Concerning Developments in Canada

[Alastair]

Three months for a strip is waaaaaay toooooooo long ,

Interesting comment, and parallels my own experience, the longer I left OA strips in the worse state the hives became. Could usually go a month with no obvious effects, after that the rot would begin.

However that is not everyone's experience. I met Trevor Gillbanks one time at an event, and he told me he leaves staples in his hives every day of the year. Said his hives are miteless, and do well.

 

[tristan]

So, while Trisatn may disagree with our spring modus operandii with strips ..... the proof is in the pudding that we get a honey crop and have no collapsing hives in the the late summer due to mites. What more c ould you want ?

reliability in all situations.

i think many run the bare minimum they can get away with. trouble is that tends to bite when conditions change. i much prefer overkill so no matter what the situation is, it still works (at least within reason). 6 staples did not effect the hive. 8 strips caused queen to move away and brood rearing stopped in those frames with strips, and resumed latter. but no bee deaths. so 3 staples is pretty weak.

the latest data from randy oliver is an eyeopener, its really surprising how low level amount of acid hes actually using and still working fine, but he does say it takes a long time. the weaker the acid on the bees the slower and less kill of the mites.
time is something the strips are not good at. they can get good amount of acid on the bees, especially with 1:1 ratio, but you still need that 8 weeks of brood cycles for a main treatment due to mites in the brood.
for short term knockdown to keep mites down in the middle of the season, 4 weeks is fine.

 

[tristan]

Interesting comment, and parallels my own experience, the longer I left OA strips in the worse state the hives became. Could usually go a month with no obvious effects, after that the rot would begin.

i would love to find why.
one of mine has had swedish sponge in for 3 months with no issues.

but don't forget staples don't last 3 months in a hive anyway. not really useable past 4 weeks.

 

[Alastair]

one of mine has had swedish sponge in for 3 months with no issues.

Not sure what a Swedish sponge is, but if it's a cloth across the top of the bars, been there done that, pretty much zero effect on either the bees, or the mites.

 

[tristan]

Not sure what a Swedish sponge is, but if it's a cloth across the top of the bars, been there done that, pretty much zero effect on either the bees, or the mites.

what was the OA mix and type of cloth? also what time of year was the treatment done at?
swedish sponge is what randy oliver has been using quite a lot of as it soaks up and holds OA really well. very very good results with it.

 

[Alastair]

Chux multicloth, using a 60 GL / 40 OA mix. Can't remember what time of year this was probably ten years ago. Tried on maybe a couple hundred hives, didn't work, gave up on it.

 

[tristan]

Chux multicloth, using a 60 GL / 40 OA mix. Can't remember what time of year this was probably ten years ago. Tried on maybe a couple hundred hives, didn't work, gave up on it.

i think randy oliver tested the usa vers of that and found it poor. it doesn't hold much (and probably adsorption) so probably never got the acid level up enough for long enough to be effective.
i think the key is moisture absorbing media like cellulose which has a high affinity to water. Swedish sponge is cellulose and cotton, and cardboard has cellulose.
moisture (supplied by the hive) is key as wet OA kills mites 2-3 times as fast as dry. so you need something that absorbs (not adsorbs) moisture so it constantly puts out small amounts of wet OA.

 

[JohnF]

With something like OA staples, I don’t think anyone can make generalisations on what will and won’t work in certain areas. Just because it won’t work in Northland a certain way doesn’t mean it won’t work in Otago/Southland with different temps and humidities. Ideally a group would run regional trials with certain doses.

So in the end I just used to go bare handed and wash my hands afterwards, I always have hand washing water on the truckI

I looked at a USA beekeeper who kept a cloth handy that was soaked in baking soda liquid to rapidly neutralise the OA if it got on hands or other places it shouldn’t.

 

[tristan]

With something like OA staples, I don’t think anyone can make generalisations on what will and won’t work in certain areas. Just because it won’t work in Northland a certain way doesn’t mean it won’t work in Otago/Southland with different temps and humidities. Ideally a group would run regional trials with certain doses.


I looked at a USA beekeeper who kept a cloth handy that was soaked in baking soda liquid to rapidly neutralise the OA if it got on hands or other places it shouldn’t.

i can't see anything that makes it really heavily location dependant (with the right strip material). it only becomes dependant on outside factors when the treatment is marginal.
thats easy to see in the dosage graphs, yet people will still under dose. not uncommon with synthetic strips. people scale back the treatment to make it slightly cheaper and run right on the edge of success/failure, instead of spending that tiny bit more to make sure its successful.
if your having to do dial in a treatment to suit an area, its already failed.

baking soda in spray bottle works great. really shows up where its spread to.

 

[Alastair]

Great idea. I may give staples another shot I certainly have thousands of them plus all the ingredients, I'll keep a spray bottle with baking soda on board.

 

[tristan]

Great idea. I may give staples another shot I certainly have thousands of them plus all the ingredients, I'll keep a spray bottle with baking soda on board.

let me know if you do.
i havn't made plans for spring yet, if we continue with it i'll have to make a large scale staple making setup.

 

[Alastair]

Won't be this spring, having sold a lot of hives I now have an excess of Apivar needs to be used.

Can certainly give you some staples if you need, I had these ones made commercially to my own slightly modified design.

The beauty of them is they are made from a material that expands if wet. So they can be taken out of the soak and if wet, they expand and absorb until not wet to the touch. Have not had too much bee kills with these compared to the "standard" ones.

 

[Winston Churchill]

Integrated varroa controll, nothing new but good practice.

Methods to Control Varroa Mites: An Integrated Pest Management Approach

Varroa mites (Varroa destructor), are the most influential of all of the pests and diseases of the European honey bee (Apis mellifera) today.

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