K wing

[IndianaHoney]

I have a hive that I was looking at yesterday, its a 5 frame split that I did a couple of weeks ago. In that hive I found one bee that had shriveled wings. She was the only one I found like that. I started looking for mites and could not find hardly any at all, and I have already treated them with checkmite in April. Is finding any bees with K wing an indication that mite infestation levels are to high? I do plan to treat with Sucrocide in the early fall.

[Michael Bush]

Shriveled wings and K wings are two very different things.

I would not panic finding ONE of either. I would get concerned if you find a lot of them, of course.

[IndianaHoney]

Thanks MB. I know that the K wing is caused from a virus that can be transmitted via mites, but what causes the shrivaled wings?

[TwT]

the shriveled winds is called DWV (deformed wing virus) and is also a virus transmitted by mites...

[NW IN Beekeeper]

But... shriveled wings can also be caused by cold weather conditions in the last 2 days of development. If you have had any recent cold snaps (like I've had here) I'd not worry too much, but I'd keep a cautious eye on the situation.

The first few drones of the year that I saw were on the ground in front of the hives either without wings or very poorly developed. This is obviously because the cluster abandoned the drone brood in favor of keeping the queen clustered and warm (good choice).

I think this is a very important topic because people hastly decide that the problem is a big disease/virus problem before assessing all/most of the hive conditions.

-Jeff

[Michael Bush]

>Thanks MB. I know that the K wing is caused from a virus that can be transmitted via mites

Usually it's from Tracheal mites.

> but what causes the shrivaled wings?

Usually DWV from the Varroa.

[IndianaHoney]

Thanks for the answers. We havn't gotten any cold snaps, but I havn't seen any mites on workers since I treated, all mites seem to be on drones lately.