hello everyone happy Friday the 13th today is frequently asked questions for beginning
beekeepers episode 34 and today this is a very important and very timely topic because we're
going to talk about whether or not I need to treat my bees for varroa destructor parasites
there's a thing this is a normal landing board this is a flow hive - and it has bee weaver bees
in it it's a split I did this year this one also has bee waver bees is the flow hive to 8th frame
which is their six frame Edition and look at the landing board on this one this is a standard bee
hive an extended landing forward and what's on it dead bees there's the thing you can see that
there are cappings there what kind of bees are in this colony they aren't Sasuke traz bees and I've
been observing this line of bees this summer and we have three hives with Cesc trance bees
in them one of the problems I'm noticing is no it's normal hygienic behavior the resistance it
would be casting out dead bees but not on this level here's another Sasuke trance colony and
this is the ground right in front of the landing board they are casting out and pulling out pupae
that have varroa destructor infections burrow destructor is a parasite that attacks bees they
reproduce in the brood frames and specifically they really like to go after her own cells because
it runs take longer and spend longer the cells there's more recent resources for those Barilla
to reproduce now normally I leave my bees and have for many years I've left them to deal with grow on
their own and they survive now I don't know about these Haskett rats bees look at that landing board
it is strewn with remnants they're overwhelmed the ground in front of it also demonstrates to me
that they're overwhelmed this is a brand new swarm that's been put in here so they've been here for a
little over a week we also did another swarm this week which I showed in a previous video and this
is on a temporary stand and that's a flow hype 2 standard edition and I put screens in there to
reduce the entrance so they can defend themselves because we're coming into a dearth period although
right now and that's why this video is timely we still have resources coming in and the bees are
still building so this is the time to intervene if you have colonies that require treatment that
are not naturally burrow resistant on their own you need to do something about it so the most
frequent question I get about that is Fred what treatment do you recommend what would you use if
you had to treat your own bees well this is the first year that I've actually started treating
and I'm using oxalic acid vaporization which is considered a soft acid but look what's going on
here when they cast out their infected brood that's not even hatched these are pupate then
we have this Yellow Jacket wasp ear gathering a little meat pellet there that it's gonna fly
away with and it's gonna feed its brood because the wasp itself can't even eat meat what it can
do though is deliver these little chunks of meat to its developing larvae so this is what you find
on the ground if you don't get out now this was filmed right at sunrise that's when I can see the
most going on around the hives I look at landing boards I look at the ground in front of them we
have no more skunk problem normally a skunk would probably come through here at night and clean all
of this up but now it's left to wasps and ants but the real topic today is why I use oxalic acid
vaporization and not only that how do I deliver it into the colony so I'm going to demonstrate
that and you're even going to at the end of this video get to see inside a hive and see what the
bees reaction is what excel-like acid vaporization is implemented it's really a sublimation we are
vaporizing oxalic acid crystals and I'm using this this is an ox of AB 110 that Musa runs on 110 120
AC current you need an extension cord and that's the oxalic acid right there get a reputable source
like acid you're also gonna need to protect your respiratory system protect your lungs you
need cartridges and you need a well-fitted masks you don't breathe it in you can also wear safety
glasses if you want to I'm just showing these here these are by Dewalt and you're gonna need a little
bag of damp cloths damp with water nothing else that's what I'm gonna use to close up the entry
boards and I'm going to show you how you use the odds about this thing is really simple that is
230 degrees Celsius on the bottom there and all we're doing is watching that top number match it
when it's up to temperature you can deliver it now this we're gonna block the entrance I'm gonna go
in from the back this is what I've done to all of my hives I have a quarter inch hole drilled
in them and this is a slatted rag so there is a quarter 20 threaded two inch long thumb screw here
I use that to keep the hole clear and to make sure it sticks all the way through the wood material so
that I can deliver oxalic acid vaporization from the bag and that is half a teaspoon that's good
enough for two deep bread boxes here's a close-up of the label for The Ecstatic acid now when you
flip this thing over be ready because it comes out right away now I just wanted to show you
that normally I want you to go ahead and stick it in that quarter inch hole first then flip it
that's to show you how powerful and quickly it sends a jet of vaporized exonic acid into the
colony now what's happening in there it's going everywhere it's also why you need to close off
the entrance because the bees are going to fan it around with their wings and they are going to get
that into every part of the hive now do you want your honey supers on right now no you don't so
this is what you do after you've drawn off your honey supers or you have to get the bees out of
the honey super you have to put a vapor barrier between the honey super and the brood boxes now
if you've got brewed up in your honey supers they won't get treated so you really need to
do an inspection first and see what's going on now the treatment period that delivery was about
20 seconds after that you can leave it closed up for six to ten minutes then you're gonna have to
pull that wet cloth away now I put these in and if I have it in the vertical position that shows
me its colony that's been treated if have that thumb screw turned flat that means it's yet to
be treated you have to do three cycles I did this on Monday I'm gonna do another one this coming
Monday and another one the following Monday after that now it still leaks off a little bit here that
thing is hot so you need to have a break or a piece of metal or something non flammable
to set it on and you're also gonna want some nice heavy gloves they can protect your hands because
you're gonna need to pull that ceramic top off the top there and it's gonna be hot too there's a man
Lake slided rack again I've drilled these holes from the bag so we don't have to walk in front
to do the treatment nice long extension cord put it in upside down and then flip it right side up
and you won't get a bunch of vapor puffing out at you and remember - the reason that that threaded
thumb screw is two inches long we want to make sure that it gets right through there and that
there's no blowback now this is where I'm going to demonstrate what it looks like inside a colony
when you deliver oxalic acid vaporization this is my observation hive it's eight deep frames it is
in tandem two frames each look on the left there you see my thumb screw and I'm gonna pull that out
now this is to buy material which means it's an inch and a half thick so I needed that two-inch
quarter 20 threaded thumb screw to keep that whole open otherwise abuse would prompt lies it put it
in upside down we're gonna flip it right side up and now you're gonna see what happens to the bees
the bees are gonna rush away from it here gets the puff now what happens the bees immediately
want to get that vapor away from themselves so what they end up doing is circulating it
throughout this hive now this has an entrance inch and a half in diameter that's been closed off and
you can see there's some condensation building up right away and look at the bees scurrying
away now what's going to happen is they're gonna circulate that through everything what time of
day do you want to do this well you want to do it early in the morning when all the bees are
in there or if it's really cold morning you want to wait until evening when all the foragers have
returned because you want maximum exposure to the bees now the excel-like acid vaporization
delivers it as a vapor but it'll land on and adhere to surfaces all over the interior of
the hive now what happens then varroa destructor the little varroa mite is going to walk on that
and the pads of its feeder can absorb the exotic acid and it's toxic to the mite it is not toxic
to the bees how many dead bees were at the bottom of this observation hive after treatment zero not
one dead bee see advantages I can deliver oxalic acid vaporization to every hive configuration that
I have including the observation hive if you have the wand style observation I mean the oxalic acid
delivery system sometimes bees fall onto that or burn or get stuck on it and they die when
you put that in the front the other thing is I can't put that one style iron in all the hive
configurations so I've gone to this Alex's vape 110 this is a brood frame the bottom two frames
in this colony you can see there's open brood you can see there's capped brood and now the bees
what are they doing well they've really started to relax so this vapor is still sealed up it's
still going throughout the colony and the bees are not freaking out anymore so this really shows
that when you're delivering a wavy it is not that traumatizing to your bees a lot of people will say
well if you put a respirator on and you have to protect yourself like that just imagine what it's
doing to those bees they must be suffocating in there well looking through this observation hive
window shows that once the initial blast of OAB goes in Oh a then they don't really care and we
keep this closed up again six to ten minutes after that delivery we're going to make sure
that it settles on all the interior surfaces including on the bodies of the bees and look
at this down lower left there where we delivered it the beads have reassumed their positions down
there and they're just moving about normally it doesn't mean they're happy about it but this is
not a stressed super agitated colony of bees they don't appear to even care after that initial puff
in and now it's circulating throughout the entire colony they're doing okay with it they're relaxed
now the other question is you're gonna hear a term called efficacy what's the percent of
efficacy how many varroa mites will that kill well I did some testing here before we did any
treatments I have at least two hives that I could compare that have removable trays in the bottom
so I clean them up pull the trays out and then I looked at the varroa that were being groomed
off naturally into the trays maybe three or four into the tray but you're gonna see later after I
did this treatment there were hundreds in the trace the bee weaver colonies they remained
only about five or six landing in the tray but the Sask atrocities had hundreds following the
treatment so 12 hours after the first oxalic acid vaporization treatment which was Monday September
9th the tray for the Sasuke trance bees in a flow hive - was covered and this is the normal
distribution just the way it landed there was no oil in the tray they fell to the bottom dead you
can see some of them look really dark almost burnt and it was very effective now we don't back off we
have to do it in seven-day intervals and we have to do three of those treatments so if you're gonna
treat for varroa you really need to do it now why is that because if you wait the bees right now are
building up their winter resources it is already Friday the 13th September the 13th there are still
resources in the environment there is still time for the bee colonies to build up their resources
but if you wait until those varroa are at maximum numbers and then you try to treat their recovery
can be very slow because look at what those basket rats bees were doing they're pulling out
both their drum larvae and they're also pulling out their worker larvae so there is an impact
not to mention the disease that comes with perova destructor also your colonies can rub elbows we
have bees that land on the wrong landing boards we have these that walk into the wrong hives
especially foragers that are loaded with resources and they can be carrying varroa destructor to
each other so I'm worrying about the sastras bees infecting other swarms that I've collected my bee
Weaver bees are holding their own the Sask attract bees needed help but you know what the breeders of
the Sasuke trance bees said that that would be the case that they're showing some resistance but they
do require treatment so my preferred treatment is oxalic acid vaporization I prefer delivery method
is the oxidative ones hence thank you for watching get out there and check those landing boards