Varroa Mite Control - Alternative Methods
Вставка
- Опубліковано 4 лип 2024
- Paul Kelly, research and apiary manager, explores alternative methods of controlling Varroa mites in hives.
Filmed by Wissarut Sukhaket and edited by Wissarut Sukhaket and Jenna Scharnowski.
A descriptive transcript is available here: hbrc.ca/beekeeping-videos/var...
Frequently asked questions: hbrc.ca/faq/
For more videos, check out the University of Guelph's HBRC UA-cam channel at this link: @University of Guelph Honey Bee Research Centre
The most important statement in this video is your use of the phrase “as part of an Integrated Pest Management system for the bees.”
There is rarely ever one quick trick or cure for pest problems in agriculture of any kind so having techniques that combine even in a small way to reduce pest pressure does multiple things for the colony health and the beekeeper’s mental health.
I have often called honey bees the “gateway drug to ecological thinking” since the observations through hive monitoring and management are such keys to understanding the small and large changes in the world around us.
These supplemental IPM tasks in the video are great methods to keep a beekeeper engaged and really focused on their colonies throughout the entire year.
Brood-less periods, monitoring techniques, selection for queen stock that has done well in your micro climate, management style and with the mites are all key to colony success.
Always love your videos. They have educated me well over the years even if I still can’t pronounce Guelph….
Im a firm believer “less interference” and doing anything possible to help create an increase of Propolis amongst the hives. I started experimenting with log hives a few years ago. The log hive bees produced more propolis and honestly just look way healthier and are more active. I will always believe that Propolis production is a cure all for what ales bees.
Great tips! Thanks for sharing
Always so happy to get another (rare!) video from you folks. Always so well presented! Also, took that lip sting like a boss 😎
Well done.
Thank you
We, my bee club, are trying to use rhubarb leaves (they contain oxalic acid) to separate layers in the hive to control mites. The bees chew the leaves and release the oxalic acid and kill the mites. We have no final determination on the effectiveness of the treatment but it is a natural treatment.
This I have to try, rhubarb leaves, who knew.
Curious as to any conclusions yet on this method....good or bad?
This sounds very interesting. Rhubarb, I have loads of it. Would love to know your results
That's what I use in mine
Realise how much(pounds )of leaves you must put in a hive. For it to be effective.
Is that not extra work that bees ?
Also would not the oa need be processed first?
Thank you sir for sharing.
Glad to see another video from you all. I have been doing a mite count twice a year and laying a paper towel soaked in 2 to 1 sugar syrup mixed with oxalic acid. I just lay it on top of the frames and put the hive cover back on. In a few weeks it's completely gone and dispersed throughout the hive. I will try the shallow frame in a deep hive though. I like that idea. Great to see you guys again.
What percentage of o/a are you using on the paper towel ?
@@DavidWilliams-wr4wb 2table spoons per quart. You can add a little honey to get the girls in the mood to tear up the towel too. Also this is just maintenance. You still need to do a mite count to know where you are.I tend to do this in the spring and in the fall for my girls.
@@w4447 thank you !
Thanks for posting. I must admit I was disappointed to find out none of the methods replace miteacides.
Greetings from the Blue Mountains outside Sydney Australia. I am a Queen breeder. I have been watching your excellent videos for some years now. Varroa came quite close to my part of the world. I am constantly checking my hives. So far no mites............I know that is not going to be the case in the future. SO! I'm researching alternative treatment methods. I understand that I will be facing the use of a miticide. I do like the idea of what we call an Ideal frame ( half depth ) allowing the bees to build drone comb below worker comb. That is a simple solution. I have reduced my apiaries down to one and drastically reduced the number of hives. I know that it will be a steep learning curve. Can I stay the course...................I hope so. Thank you for this excellent video. It helps.
Hi Roy
So nice to hear from you and to hear about your beekeeping activities. Yes Varroa are a challenge but if you take a integrated pest management approach you can still have success. Long term we do hope to breed bees resistant to mites. We think it is possible based on our LVG work. Some say it's like trying to breed sheep that are resistant to wolves!
All the best.
Great information!!
Thanks!
So nice Sir .. Good methods 👍
LOL! You are a much better man than I. If I had gotten stung on the lip, I would have taken off running.
Counting varroa mites is interesting, but it does not rid you of them. That can be done if the hive design is both humid and well insulated. If you change the hive environment by changing its design features you can be varroa treatment free. You just need to make an environment that reduces the varroa replacement value over each generation. This is not so hard. Forget chemicals. Honey bees in Cuba and South America have apparently learned to deal with it. The reason is likely to be that the climate is hot and humid. The question is how far north will it go in Australia where it is now resident. The propensity for varroa to die away in a humid hive was found out by accident when a laboratory hive was accidentally left at a higher humidity than others and that one lost its varroa. The precise mechanism of varroa destruction by high humidity remains a mystery. A standard bee hive entrance at the floor level with ventilation at the top causes a cooling stack (or flue) effect internally. This cools the hive in winter and takes away its humidity all year. The temperature difference in winter between inside and out is greater as is the ventilation, when it is not needed, but less so in the summer when it is. Trickle top cross bee entry and ventilation in a beehive rather than bottom entry causes it to be more humid allowing a bucket of humidity to form and which also appears to be controllable by the bees, because when the outside ambient temperature falls at night the humidity rises by up to 20% points in a top entry hive. I invite you to try this. The only thing you have to lose is your varroa.
The propensity for varroa to die away in a warm hive is due to the time that a bee pupa takes to hatch which varies between 10 days (35C.) and 15 days (31C.) which depends on when and where it is in the brood nest. A highly insulated external hive envelope serves to keep the brood temperature up throughout the hive and over time, allowing the bees to hatch quicker and therefore for the varroa to not have enough time to mature in the cells. Winter in the UK is varroa breeding heaven, but insulation confounds them and reduces the winter stores consumption to about half, as a bonus.
The DIY ZEST hive is made from aerated concrete blocks which have 39 times more Resistance (R) to the passage of heat than a thin walled wood hive has and consequently is functionally free of varroa. If you want to know more about varroa free hive design go to the ZEST web page, and read the free E-Book going to pages 21 to 24 and 50 where the mechanism for varroa free will be revealed. There is a U-tube that you may also want to view titled “Build your own bee hive-heathy bees-zest hive”.
You brave a kiss in the lip better than I, Paul. Thanks as always for the great videos.
Thanks Joe. Glad you appreciate the videos. I got the stinger out quickly so kept talking. We had already done 4 or 5 retakes by that point!
Thank you
I'm really confused about the screened bottom board's supposed effect, we have two hives with screened bottom boards and we coated some paper in vaseline and left that in there a good while, never saw a single mite on either one all summer, just a whole lot of wax moths... and our biggest producer (which we figured would have been the mitiest given that they're PACKED with bees) had one mite when we did a mite wash but I'm glad we treated everyone with Apivar anyways because the hive next to it that also had a bottom board was a mite bomb according to what we found on the screens a week after putting in the strips. The hive we tested had maybe a dozen dead mites, the other one had too many to casually count. I'm gonna have to go watch that video again on screened bottom boards again, even though I was sure I'd looked at it before.
I use the method recommended by Randy Oliver of Scientific Beekeeping, oxalic acid extended release strips.
When can you harvest the honey after the spring treatment?
I put double medium boxes with only 1 layer of 10 medium frames on upper 2nd box. They seem to be able to cluster tighter and stay warmer. They build comb along the bottom.
Personally, I haven't heard anything concerning the wild bee population spreading the Verona Mite". There must be a better way in trying to control this pest, than just destroying the domestic bee hives, when at the same time the Mite is still spreading by the wild bee population.
I've used pseudoscorpions for the last four years and I don't have mites. Also I personally as a hobby beekeeper neglect my bees, by neglect I mean that I don't go into the brood box and instead of weekly checks I do monthly. Also no other beekeeper gets anywhere near my bees and if I'm going to a communal apiary then I'm not going to wear anything that is likely to come into contact with my bees. I live in the Tyne Valley in North East England. It's cold, it's permanently raining, it's always windy and my apiary sits on a North facing slope.
What about using Stratiolaelaps scimitus (Hypoaspis miles) which eat, bite off the legs and punch holes in the varroa mites. It works well when combined with small cell, drone, and screen bottom boards.
One note. They do not enter capped brood.
That would be most effective approach using different methodes at once to fight varroa. But its hard to trace which methode was most effective and which absolutely not.
When i first started beekeeping several years ago there was “promising talk” of varroa baiting for control. Has there been any advance in research along that front?
Hi Andrew
I'm not sure what you mean by varroa baiting. Drone brood removal, mentioned in this video, is baiting and trapping varroa mites in a way.
I believe that any program should include the help to bumblebee so the transmission of mites in decreased.
Dr. Zachary Lamas Interview by Frederick Dunn has some good information on drone and mites and how to use a queen cage to get a brood break and to confine the drones to the one frame.
I'm not a fan of caging queens for a brood break. In my experience, too many queens die while caged.
@@UoGHoneyBeeResearchCentre Thank you for that info. I think they were discussing the use of the queen excluder based cage, so the normal bees can move unimpeded. The cage goes around an entire deep drone frame. That was to facilitate the documenting of the drone brood age for Dr Lamas. He was doing a study on drone brood, since he was proposing that mites prefer drone brood. Since drones take longer to hatch all the free mites would be drawn there as part of pest management.
If you take pepcid ac max (famotidine 20mg) before you play with bees, then the sting won't swell or hurt. Just a lil poke. I was stung by 43 bees in Sept 2022 when I dropped a hive. I never reacted in any way. Before I started taking famotidine, I would swell up all over for over a week and feel like I had the flu. But now, I have no reaction.
Were can you buy this pepcid ac max?
For the drone removal method can you also just remove drone brood that builds in the hive normally? And is there a minimal amount of drone brood that should be left in the hive or can most of it be removed?
HI Dan
It is more difficult to remove drone brood that occurs throughout the hive. The methods shown make it easier. You can remove it all if you like for best mite control. The drones are useful for mating with queens but don't contribute to the hive productivity. Of course if you are breeding or rearing queens you need drones.
I’ve found your videos extremely helpful, but I run into some points of conflict. Many sources say going into colonies too often upsets the bees, but you seem to be in them really often; e.g. checking often enough to know when eggs are laid. Are we overly worried about going in too often? Thanks for the info you provide!
Thanks Steve
Yes you can overdo checking your hives but every week or two doesn't do any significant damage. More damage is done by neglect.
What are your thoughts, regarding queen rearing and using these techniques. Isn't there a possibility that you are decreasing the gene pool, whereby there may not be enough drones in the area, especially if other beekeepers used the same technique.
The use of queens for varroa control is simply having a long enough brood break of at least 24 days
@@ozoneyemi5178 Unfortunately, not the right answer. The question regards the depopulation of drones for queen rearing, leading to inferior mated queens and then the unsustainability of a colony.
Hello, I would like you to tell me what treatment is used for varroa, if you have used amitraz? and how is the treatment with amitraz done?
Please watch our other videos on mite control methods.
Hello I also use the screen bottom board an love them . Also I use the screen top inter cover . A question have you ever done any study on the placement of the drone frame to see if the placement of the frame has anything to do with how many mites it collects at different locations. Also I run a deep an a medium brood boxes so what would your thought about using one in each box . Never tried that just a thought. Thanks for your information. THANKS
It works best as the last brood frame in the box. Varroa prefers brood cells at the edge of the cluster (colder...), that usually takes a day longer to emerge.
A back yard beekeeper should always have an uncapping fork and a needle.. and learn to pull capped brood out and do varroa and disease assessments that way. Used in combination with what you can "read" from the bottom board tray.. there's no need for bee washes in back yard beekeeping. There's no selecting them with 10 hives. The only need is to know if you need to treat or not.. which almost always ends up with treating them around fall flow, winter brood break and sometimes early summer
also use a screen bottom board with a tray of water/oil film to catch SHB and wax moth lava. Have to clean tray every couple of weeks or more when covered by skin of rubbish. Currently we are trying to stay mite free here in Aus but would be happy to drown a few. I can see a hassle using treatments that rely on a derth to give a break in brood
What do these mtes look like, Do they kill the bees? Sorry if silly questions I am not a bee keeper but am fascinated . Thanks for posting and sharing.
If you just google up varroa mites I'm sure you can get pictures. But to the beekeeper they look like red specks on the underboard (under the screened bottom board).
Oh, and they shorten the individual bee's lifespan, and carry viruses that will kill the colony.
@@GrannyRoberta
Thanks for your reply much appreciated
@@martynspooner5822 I would say they look a little bit like a crab big back with little legs when you see them, they are interesting. They don't kill bees a such but are vectors for viruses which can damage the hive a lot more. I have been looking at using apple cider vinegar as a method for reducing my viral load added to sugar syrup.
@@fishmanfairclough7530
Thanks for the reply. I actually looked them up on Google which i didnt think of. What is their purpose? I guess you could say that for all parasites. Could they wipe out bees altogether or is there a balance for wild bees that just remains even over time. Also I didnt realize they attack the larvae. Is there anyway they can stop the mites from reproducing, by that I mean sterilising them somehow. Incredibly interesting thanks again for your reply.
dawn dishsoap as a better alternate to alcohol wash,im trying the drone frame in a queen isolation frame holder, then after they emerge 2-3 day old drones get washed for mite count,and either formic pro and or OXALIC ACID,...later in fall drone population fades...mites hop onto workers, more predominately,
More updates on oil of oregano. It works!
I wouldn’t call these “alternative“ methods…. As they aren’t options that can be chosen instead.
These are “complementary” methods as they should be incorporated in your usage of chemical means - Which are most clearly the necessary means by controlling mites in the hive. It needs to be expressed that these chemical methods can be used on their own.… Whereas these complementary methods need to be used in conjunction with the chemical ones.
Anyone hear of the bees using a natural oil like olive oil) to protect themselves from the mites. A keeper in the UK says they will naturally use it.
USA. I had a beekeepers group say that bounty brand paper ( must be bounty)towel soaked in vegetable oil will be torn up by bees and kill mites. No one else says that..I haven't tried it yet
@@dennistaylor3796 y
@@dennistaylor3796 Just curious if you or anyone you know has tried this yet?
What about book scorpions? Has anyone tried introducing these into beehives?
I think so. I haven't heard anything more...
Hi how do mites know it will be a drone brood and not female worker ?
Thanks
the mites know where drone brood is by smell, they require more jelly than workers, varroa mites have no eyes, their front 2 legs have lots hair like sensors that smells and senses thermals as well mated females hang around the brood area waiting for eggs to hatch, then they move in once larva are fed and hide behind them, they smell or sense the e beta ocimene pheromones that newly hatched brood gives off, it's stronger in drone brood, if they can't find any open drone brood, they'll settle for worker brood.
@@carlsledge3868 amazing
even tough mites were not present in bees they are well adapted to prey on bees. Interesting...
They smell the pheromones edited by the drone brood, it is different from worker
@@blackberry5908 varroa mites are Asian bee parasites, so they are adapted to bees, they then moved on because of globalisation to European bees, as the bees didn't coevolve with the varroa mites, the varroa mites are much more lethal to a European colony
@@samdumaquis2033 amazing it feels like these asian bees can defend well against varroa and even hornet ...very cool
Has anyone tried breeding mites that haven't exparanced treatments for several generations.
Collect the mites and seperate them according to sex.
Then after mites treatment introduce the male mites to introduce a genome that has no resistance to treatments.
Maybe find a way that shortens the life of the male mites.
Just do it when resistance is becoming prevelant.
And some time after treatment
Mites can’t walk up the wooden side of the screen board? I thought you had to use sticky bottom board liner?
I use a screen and no bottom board, the mites fall to the ground that way
It costs a lot of honey to make comb that is being thrown away
saya peternak lebah melyfera dari indonesia.. bagaimana atau obat apa untuk membunuh varoa? terima kasih
Hi Madu 45
I tried to use google translate and it didn't work. Please try an online translation and send me your comment in English. My Bahasa skills are limited to counting and a few foods!
What about caging the queen for a month, then treating and then letting her go back to laying
Without any mites
Could you not be at risk of making your hive supersede or become a drone layer. The hive needs open brood to control certain things and without I would be nervous also the mites would still survive on the adult bees / drones and also drones that come from other hives.
It's done in summer dearth. The cage is a queen excluder box mounted in the comb under the top bar.. queen caged for 22-25 days.. release queen and treat with oxalic before they cap new brood. It works great.. it's by far the cleanest treatment we have. By now it must be 10 years that we do it in Europe. After releasing, queen will lay like a mushin gun as much as they can cover. It's all tested and works great
@@researcherAmateur in Eastern Europe (especially Ukraine) this method has been now used for over 30 years. Possibly the most advanced, cheapest, and simplest way to control Varroa mites. In Lithuania, we cage hundreds of queens during the summer and also during the winter so that the colonies do not rear brood. Just now that the West starts to discover it. Hopefully, it will spread quickly.
@@fishmanfairclough7530 not at all. Around 2-4 percent of colonies do that. Yet, it is a good sign since the queen's pheromone must have been weak.
I would say that screen-boards are one of a host of way to monitor that are extremely unreliable. Alcohol wash with very high % alcohol is the only reliable method.
2 tablespoons of Dawn Ultra in a gallon of water drops more mites in a mite wash than anything out there, read Randy Oliver's test results, he tried everything imaginable.
If you oil the board (preferably with biodegradable chain saw oil) it becomes very reliable since all mites stick. You can use powdered sugar instead of alcohol, the bees survive and it's absolute reliable. It's a common technique in europe and tested by different scientist. It's called Puderzuckermethode, there are plenty videos.
@@HerrKlaus1963 Sorry, but actual studies show that none of those methods are anything like reliable counts, while the alcohol wash if done properly is 95% accurate.
@HerrKlaus1963 Here is what you need to watch: ua-cam.com/video/HFGZ110irFY/v-deo.html
Don't you only get the mites in the screen board after the mites have fed, climbed onto other bees, fed, and climbed to other bees, fed, then oops fell off somehow? Seems like too little too late to me. Research has proven they also feed on adult bees too. (Agreeing with you).
does anyone lightly dust with icing sugar? I havent done it, but have read that it encourages grooming so helps them naturally rid themselves of the mite. Also, i have heard smoking with the birch poly pore mushroom and rosemary helps increase the bees immune system as well as providing sunflowers for them to collect pollen from, as it is packed with antioxidants to strengthen their immunity. I hate the use of these chemicals, as it must ultimately weaken the bees and prevent a natural response and ultimate cure to this accursed pest. Some eastern European countries did not treat their bees with chemicals and now have robust colonies that are much better at dealing with them. How are the wild bee colonies coping? ( if any are left, that is)
Thank you for this info!!
I think he got bit on the lip cause they heard him talking about killing off the drones.
Yes, they thought I was getting 'lippy'!
I had a swarm I caught this summer with a very high mite load, when I checked drone brood in August I was finding some cells with 7 varroa - would only 2-3 of these be offspring? Would you have more than one varroa lay in the same drone brood cell? See link ua-cam.com/video/OgFKRuhwO-0/v-deo.htmlsi=JnHV9O-WZ3n0KHn5
Good video. That brood was crawling with mites!
Seems like there must have been more than one foundress mite/drone pupae in your situation. As you say 1 foundress mite produces 2 to 3 new mites per drone pupae.
What's the point of destroying so many bee hives, if the Verona Virus can also be spread by the wild bee population?
I wish someone could incarnate as a bee and teach me to bite and kill a tick
The answer for eradicating the Verona mite is Chris Bowen, the minister for Climate Change. Since Bowen knows how to tame the climate, the Verona Mite won't stand a chance against that mighty warrior.
Good luck Chris.
What happens in nature with mites?
They infect the wild bees give them viruses and end up killing the colony. Then a beekeepers health bees go there to steal the honey and bring back those mites to their home and it starts all over again.
as with most diseases or parasites the best deterant is a strong hive.
In nature bees establish colonies on average about 3/4 miles apart so they rarely come in contact with bees from another colony, except when foraging, they've evolved this way for mutual protection against pest and diseases and to cut down on inbreeding.
@@w4447 you my man have no clue about varroa. bit more tough than your innuendo portends.
In nature hives strong hives swarm and that causes brood breaks. Mites food source gets interrupted.
Türkçesi yokmu
I worry that we are breeding weak bees
I worry about this, too.