hygenic behavior of beekeepers

[psycokeeper]

we read so much about hygenic behavior of the various bee races but next to nothing about what beekeepers can do to avoid cross contaminating other hives.
is this no concern at all?
is disinfecting the hive tool between hives a waste of time?
would wiping off the gloves between hives also be a waste of time?

since the supers and frames are interchanged from one hive to the next maybe none of this is relevant.

or would a good hygenic protocol be to keep the supers and frames all for each individual hive never mixing them. if you are a commercial operation something like this would be a logistic nightmare and totally impractical.

lets say you open up a hive and find chalk brood in it or you do a field test of a worker bee and find the mid-gut is all white and swollen suggesting nosema. if you go into the next hive with out disinfecting your tools you could introduce the disease by transfer into an otherwise healthy colony. it could be possible to have a major problem on your hands if you cross contaminated 100 hives from a single hive problem.

i would really like to know more about such things.

[Oldbee]

We do what we can to the best of are ability under the circumstances of our situation.

[Michael Bush]

>but next to nothing about what beekeepers can do to avoid cross contaminating other hives.

Actually Jim Fischer points it out all the time.

>is this no concern at all?

To some people.

>is disinfecting the hive tool between hives a waste of time?

Yes.

>would wiping off the gloves between hives also be a waste of time?

Yes.

>since the supers and frames are interchanged from one hive to the next maybe none of this is relevant.

Interchanging supers and frames is probably the only thing that IS relevant. smile.gif

>or would a good hygenic protocol be to keep the supers and frames all for each individual hive never mixing them.

That's what Jim does.

> if you are a commercial operation something like this would be a logistic nightmare and totally impractical.

Actually, it just takes an id system where all the supers and hive have the same id.

>lets say you open up a hive and find chalk brood in it or you do a field test of a worker bee and find the mid-gut is all white and swollen suggesting nosema. if you go into the next hive with out disinfecting your tools you could introduce the disease by transfer into an otherwise healthy colony.

Considering that bees rob each other all the time, the bees are more likely to cause this than you.

[Mike Gillmore]

I just got a mental picture of "Monk" in a beesuit, working the hives. smile.gif

[Oldbee]

Me thinks you should really try to "take care of" some colonies of honey bees and maybe you will acquire an appreciation for them and their "keepers" after a few years. And, let's say you have to make a "reasonable" profit from your "endeavor". Then what will you say?

[psycokeeper]

>I just got a mental picture of "Monk" in a beesuit, working the hives.

thats hilarious. and after reading this what i just suggested was as hilarious.

Oldbee is right. it is hard for me to understand what is going on when i have never been there. its like discribing niagra falls to someone who has never seen it or snow.

thanks mr. bush for your concise answers.

[sierrabees]

In all fields involving living things, there is a spectrum of handling methods that coorosponds to the spectrum of different reasons for doing the job. For example, in medicine if one is in research the most extreme measures are required to reduce the number of uncontroled variables. In hospital surgery room, a lot of dedication to detail is needed, but because the surgery has to be profitable to keep it going a few small compromises are generally accepted. In an ER an attempt is made to follow rigid procedures in a nearly impossable situation, in a military field situation everything goes out the window to just keep the patient alive until better care can be provided.

Likewise in beekeeping, the proper proceedures will depend on wheather you are a university apiarist funded by grants, a smalltime beekeeper working bees for the love of it, someone who keeps 50 or so hives and wants to supplement their income but has to fudge it all in when not tied up by their full time job, or a comercial opperator with tens of thousands of hives and a huge number of employees to supervise.

There is no absolute right and wrong way to do anything. There is only what works for you.

[mwjohnson]

The New Zealanders suggest,in their book "control of American Foulbrood" two approaches.

1) Hive Quarantine:
Keep EVERY hive identified and never interchange honey supers(I.E. frames too).
Brood frames may be exchanged IF they have passed the inspection procedures.
I would think that I would want to record this info in my hive record book...I gotta get one of those THIS year.

2) Apiary Quarantine:
Keep each apiary identified and only interchange equipment in that yard.Extract yards seperately.
Basically,don't put all your eggs in one basket.
I think this is actually doable for someone with more than a few hives.

That said,I usually melt the wax/propolis off my hive tool between hives,not sure why as my fingers are usually pretty stickey!

[kensfarm]

The one time I had the state inpector come to check my hives.. he cleaned his tools before going down to the hives.

The concern would probably be more from Apairy to Apairy then from hive to another hive in the same Apairy.. the bee's drift, robbing, etc.. you can't totally isolate w/in the Apairy.. but the distance from Apairy to Apairy provides some isolation.

[Ardilla]

In a intro to beeking course, Dr. Spivak said that AFB spores can survive cleanings using undiluted bleach. She suggested that the inspectors cleaning there tools is a nice gesture but may not be effective.

[carbide]

Our bee inspector puts his hive tool into his lit smoker before using it in anybody's apiary. He says that he doesn't want to spread anything from one yard to another. He has about 1200 hives of his own and claims that he never bothers doing it in his yards. He states that he normally sees maybe one case of AFB per year in all of his and his wife's inspections. He inspects all apiaries in 7 counties and his wife inspects all of the apiaries in 6 counties.

Personally I haven't bothered cleaning my hive tools since I bought them. That being said, if I ever discovered AFB in one of my hives I would at that time clean the hive tool with a propane torch before I used it in another hive.

[Mike Gillmore]

"i would really like to know more about such things."

To one degree or another I think all of us would.


"Oldbee is right. it is hard for me to understand what is going on when i have never been there."

You are correct in doing research first, asking good questions, and filling your files with a diverse collection of information and perspectives on the art of beekeeping. But there is a critical third dimension missing if all of this knowledge is not put into actual practice.

Say, for example, someone decides he wants to become a violin player. He first collects mountains of books and for hours every day he studies faithfully all aspects of this field...musical notation, bowing techniques, intonation, biographies of the masters and great composers, violin construction, etc, etc. Is this person now a violin player? No.
But the day he brings home a violin and starts to "practice", the journey has begun. With the countless hours of preparatory study and research will he play Johann Sebastian Bach's "Violin Concerto in D minor" the first day? Not likely. But the learning curve will be dramatically shorter than for someone who is starting green with no advance preparation.

I think beekeeping is much the same. It does not all come together until you actually start working the hives and then begin to apply what you have already learned to what is happening in the field. And the beauty is, as is the case with violin playing, that you can choose whatever level you wish to attain... professional or amateur... and its OK.

[psycokeeper]

so by asking questions, reading, and interacting on the forum, i am laying down a firm foundation of information on which to build a beekeeping yard. "practice makes perfect" still holds some water. that does not mean there will not be pit falls along the way but i might have enough locked away in my mind to bring forward later when i need it.

i do this on my job. i operate a printing press. i can still here my mentor telling me to do this or that to resolve a problem. some of it was ten years ago. he told me that when you need what i have told you it will come to you. and it has. he is not with the company anymore but what he told me sticks in my mind.

one thing i am omitting in all of this is that this is by and large an agrucultural venture. for lack of a better analogy it is something like running a dairy only in miniature. you grow animals, apply selective breeding, provide housing and protection, food, control or treat disease. collect milk {honey}, package it and sell it. sell live stock. sounds simple but i don't have any better idea of how to start a dairy than i do an apiary.

i like the violin idea. that reaches me since i am a musician on the side.

every one has been great. this is one of the nicest groups i have encountered on various internet forums. everyone seems genuine in helping neophytes like me. cudos to you all.

[dickm]

Someone said. "You're not a beekeeper until you lose a hive." I think that's true.

Dickm

[clintonbemrose]

I have separate tools for each bee-yard. That way I do not contaminate all my hives with infected tools.
Clint

[Mike Gillmore]

> I have separate tools for each bee-yard. <

Thats a great idea Clinton. No wasted time trying to thoroughly clean the tools between apiaries... and hive tools are cheap vs. the alternative.