls ie varroa will lead to colony loss at 10% infestation. Need to monitor mites especially in summer. Varroa does little harm at 1% but ideally need to use this method (and any others) before levels rise to damaging thresholds. C3% is used as a threshold in some countries. Varroa drops of 20 per day was quoted in the lecture as the max threshold to take action in august
-the method learns from natural swarming ie 4 weeks brood interruption so mites become phoretic and interrupted by grooming
-in the first and second cycles of mite reproduction in spring mites do not reproduce well, same happens with brood breaks the mite is slower to start reproducing afterwards
-1-2% of the phoretic mite population is lost per day when’s broodless through grooming and the loss of foragers, so a brood interruption period like this leads to a natural mite reduction of 25%
-you can optimise the honey harvest or at least have no loss by choosing the right period ie time it for when foragers are already produced for the next flow. Whilst used in July it also works well early august for a late flow - need to understand your own climate and local conditions.
Ideal timing is to start 4 weeks before the late summer flow and follow with a one time oxalic vap just as you remove the honey and shortly after the queen is released. She will start laying c 2 days after release
-Also critical is timing of winter bee production, so time ahead of this ie complete by august
-nurse bees who have not been looking after brood will live longer - have been found to revert to feeding brood up to 55 days old
-need to continue to monitor mites before and after - no one can legislate for the beekeeper down the road who may be less diligent than you, or feral colonies that are about to collap

Hope this is of interest to some of you
Elaine
[/Q

This method was mentioned earlier in the thread. However it requires the destruction of very large numbers of brood for which many wouldn't consider the end justifies the means.

If the Queen is given an empty drawn caged frame and lays 2000+ eggs per side, that's 12,000+ larvae being sacrificed over 3 consequetive frames. 12,000 larvae which have been intensively fed by nurse bees who, as we've seen earlier, shorten their own lives by putting everything into the next generation.

Would you intentionally kill 12,000 adult bees as part of any other varroa treatment?

That concerned me too but if you read to the end of my post you'll see I included this -
- - "The removed capped brood could be used to make up new colonies with a one time treatment when all emerged as there should be no brood present." - -
* ElaineMary subsequently mentions this too.
It's up to you, of course it is, but even with the destruction of the brood Ralph Buchler's studies suggest it's, perhaps counterintuitively, very beneficial.
Like others, I haven't tried it yet (so I'm keeping an open mind) but Ralph has, extensively and intensively (in his own hives as well as part of the European wide Coloss study) for more than seven years now and is thrilled with the results - both destroying and / or building new colonies with the removed capped brood as I mention. The point is the use of the removed brood is flexible - it just depends on whether the beek wants to reduce chemical treatments or avoid them altogether with the same level of protection as first class chemical treatments. I hope this helps,
Richard
It's quite amusing reading the comments here that it appears that all who have taken the trouble to watch Ralph's demos think he might be talking from experience while those who haven't don't. I can imagine, when Langstroth introduced his framed hive that many even very good skepists (who hadn't seen it) cried 'rubbish!' Nothing at all wrong with the way we're doing it now!

 

[North End Bees]

The removed capped brood could be used to make up new colonies with a one time treatment when all emerged

Having seen the Honey show lecture we trialled the whole frame cage this year [...]
I couldn’t bring myself to destroy a whole frame of brood, so popped them into a Q+ nuc. Interestingly that nuc hasnt made it through the winter, despite normal varroa treatments.

I guess that putting a frame with all the sealed varroa from a full colony into a nuc with probably less than a quarter the number of bees couldn't have done them much good...

 

[RichardBeeW]

I guess that putting a frame with all the sealed varroa from a full colony into a nuc with probably less than a quarter the number of bees couldn't have done them much good...

Could be too that having it queen-right meant that there wasn't a brood break for effective treatment? But nucs do die out in winter I suppose. I think it's worth a try - 'having watched Ralph's talks'.

 

[elainemary]

I'm not saying that forcing brood breaks isn't a viable alternative to chemical treatments and, who knows, they may in some future scenario be the only treatment option available.
But it can't expedite the evolution of VSH. For that to come about the bees have to be exposed to varroa.

There’s a good lecture with Somerset Beekeepers & Prof Stephen Martin one of the experts on this subject coming up. Good opportunity to learn more
https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/unde...-stephen-martin-tickets-135987348821?ref=eios

 

[B+.]

One other option Ralph Buchler talks about in the Honey show video is rather than destroy the brood, is to move the brood to a Nuc with some nurse bees, wait for it all to emerge, treat the phoretic mites with a one time OA, this way you save the brood. Can then unite it back or to another hive.

Varroa mites aren't phoretic. We used to think they were but Samuel Ramsey showed in his Phd work that varroa feed on the fat bodies of adult bees a couple of years ago.