Thanks, well I've used the towel version for several years and found it effective, though it's probably more effective at some times of the year than others and depends on the colony; some colonies chew them up quickly but not others.
the UK inflict it on themselves, I remember back in the days of people clutching their pearls over EU rules affecting UK fisheries etc, when in most examples it was the UK gold plating regulations and adding layers of enforcement/bureaucracy not required by Brussels. There were more fisheries inspectors/enforcement officers in Newlyn (Ten times as many as what was required of the whole of Spain) than what was required for the whole of the UK.
That sort of english behaviour became very evident to me when I lived in Belgium. Same rules but the application of them was simple and totally different.
I didn't use sponges in the spring.
And if the fire retardant or one of those chemicals contributes in any way to the effectiveness of the sponge strip?
They say that it’s carcinogenic and might end up in the honey.
I am just the messenger I don't have an opinion either way.
I had a dream of using sponges after hearing Randy Oliver lecture last year about sponges. Initially I thought "dream on" but last spring my dream came true and I sponged some approved product from a friend with effective results. Dreams can become reality.
I wasn't saying this for you, but because sometimes we forget, for someone who must review an authorization, that we are completely sure that there is no doubt. I just pointed out the first question that arose when reading the publication in the forum.
I'm not sure how effectively it translates over here based on how the colonies are doing 3wks or so in. I think I saw someone say they'd spoken to Randy after trying it in the UK to no effect and he suggested our humidity wasn't the correct amount for his method/dosage. I try to only run single broods over winter so my experiment on my non-production colonies and nucs meant the sponges were mostly just on the top bars at the top of the hive, whereas Randy recommends having them between double brood boxes. I was discouraged to find high varroa load in 3 of my trial hives and have decided that sacrificing a part-full super to nadir for the sponges to sit atop is the best I can replicate - though as I'm not sure of the OA/glycerin's modality, I've no idea whether inserting the droppings board to effectively make a solid floor would be beneficial in raising the quantity of fumes given off or if it works solely by bees walking it around the hive, allogrooming it amongst each other and removing it (only a couple of sponges had a few nibbles at, the rest were good as new, though they're somewhat stiff despite following Randy's method to the letter, so I'm not sure if next time more glycerin is needed to keep them moist and prevent the OA dihydrate powder and dry sponges I seem to have a lot of. My production colonies treated with apivar are certainly absent of any kind of threshold level of varroa I'd be concerned about, and they're commensurately better for stores too - though the complete outlier is the single hive out of circa 100 that I forgot to give any treatment too and who look to be my strongest - entirely anecdotal, but the OA sponge hives DO seem to have a markedly poorer brood pattern of BIAS of different ages where you'd normally expect them to be of uniform age. Interested to hear of other's 'hypothetical' dabblings, cheers.
something i shall now try, apivar always leaves gaps of torn out comb so the sponges presumably won't do a great deal more damage
