tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5812285702672175439.post6241071736574850077..comments2013-09-09T22:13:02.877-07:00Comments on The Eye of the Bee Holder: Movin' up townFreeMarkethttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12640525471233108791noreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5812285702672175439.post-70573487179137094692007-06-19T09:34:00.000-07:002007-06-19T09:34:00.000-07:00Sorry- I have been pretty ambiguous with what is g...Sorry- I have been pretty ambiguous with what is going on. I am not doing any of this to count mites, just to prevent and/or kill them. <BR/><BR/>The green frame is drone comb, which is larger than ordinary comb. Drones are the larger male bees. Since varroa mites reproduce within the cells of capped brood (i.e. cells with baby bees), they prefer the larger drone cells. A good chemical free approach to mite control is dust the bees with powered sugar (to kill the mites out of capped cells) and to back that up with removal of the green drone comb and putting it in the freezer for 24 hours (to kill the mites reproducing within the drone cells). This does, of course, kill the baby drones in the cells as well as the mites. Since drones do nothing but mate with queens (they don’t even collect pollen or nectar), it does not appear to hurt the colony if drone comb is removed.<BR/><BR/>There are chemical treatments for mites, but the mites appear to become tolerant so quickly that the long term effectiveness of chemicals is not certain with current technology. In fact, most beekeepers never use the same mite chemical two years in a row. Also, you can’t use chemicals with honey supers on, since the honey may become tainted.<BR/><BR/>Interestingly, Africanized honey bees seem to be mite resistant. This is likely because the African bees are smaller bees than the tamer European bees, and because the Africans “hatch” from the capped cells faster than the mites can.<BR/><BR/>I don’t like killing bees either, and I am not looking forward to requeening (killing the queen and replacing her) this colony, which must be done every two years or so to prevent swarming and various problems.FreeMarkethttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12640525471233108791noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5812285702672175439.post-72933022468128930152007-06-19T06:51:00.000-07:002007-06-19T06:51:00.000-07:00I am slow. Are you going to freeze, kill the bees ...I am slow. Are you going to freeze, kill the bees and the mites, so you can get an actual count of the mites<BR/><BR/>Could you use statistcal samples from the two previous populations, the screening and the sugar coating to extrapolate.<BR/><BR/>What are you going to do with the data, are there other approaches to the mite problem, and what difference does it matter that not all the mites are not metered.<BR/><BR/>I must be getting soft in my old age, worried about bees I have never meet.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com