Small Hive Beetles and your Queen Breeder?

[mwjohnson]

Hi,
It was mentioned lately that one of the questions that we should be asking our queen breeder "is how far are they from the nearest SHB infestation".

Why is that?

I usually skip most of the SHB threads....

Thanks
Mark

[Bizzybee]

I would imagine they are all at least a thousand miles from the closest shb's! :)

Why one would care where a queen breeder is in relation to pests are concerned I wouldn't know. Other than to prefer they are right in the middle of the worst area. Hopefully so they are survivors and the offspring will in turn be. I can't image a queen breeder packing shb's in the cage for you.

Of course, if anyone would like to have some. I'm selling em in a modified queen cage shipped to your front door for only $5 a dozen. Get your orders in now, they're going fast!! :)

[Little John_NC]

If you run out Bizzy let me know I can restock you ........

[mountainvalleybee]

Use Peanut Butter and Eliminate them.

[greenbeekeeping]

Peanut butter??

[Grant]

Peanut butter was mentioned in an earlier post this summer, but they didn't respond to questions about why or how it was used in conjunction with SHB control. I'd like to know more too!

I was like you, Mark. I used to ignore the SHB posts because I didn't have a problem with them. That was 2006. In 2007 I had a yard absolutely decimated by SHB. They wiped out my recently caught swarms, my queen mating nucs and then systematically wiped out my established hives. The biggest problem was this yard was located in a lovely wooded, deeply shaded bee yard along the creek.

Initially I took comfort in that old axiom that a strong hive will defend itself from SHB. That only works when there's only a few SHBs around. But when they attack a series of hives and multiply, and when they release pheromones and mating smells that draw other sHBs from miles around, there is no hive strong enough. The hives fell like dominos.

American Bee Journal is going to print my sad saga. It was the greatest learning experience of my life (translation: it was the most horrible and tragic loss I've ever experienced).

Ignorance is bliss until the SHBs show up.

Grant
Jackson, MO http://www.25hives.homestead.com

[Marc]

Hey Grant, I just finished your article in the American Bee Journal. I can only imagine the horror of loosing all your hives to that pest. After reading the article I am determined to get prepared for the new year. Thanks for sharing your experiences and observations. So far we have only had a few incidences in the state with shb, but they are coming, no doubt. I have a question for you as a result of your article. Now that you are in beetle infested territory, how do you plan to make nucs or stock mating nucs for queens? Give yours, and others, experience with how quickly they identify and overrun weak hives or small hives, how do you o about increasing numbers or raising queens in mating nucs. Are those days over? How do the large queen producer operations in the south handle that?

[Beemaninsa]

I will take a guess at the peanut butter. Some have tried a certain roach bait containing fipronil and peanut butter squirted inside corregated plastic. Not approved.

[greenbeekeeping]

I have heard of use of the roach bait but not the peanut butter. Come on Mountainvalleybee lets here the peanut butter thing.

[JohnBeeMan]

>>>I will take a guess at the peanut butter.

I have a sure fire method.

Get two blocks of wood and place peanut butter on one. When the SHB starts to feed slam down with other block of wood. Works every time. ;)

[mountainvalleybee]

Not sure of the Exact Formula yet, a friend of mine uses the Peanut Butter along with Boric Acid and some Attractant such as Bananna Oil, as soon as he is convinced to tell me I will post the Formula on the Source. this formulation is being used in the Thinline CD cases and from all appearances the Beetles cannot leave it alone, you will see lots of them dead in the cases and on the Bottom Board and in extreme cases in front of the Hive.

[Bizzybee]

Was this thread about queen breeders, peanut butter, bananas, shb's, rocking horses or fishing???? :confused: I forget???

[Grant]

Hey Grant, I just finished your article in the American Bee Journal. I can only imagine the horror of loosing all your hives to that pest. After reading the article I am determined to get prepared for the new year. I have a question for you. Now that you are in beetle infested territory, how do you plan to make nucs or stock mating nucs for queens?

My mistakes this past year was 1) thinking a few beetles in the weaker hives were no big deal. Therefore, this next year will include traps as a preventative means rather than a reactive response. I want to put the traps in before I find the problem. Additionally, 2) my mating yard was in deep shade. Therefore, I'm moving my mating nucs to a full sun location. 3) I had used Hood traps sporatically in years past. I'm looking at Dr. Teal's plans for a special bottom board to use with Hood traps, including some West traps, some sandwich container traps. I'm not going to depend on any one method.

Once burned. Twice shy.

Grant
Jackson, MO http://www.25hives.homestead.com

[mwjohnson]

Bizzy
Uh...Queen breeders?
Not that this stuff isn't of interest....
Thanks for your reply regarding selection pressure (due to a breeders location) was kind'a what I was thinking....but had to wonder IF it would be possible to get SHB in a queen shipment?
Packages I have heard can, but what say you?

[Will]

Grant,

Do you have a link to Teal's trap design? This is the best one I've found.

http://www.sare.org/reporting/report_viewer.asp?pn=OS04-022&ry=2006&rf=1

Thanks,
Will

[Bizzybee]

Getting them in queen cages isn't likely and easy enough to see if they happened to be. Discounting that it's not impossible.

Packages, more possible but I still think not as likely as many may like to think.

Nuc's, probable if the producer has them.

[tecumseh]

bizzybee writes:
Getting them in queen cages isn't likely and easy enough to see if they happened to be. Discounting that it's not impossible.

Packages, more possible but I still think not as likely as many may like to think.

Nuc's, probable if the producer has them.

tecumseh replies:
I would say all the above is quite likely... although I suspect that their may be areas where the shb is limited, these area will likely not produce enough queens, packages or nucs to be of any significance (ie the bees and the shb like the same kinds of territory).

1)highly attacted to queen cage candy. place a small number of queen cages in a bank over a hive with any quantity of shb and see how long it takes for the little buggers to get into the cages.

2)can and will hide in just about any crevice or crack in wood works and frames. I suspect those plastic frames are actually the worst in this case but wood frames with split bottom bars are likely only slightly better.

3)the stronger the nuc the less problems with shb. actually some time I reduce a hive to a 5 frame nuc size and the crowding seems to force out the shb. once again any defect or nook becomes a possible place for the shb to hide.

finally... like foul brood or wax worms the shb is here (you can really thank free trade for this one folks) and you just need to learn to manage your apiary with the shb in mind.