Another First Fogging

[DLee]

I installed a SBB and fogged for the first time this weekend. I checked my oiled wax paper after 15 minutes and discovered 9 mites.

Questions:
What is a normal/excessive amount of mites?

After making the emulsion cords, how do you store them for future use?

I've seen a lot of range of the frequency of fogging the hives. What do you suggest?

Thanks,
DLee

[JJ]

Hey DLee, I would e-mail the Dr. or call him 757-486-1573 Take care JJ

[Michael Bush]

>What is a normal/excessive amount of mites?

You can look at it two ways. If there are a lot of dead mites the treatment must be working. Or if there are not many dead mites, there must not be a lot of mites. Or, conversely you could figure that few mites mean it's not killing them now and a lot of mites means it hasn't been working before. In order to be useful you need a baseline. How many mites were falling BEFORE you treated and how many are falling AFTER you treated.

>After making the emulsion cords, how do you store them for future use?

I have never used them, but most people keep them in the fridge or freezer.

>I've seen a lot of range of the frequency of fogging the hives. What do you suggest?

Personally, when I did it, I only fogged and only with straight FGMO. I did it every other week during the summer and every week during the fall going into winter. Every week from early spring until late fall probably wouldn't hurt.

[DLee]

Thanks Michael.

May I ask why you no longer fog? What kind of results did you have with FGMO?

What methods do you currently use to control varroa?

DLee

[Michael Bush]

FGMO was fine. Small cell/natural cell is no work at all. I haven't found it necessary since I regressed the bees.

[Neubee]

I have a hive on pierco frames. Its nine frame, one hive body. What would be the best way to regress them?

APK

[Michael Bush]

Starting from Pierco has them almost a full regression already. I like foundationless frames, but you can use 4.9mm foundation if you prefer. You can shake them out or you can just feed in the 4.9mm or foundationless.

[Neubee]

How fast can you feed in the frames? for the foundationless frames do you just put the frame in and let them do the work or is there a trick to it? Thanks for the help.

APK

[Michael Bush]

If the hive has some strength you can just put any old empty frame (with or without a bevel, with or without a starter strip) between two drawn brood frames and they will quickly draw it and lay it up. How fast depends on how strong the hive is. If it's strong enough, you can pull three frames of brood up one box and put every other frame near the center a drawn frame of brood and an empty frame. The only trick is not to do this on a struggling hive that's still trying to get going early in the spring.

[Neubee]

Is natural cell smaller than small cell from Dadant or Brushy Mountain?

APK

[Pugs]

APK,

From reading other threads (there is a recent one, I'll try to find it for you) natural cell lets the bees build what they want, which can be bigger than LC or smaller than SC. Just depends on what the bees want. Some of it can go down to 4.6 (SC foundation is 4.9).

The other thread is in Biological Beekeeping and the thread is:
Observations regarding Large Cell Regression and Small Cell Packages

Pugs

[Neubee]

Pugs,
Glad to talk to you again. How are your hives? Thanks for the info. I'll be sure to check that thread.

APK

[Michael Bush]

>Is natural cell smaller than small cell from Dadant or Brushy Mountain?

Small cell is 4.9mm. Natural cell is mostly 5.1mm down to 4.6mm. Natural cell has much more variety and some of it is smaller than 4.9mm and some of it is larger than 4.9mm.

[Neubee]

Sounds like a great plan. Not having to buy the foundation makes it alot cheaper.

APK