American Foulbrood photos

[MichaelW]

Hi, I ran into a bunch of American Foulbrood at the University I work at. We are burning them out, but on the bright side, I'm taking some detailed pictures to help others identify it. Check out this very close up pic that explains some of the symptoms

http://beeinformed.org/2012/04/ameri...gement-survey/

While your there, be sure to check out the annual National Management Survey and video. We are trying to figure out if beekeepers who use antibiotics loose more colonies than beekeepers who do not use antibiotics. Other similar types of questions can be answered by the survey too. So, if you take the survey, and get others to take it, that would help!!

[Rader Sidetrack]

Michael, thanks for the great photo!

Would you consider allowing the photo and caption at your link labeled "large version of Figure 1." to be added to the Beesource Illustrated Glossary, linked to the term "American Foulbrood"? (You will get photo credit.)

Here's a link to the Glossary:
http://www.beesource.com/forums/show...eping-Glossary
There is more info on the photo project at the very end of the Glossary at the link above.

[Mbeck]

Thanks that's a helpful photo and link

[MichaelW]

Hi Rader, yes you can use it in the glossary as long as you include the photo credit Michael E Wilson.

If you would also use, "Originally published at http://beeinformed.org/ " then that would be best practice.

Thanks and glad you can use it!!

[sqkcrk]

How did you let things get in such a state? The photos tell me that this AFB did not just suddenly appear. The infection has been there since last year and maybe earlier at lower levels. I think Oldtimer would agree.

You shoulkd be burning and burying everything that shows sign of AFB and treating the rest of the colonies w/ TM or Tylosin. If you can irradiate the honey supers, do so. Otherwise you may wish to burn them too. If you decide not to burn or irradiater the honey supers, number them and the hives they are used on. Then, when the honey comes off, inspect brood for disease sign and burn the honey supers from those colonies found diseased, along w/ the honey.

How many colonies does the University own? Is there a designated beekeeper?

[JYawn]

you must be a VOL!!!!!! Checkerboards! lol

[MichaelW]

sqkcrk, if you check out my post at

http://beeinformed.org/2012/04/ameri...gement-survey/

you will see one burning hive. We have burned 9 infected colonies so far, with the oversight of our state inspector. The apiaries have a little less than 50 total colonies. We then are reinspecting all hives and watching out for more cases. All infected colonies are being burned, honey supers, tops, boxes, bees and all.

How did we get here? These colonies are part of an Extension program and general pollination needs of experiment station farms at the University of Tennessee. They are not currently part of any research project and they are not there for honey production, nucs, queens, or any other marketable products, since its our job to do education, not production.

THEREFORE, the colonies go overall neglected, other than increases to replace lost colonies and harvesting what honey we have to. They have been managed by at least 4 different people at different times over the last two years. Certainly we probably missed low levels of infection then moved infected equipment around from dead colonies and a few colonies are now obviously infected, like the one pictures. Out of the 9 infected colonies, only 2 were obvious, the others took close poking around and testing with the microscope and test kits.

SO, we got here by not noticing low levels of American Foulbrood infection and then moving dead equipment around. Where the original source was, is unknown. AFB is generally rare in TN with about 8 official cases per year.

Diagnosis is confounded with a really bad year for European Foulbrood in Tennessee (not AFB). For diagnosis of EUROPEAN Foulbrood, see this write up I put together about it. I plan to put together a similar write up about AFB, but it may take a while.

http://www.extension.org/pages/23693...oney-bee-brood

[Rader Sidetrack]

Thanks are due to Michael for granting permission to add his photo to the AFB term in the Illustrated Glossary, linked here:
http://www.beesource.com/forums/show...eping-Glossary

There are still plenty of terms in the Glossary that could benefit from a nice photo. Contributions from other Beesource members are welcome and invited. See the message at the very end of the Glossary for more details. (We are now seeking photos for all terms in the Glossary, not just those starting with "A".)

[sqkcrk]

Well Michael, I kinda suspewcted that was the reason. Too many cooks. Whatever one is doing w/ their bees seems like they aught to get more attention than they did. But, beekeeping by committee seems haphazard to me. I understand that if one doesn't have a lot of experience detecting AFB, then that can be a problem too.

I hope I didn't come across too critical.

[MichaelW]

No sqkcrk, you are correct. And, it is haphazard, but like all beekeeping operations, the economics is a constraint difficult to shift. But also, these things can happen on occasion and by being serious about dealing with it, we should be able to get it out of the operation.

[sqkcrk]

Well, that may be true to a certain degree, but this is not a typical beekeeping operation, is it? It's a University owned apiuary. I hope you all are planning for the future oversight of your bee hives so such an infection doesn't occur again. Seems like the University wouldn't wish to be, or appear to be, a source of further possible infections. I do understand that you are affressing the current problem. This is good.

Thanks for sharing the photos. Many people have no idea what AFB looks like since they haven't experienced it before.