What varroa treatment with supercedure cell present

[jackstraw]

I bought a new Carnolian queen and introduced her into a small nuc of bees on 29 May 2014.

She started laying and a good brood pattern was established. On 24 June 2014 there was a severe varroa infestation in a neighbouring hive and a natural daily drop of 2 over 7 days from this colony, as this was still a very small colony I treated this colony to half a tray of Apiguard followed by a repeat 14 days later.

The bees are currently covering 9 frames and are halfway to filling their first super. All is good. the queen is present, there is brood in all stages, there are no obvious failings. I last checked 4 weeks ago and there was a very low varroa drop.

I was therefore surprised to find a larvae in queen jelly in a supercedure cell today.

My dilema is

I was planning to put Apiguard on over the weekend and then feed them syrup at the end of September before shutting them down for the winter

If I do so I would have a virgin queen emerge whilst the Apiguard is on.

My first thoughts are

1. To put apiguard on this weekend and again after 14 days
2. To delay the Apiguard for say 14,21 or 28 days to give the virgin time to emerge first, to start flying first or potentially to mate first. This is problematic as the temperature may be too low for Apiguard to work effectively
3. To use Bayvarol, Hivemaker or perhaps MAQS instead, although I am not sure of the timings or daily temperature requirements of these
4. To give no varroa treatment to this hive, assume that the June treatment was sufficient for now and to ready myself to treat this colony with vigour in the Spring

My thought is to do the latter but I would be interested to know the forum's opinion

Many thanks

 

[itma]

Check the drop now. Unless its about 8+/day, don't bother prioritising treatment for varroa.
A midwinter Oxalic trickle would be a good plan anyway.

Your call as to whether to allow supercedure or to remove old Q to a minimal nuc until the new girl is clearly doing her stuff. (That way you would have a fallback plan -reintroduction- if there were to be any problem.)

Its cool this week, some Ivy is in flower (seen it, and seen the pollen flooding in), but there's no rush to close them up just yet, down here in The Garden of England.

 

[Arfermo]

Ted Hooper MBE (Guide to Bees and Honey page 91) says "Supercedure appears, from practical experience, to occur mainly in the autumn, during August. Often the new and old queens are found together, usually on the same comb". The local SBI is a member of my BKA and agrees and says that the bees know what they are doing so leave well alone. Can't say better than that imho. Your choice - but the book is must if you don't have it.

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

don't bother prioritising treatment for varroa.
A midwinter Oxalic trickle would be a good plan anyway.

if you are going to allow them to supersede, that is your priority. Putting apiguard on with an emerging queen/virgin awaiting mating present could cause problems.

 

[BigAshW]

This is the same situation I'm in hopefully my QC will be capped by now so I will hold off from apiguard for a while.

 

[VixyB]

I have a similar situation too. I have two queen cups with larvae in them but am part way through an Apiguard treatment. The second dose should go on this Saturday.....

 

[Erichalfbee]

VixyB you say in your thread that you have "some" sealed brood. If there isn't much I would stop your thymol Tx and oxalic at Christmas time instead.

 

[VixyB]

Sounds like a plan given all that is going on in my hive at the moment!