varoa treatment

[itma]

... The upper BB has 4 frames of brood too. There are many bees. The weather forecast for the coming week is better...so today the honey frames will be removed...this will give more space for the queen in the lower box. There are no supers on this hive. We have a field of OSR due to explode into flower in the next few days. So we go from nothing to everything within a week!

"Space" for Q doesn't mean volume, it means area of empty comb - and undrawn foundation doesn't count.
Extracting or soaking out that honey would allow return of the the drawn frames fairly quickly.
Uncapping it (and possibly misting it with water) would encourage the bees to consume or reposition it within the hive. Do you want to keep it out of your crop? (Is it possibly thymolated syrup, or somesuch?)

You need to (pro-actively not in response) throw some drawn comb at them, and if it has to be shallows above a QX, so be it. Nectar processing also needs "space" - and again that means drawn comb area, not volume, not foundation.

The smart beekeeper can anticipate. Bees respond. Fail to anticipate and you will fail to keep those bees!

 

[Tremyfro]

Just went to check the varroa boards after yesterday's OA sublimation. We did all three hives.
Hive 1...this was the one with DWV...only a few bees seen with this...and a varroa drop onto test board....treated with Hivemakers recipe on kitchen roll....a drop of 15-30+ for several days...then less but still dropping varroa each day.
Treated with OA sublimation yesterday...25 varroa drop within first few hours. This morning only 5 seen on board. So total of 30 varroa for the first 24 hours.
Hive 2+3... No varroa seen after 24 hours.
So do I continue with the OA for Hive 1? For the full 15 days?
If the weather warms up today...I will remove some of the sealed honey from Hive 1 and replace with empty comb and a frame of foundation. I have plenty of empty super comb but I am reluctant to put this on yet as it is still cold at night here.
Saw our first drone today sitting on the landing board.

 

[Erichalfbee]

So do I continue with the OA for Hive 1? For the full 15 days?

Yes
Most of the varroa are in the brood yet to emerge.

 

[Finman]

Sublimation needs several days that you see results.

 

[Finman]

.
I completed my trickling just now.

We have had 3 months very warm. Temps near zero. Bees have made those brood what they can with their protein stores.
Pollen stores have been finish long time. I looked my hives and no brood. So I gove second treatment of the winter.

It takes about one week that first willows start to bloow.

I just tell this, that some one can tell me that we have different climate.

Varroa control is here easier, because our brood break is several months.

But mere oxalic trickling is not enough to keep hives healthy. August treatments are more important.
.

 

[Obee1]

Lots of drone comb

So finman was right. I just checked my hive and the frame I put in last week with a 3" strip of foundation has been fully drawn out. The foundatio part is now full of nectar but the the bit they built themselves is all drone comb. Also found lots of drone comb built at bottom of upper brood box which ripped open when I split boxes. All the larvae exposed and lots of mites on them. I have an inspection board in which has got one varroa mite in 7 days. So do I need remove the drawn drone comb or let queen lay drone first then remove when capped. I saw quite a few drone inside the hive.

Obee

 

[Finman]

.
The colony is anxious to enlarge the hive. You could give a box of foundations under the brood box and bees start to draw them. It prevents swarming.

 

[Obee1]

Going to do an AS tomorrow as the local bee inspector is coming so she said she'd help me

 

[Tremyfro]

So had a look in Hive 1 .....the bees have drawn out almost all the foundation in the upper BB....brood on 4 frames...but only a half moon size and shape. The rest they have filled with nectar.
Removed the stores from the lower BB...replaced with 2 drawn comb frames and a foundation frame. The rest of the lower BB(14x12) was full of brood with stores in each corner of the frames. Plenty of pollen too.
Added a drawn comb super.
We will continue the OA sublimation...next treatment on Saturday.
We intend to use this hive for rearing some queens...so some extra stores can be used in nucs.
We also did the first spring inspection of the hive ...Hive 3 ...we moved into the new Bee Yard. They have settled and have been out collecting pollen at every opportunity.
We found quite a bit of brace comb around the takeaway cartons in which we had fed the fondant. Tidied it up along the frame tops.
Previously this colony was a bit defensive...but today they were OK. I think going and looking at other peoples hives made us realise that they weren't so bad after all!.
There was honey and pollen around the brood, which covered 7 nearly 8 frames. 2 frames had been started with comb....we moved them closer to the brood, one each side. We saw BIAS. So although we didn't actually see the Queen...we know she is there. We didn't pull all the frames out once we had seen BIAS. There were more bees than expected...so they are building up quickly.
We added a super with all drawn comb.