View Full Version : Emergency mite treatment
One of my hives has a lot of mites in it. I find nearly every drone cell that I uncap has several mites and when I tried dusting them I got almost two dozen mites in half an hour.
A good flow is on and they are making honey like crazy. I know you can't treat and collect honey and this is why spring/ fall treatment is used.
Would this colony have a chance of making it to fall before treatment if I dust with sugar every couple of weeks or do I need to treat now? How do you pull the supers off to treat for such a long time and not have them swarm since they are in full honey production? Thanks, Pooh
Michael Bush
06-10-2007, 07:33 AM
You can put a pretty good dent in the mites by cutting out all the drone brood. You can also add some drone foundation and trap some more in drone comb. You can dust with sugar.
Here's the OTHER problem with treating while there is capped brood:
http://www.bushfarms.com/beesvarroatreatments.htm
I am pulling and freezing any drone I find but that hasn't been a whole lot. Is this colony ultimately doomed or will dusting/ freezing pull it thru?
Focus on Bees
06-10-2007, 09:14 AM
If the honey is for yourself, then dust with powdered sugar. Regardless of what people say, it doesn't hurt the brood or honey at all. I dust all through the summer and don't have any side effects. I say go for it.
lstclair
06-10-2007, 04:16 PM
I am pulling and freezing any drone I find but that hasn't been a whole lot. Is this colony ultimately doomed or will dusting/ freezing pull it thru?
Can you put in full frames of drone foundation? Two full frames would help quite a bit.
Axtmann
06-11-2007, 12:24 AM
[QUOTE=Pooh;241368]One of my hives has a lot of mites in it. I find nearly every drone cell that I uncap has several mites and when I tried dusting them I got almost two dozen mites in half an hour.
I would treat them and try to save the colony. It is very difficult with lots of brood and mites in sealed cells. You can see it on Michael Bush’s statistic. Even with OA at this time of the year, the result with one or several treatments will not reach all mites.
The best result during summer would bring one Thymol strip for 9 – 10 brood frame and without removing the first strip, a second one 2 ½ weeks later. Thymol penetrates wax and mites getting problems even in closed cells.
I know you should not treat during honey flow. What’s happening if your bees find thyme and bring this honey home, would you destroy the honey?
Put a strip on top of the queen excluder and give them the honey super back. Thymol fumes going down and after a few days you can use a broom and collect the dead mites. Make sure the entrance is not wide open (only 15cm / 6inch) to keep the fumes longer inside.
To reduce the volume of the hive you can place plastic on top of the queen excluder with an opening 5x10 cm for the bees to bring the honey up.
If there are mites left or a re invention from other colonies you can place a third strip after another 2 ½ week.
When you remove the honey super and there is a strong Thymol smell in your honey you don't like (It might be happen but so far I didn’t had this problem) saving the honeycombs and giving them your bees back for the winter.
You also can put the honey in the full sun for a few hours’ covered with clear plastic to keep the bees away; UV light destroyed the Thymol.
I'm not using Thymol past or oil based Thymol products. Bees will have it on there feet and smear it all over the frames and it comes for sure into the “honey compartment”.