Selling nucs and queens with mites

[squarepeg]

outstanding johno. time will tell.

i have been suprised both ways, with hives that ended up doing a lot better, and hives that ended up doing a lot worse than i thought they would.

[Vance G]

Welcome to the wonderful world of the marketplace. Just make full disclosure to your customers and let the chips fall where they may. If the mite count is high enough you worry about the colonies viability, you should treat them or not sell them. The folks who succeed at selling mite tolerant bees have got to that place over years of extra effort and expense. If I put out nucs that are temporarily outbreeding the mites who will in turn catch up and kill the colony in the fall, I have no business selling them with any claims.

[Joseph Clemens]

Sure, to my mind, selling nucs and queens with mites is completely normal. Claiming they are mite-free, sounds too good to be true. Certainly more like setting oneself up to be proven wrong - as I'm sure anyone with that claim would be.

Varroa mite-free? Sounds as silly as claiming "chemical-free", when we know everything in our world is made of chemicals.

[KQ6AR]

I sell a few treatment free nucs every year. When asked if they have mites I say, "I'm sure they do all hives do.
We use minimal treatments powdered sugar only for testing, & treating. Last dead out was 3 years ago.

[xcugat]

If you are not treating, chances are you have some mites in there period, it is always just a question of how bad the infestation is. If you are just making up the nucs in the spring depending on if you let them raise a queen or use a caged one you may have a enough of a brood gap to lower mite levels. Other than that, you will have some mites in there; buyers should know to monitor for mites and then watch out in the Late summer early fall time which is when Varroa makes the most problems. If they dont know what a "mite count" is use caution selling the bees unless you make it expressly clear that there are no guarantees with a natural product, and that AT THE TIME OF SALE the bees are in healthy condition

[ashb82]

Thanks for all the info and advice

[dleemc1]

i sell nuc`s mine have mites but i think every body else has mites also. at least i dont know any one who has bees that the mites are scared of.

[dleemc1]

i for sure let the people who buy them that they have to decide how they want to handle the mites, i treat mine.

[winevines]

Selling Nuc's is one of the most difficult aspect of beekeeping IMO. It seems every customer, especially those new to beekeeping, has a pre-conceived notion of what they should look like. When the reality does not live up to thier expectations, they vent to anyone who will listen. You never hear about the great job you did, but you hear about that one which wasn't up to thier expectations.

I beg to differ. I hear consistently about the quality of the nucs I sell and how well they did. Even if they swarmed- most survived the winter whereas the colonies started from packages did not.
I have to wonder what your expectations are in making them up. We along with other Northern VA sellers have printed out guidelines as to expectations- size, amount of brood, number of frames, etc.