I am passionate about beekeeping and really enjoy helping beekeepers through our UA-cam channel and bee mentoring programme! Want to get the VERY BEST out of your bees? Sign up today to join the programme: VIP Mentoring programme - www.blackmountainhoney.co.uk/beementoring
Hi Lawrence, thank you for the video and the effort you put in your channel. I really like the tips and tricks you provide and the way you handle your beest. But there is one thing I would like to point out on this topic: Please reconsidder treating your bees only with apitraz / amitraz. There is scientific evidence, that the varroa mites are develloping a resistance to it! The verry last thing we need are resistant varroa mites. Thank you and best regards.
Hi Lawrence. I’m considering carrying out a shook swarm on a couple of my colonies fairly early this year and was wondering if it would be beneficial to do an oxalic acid sublimate after the process? My thoughts being there would be no brood at that point. I’d bi interested in your (and other viewers) thoughts. Thanks
If there is no brood (like in winter) how do varroa mites survive? I have a high load now (24/2) and not sure what to do.. Apivar off in October bu no other i.e. no oxalic acid in December. What would you recommend?
Adopting the ZEST hive will do what you want to the point of being functionally free of varroa. It is a horizontal hive made out of aerated concrete blocks which gives both insulation (39 times better (R) value than a traditional thin walled vertical wood hive) and consequentially a bee pupation period that is shortened by up to 3 days, allowing the varroa less time to mature and hatch from the cells, reducing their numbers below replacement level. With top entry it is also a naturally humid hive being up to 20% more humid,...... which varroa also do not enjoy. That part is well known. So it is not treatment that is needed but a change to ZEST hives.
Hi Lawrence, how would you treat your bee's for varroa if you planing to do demarre next year as swarm control and the box/frames can't be exposed to i.e. Apivar ? We all know that as soon the brood will start emerging in the top box bees will fill the cells with nectar so there will be always some brood and some nectar on the frames.
You can have brood frames in the demaree with honey that have been treated with Apivar. You just cant extract from them. All you do is bruise the frames, place them back under the brood nest and the bees will move them to your supers with arent tainted. You can then extract :)
So the honey that was orginaly stored for short period of time (3-4 weeks) in the frames which were exposed to Amitraz will be still ok for consumption after the bees move the honey to frames which were not treated with Amitraz ?
@saleta1833 Yep. It's no different to honey being stored in the brood frames and then being moved up to the supers (which is the case for all honey albeit for a short amount of time)
@@BlackMountainHoney sorry to be a pain but I just want to make sure I got that right: you have mention that I can't extract honey from frames which were exposed to Amitraz but as soon as the bees move the honey to "new" frames is ok to extract that- what exactly difference makes that? The honey was touching the exposed frames to Amitraz anyway- it is about the short period? Thank you in advance for being patient with me :)
Really good detailed information. I bought stripes for the end of summer, but only having one hive didn't use half of them. Is a good or bad idea to use stripes twice a year? I've read the mites could become resistant.
I am passionate about beekeeping and really enjoy helping beekeepers through our UA-cam channel and bee mentoring programme! Want to get the VERY BEST out of your bees? Sign up today to join the programme:
VIP Mentoring programme - www.blackmountainhoney.co.uk/beementoring
Great information, thanks for sharing
Hi Lawrence,
thank you for the video and the effort you put in your channel. I really like the tips and tricks you provide and the way you handle your beest. But there is one thing I would like to point out on this topic: Please reconsidder treating your bees only with apitraz / amitraz. There is scientific evidence, that the varroa mites are develloping a resistance to it! The verry last thing we need are resistant varroa mites.
Thank you and best regards.
Excellent video. Great job
Thank you, very informative, parts I was wondering about.
(There is a beautiful ~6min black screen at the end btw :))
Thanks SO much for letting me know! I'll fix this now 😀
Hi Lawrence. I’m considering carrying out a shook swarm on a couple of my colonies fairly early this year and was wondering if it would be beneficial to do an oxalic acid sublimate after the process? My thoughts being there would be no brood at that point. I’d bi interested in your (and other viewers) thoughts.
Thanks
Perfect time to do it 😉
If there is no brood (like in winter) how do varroa mites survive?
I have a high load now (24/2) and not sure what to do.. Apivar off in October bu no other i.e. no oxalic acid in December. What would you recommend?
Adopting the ZEST hive will do what you want to the point of being functionally free of varroa. It is a horizontal hive made out of aerated concrete blocks which gives both insulation (39 times better (R) value than a traditional thin walled vertical wood hive) and consequentially a bee pupation period that is shortened by up to 3 days, allowing the varroa less time to mature and hatch from the cells, reducing their numbers below replacement level. With top entry it is also a naturally humid hive being up to 20% more humid,...... which varroa also do not enjoy. That part is well known.
So it is not treatment that is needed but a change to ZEST hives.
Hi Lawrence, how would you treat your bee's for varroa if you planing to do demarre next year as swarm control and the box/frames can't be exposed to i.e. Apivar ?
We all know that as soon the brood will start emerging in the top box bees will fill the cells with nectar so there will be always some brood and some nectar on the frames.
You can have brood frames in the demaree with honey that have been treated with Apivar. You just cant extract from them. All you do is bruise the frames, place them back under the brood nest and the bees will move them to your supers with arent tainted. You can then extract :)
So the honey that was orginaly stored for short period of time (3-4 weeks) in the frames which were exposed to Amitraz will be still ok for consumption after the bees move the honey to frames which were not treated with Amitraz ?
@saleta1833 Yep. It's no different to honey being stored in the brood frames and then being moved up to the supers (which is the case for all honey albeit for a short amount of time)
@@BlackMountainHoney sorry to be a pain but I just want to make sure I got that right:
you have mention that I can't extract honey from frames which were exposed to Amitraz but as soon as the bees move the honey to "new" frames is ok to extract that- what exactly difference makes that? The honey was touching the exposed frames to Amitraz anyway- it is about the short period? Thank you in advance for being patient with me :)
@saleta1833 Yep. That's right. it's the exactly what normally happens when you don't use the demaree
thanks for the info :)
Do mites only lay in drone cells?
Hi, what do you do with your heather colonies?
Treat straight after and do a spring treatment
@@BlackMountainHoney thankyou.
How do you actually apply oxalic acid to the hive?
Via a OA vaporizer …
successful beekeeping is constant fight for more brood in the bee hive....since varoa came this is more actual definition
Super calm bees!
Good
Really good detailed information. I bought stripes for the end of summer, but only having one hive didn't use half of them. Is a good or bad idea to use stripes twice a year? I've read the mites could become resistant.
Hi what bee treatment are you going to ues next year thanks you
Apitraz