Varroa concerns

[W0otz]

My bees swarmed earlier in the year, I took the opportunity to give them a precutionary OA vape with my gas-vap a couple of days after the new queen started laying but brood not yet sealed - hardly any varroa drop. Early July.
I treated with MAQS in the first week of August - again hardly any varroa drop, but it definitely did something as there was quite a pile of dead bees out the front of the hive. Possibly a bit early to treat for the winter, but first year beekeeper keen to make sure winter bees have the best chance.

Which brings me to yesterday, I decided to take a look at the inspection board, which I'd left in for a very long time though not exactly sure how long. Quite a few mites, a lot more than I expected.
So I dug out the gas-vap, respirator and api-bioxal and vaped. 20Hrs later (I'm impatient!), 111 varroa on the board. Oh.

At the risk of opening a can of worms, what's the recommended treatment from here? Repeat vaping every 4? 5? 6? days? A set number of vapes, or until mite drop tails off?

Glad I checked rather than relying on that August MAQS treatment and calling it a day!

 

[E&MBees]

My bees swarmed earlier in the year, I took the opportunity to give them a precutionary OA vape with my gas-vap a couple of days after the new queen started laying but brood not yet sealed - hardly any varroa drop. Early July.
I treated with MAQS in the first week of August - again hardly any varroa drop, but it definitely did something as there was quite a pile of dead bees out the front of the hive. Possibly a bit early to treat for the winter, but first year beekeeper keen to make sure winter bees have the best chance.

Which brings me to yesterday, I decided to take a look at the inspection board, which I'd left in for a very long time though not exactly sure how long. Quite a few mites, a lot more than I expected.
So I dug out the gas-vap, respirator and api-bioxal and vaped. 20Hrs later (I'm impatient!), 111 varroa on the board. Oh.

At the risk of opening a can of worms, what's the recommended treatment from here? Repeat vaping every 4? 5? 6? days? A set number of vapes, or until mite drop tails off?

Glad I checked rather than relying on that August MAQS treatment and calling it a day!

I had to vape one of my colonies 7 times before the mite drop was acceptable. I did them every 5 days. The drop to start with was massive, too many to count.

 

[W0otz]

I'm just not sure where the mites have come from given that the hive has already been treated with MAQS. I was feeling quite confident about overwintering them - they were treated, DPM-wrapped, top insulated and when I've checked in the past there's been minimal mite drop. Now I'm worrying, probably more than I need to given that I've spotted the problem, but still worrying!

 

[E&MBees]

I have no idea why this one particular colony of mine had such a large drop compared to its neighbours.

 

[Curly green finger's]

Maybe been robbing other colony/s

 

[Amari]

You've demonstrated that despite OA and MAQ you never get rid of all the mites so 'quite a few' two months later is probably par for the course. Personally I wouldn't continue OA now but repeat once in mid winter.

 

[W0otz]

You've demonstrated that despite OA and MAQ you never get rid of all the mites so 'quite a few' two months later is probably par for the course. Personally I wouldn't continue OA now but repeat once in mid winter.

Thanks, that's put my mind at ease a bit. Being new to this I don't really know what constitutes a high varroa load and I was concerned about winter bees being weakened.

 

[oliver90owner]

IF you have a varroa problem, get rid of them now, before all the winter bees are affected. 111 mites, if that is all there were, is not a great number. Multiply by 3 for those in cells. However one check on the board does not necessarily mean a great deal….

 

[W0otz]

That was after vaping, not just regular drop. Another 163 today.
I think I'll wait another couple of days (5 day spacing) and vape again, then again 5 days after that and see how things look.