# How to OAD a cluster of bees hanging from the ceiling?



## Kuro (Jun 18, 2015)

Hello,
I am a first year beekeeper with 2 hives. I am planning to treat both with Oxalic Acid Dribble (OAD) later this month. Both hives have two 8-frame deeps, a feeding shim (1 1/2 inch high), a quilt box, and a telescoping cover. It was relatively warm yesterday (~50F) so I took a quick peek. In both hives, the bee cluster was hanging from the ceiling (the bottom of the quilt box) into the top box (I did not look the bottom box). How can I possibly dribble OA onto these hanging bees? :scratch: Is it okay to scrape them onto the top bars then smoke them into the frames shortly before dribbling?


----------



## FlowerPlanter (Aug 3, 2011)

I would OAV, there are lots of new easier, cheaper methods to do OAV. YouTube is full of them. 

There are only a few left that still OAD, this number has dropped a lot in the last few year and I bet it drops even more in the future. 

OAD is hard on bees, shortens their life, you can only do it once during the winter, it takes a lot more time, a small miscalculation may end them. If it's hard on the bees, it might be safe to assume it's hard on the queens too. 

Then in your case you will need to disturb the cluster (most every beek will tell you not disturbed a winter cluster), you may end up with cold wet sticky bee crawling all over hive.


----------



## funwithbees (Mar 27, 2010)

Shake them down and drizzle them. Its not a big issue. Bees are a lot more resilient than we think. I have done this many times and no issues. Drizzle only once though. The bees spread it around. Fast , simple,cheap and effective.They need to bee broodless or you are wasting your time.
Nick
gridleyhollow.com


----------



## enjambres (Jun 30, 2013)

Does the QB have a fabric floor? Then simply tilt the QB up (don't remove it) and gently use your hive tool to scrape/detach the hanging bees down on to the bars. They will fall gently down and be none the worse for it. Easy-peasey, I do it nearly every time I go in my hives because I keep QBs on almost all year. You just have avoid squashing them against any little nubs of wax they have installed. (That will not be a risk if the QBs are new.)

If OTOH, you have made your QB with a screen or wire floor it's a different story and the bees very likely have their toes in the mesh and it will require extremely delicate nudging to get them to detach safely, without pulling parts off them. Less so if the mesh is say 1/2 hardware cloth supporting a fabric layer above than if you have chosen to use screening.

I've found you can't shake or bang the bees off without dislodging a lot of the filling (though you could remove that in advance, if necessary.)

Scraping them off against a smooth fabric surface is the easiest and best way and why I recommend that all QBs have a fabric layer on the undersurface. If you already have wire there, make the effort to get them off safely, once, and then then staple fabric over the screen.

If you do switch to OAV, no matter which wand you chose, you must budget for the proper respirator with the correct acid gas and organic vapor cartridges, as well as goggles (the latter you would need doing OAD anyway). Please do not scrimp on the PPE - you can injure yourself very seriously with OAV.

I think the fabric floor to a QB is so important I would consider removing it and remaking it properly. It will be a royal pain having screen on it every time you need to open the hive.

Enj.


----------



## Dave H (Aug 23, 2014)

I use OAV with pretty good results. Regarding wearing a respirator, I don't. I found that by placing my smoker on top of the hive and watching the direction the smoke in blowing I can easily avoid the fumes.
L8ER, Dave H.


----------



## Slow Drone (Apr 19, 2014)

My first concern would be as why they are at the top of the hive this time of year.


----------



## Kuro (Jun 18, 2015)

Thank you all,

OAD seems much easier to me but I’ll seriously look into OAV. I still have some time; the last two weeks in December is the right time for the winter OA treatment where I live (another good advice I got from beesource).

>Less so if the mesh is say 1/2 hardware cloth supporting a fabric layer above than if you have chosen to use screening
My QB has a 1/8 hardware cloth floor with a queen excluder beneath to prevent sagging. Maybe the bees are holding onto the excluder rather than the hardware cloth? But since I realized my QB needs some improvement (more depth to hold more shavings and larger ventilation holes), I’ll use unbleached muslin for floor as you described in another thread.

>My first concern would be as why they are at the top of the hive this time of year.
I am afraid there is not much to eat in the bottom boxes. In fall, I did not inspect the bottom boxes until mid October, assuming the bees stored as much honey there as they did in the top boxes. I was very wrong; the outmost frames which had been filled with honey in early summer were almost empty and the rest were mostly pollen and brood. Both hives had only ~5 deep frame equivalent of capped honey, the majority in the top box. Then I fed them with 2:1 syrup until mid November when the daytime temp dropped <50F. They consumed syrup ~0.5 pint/day, but I doubt they stored much in the bottom boxes, which felt much lighter than the top boxes when I stopped feeding syrup. Then I put sugar blocks on the top bars, which are now engulfed by those hanging clusters. Our winter is quite mild and the hives are only 25’ away from my front door, so I take a peek once in a while to make sure they still have sugar.


----------



## Phoebee (Jan 29, 2014)

Just looked at the Brushy Mountain website for oxalic acid. They only sell to states where OA is approved, but Washington is now on the list. Looks like 30 of the 50 have now done the paperwork.


----------



## Slow Drone (Apr 19, 2014)

Good deal sounds like you're on top of things Kuro. I wish you well!


----------



## enjambres (Jun 30, 2013)

Regarding bees in the feeding chamber hanging from the underside of the QB - that's completely normal here, and not at all a sign of lack of stores (though lack of stores may co-exist.) Lots of my bees hang out in the feeding rim space on most days of the winter when it's not below zero. If you looked in my hives you would probably find five or six of them with great masses of bees just goofing off in the feeding rim - and all of them weigh more than 180 lbs, so stores are not an issue in these hives. (I run 10-frame - DDDM or DDMD - and they are packed with bees and chow this year.)

My first year with QBs and sugar cakes in the feeding rim I was very anxious about their presence there and very worried I had lured them to a place where they couldn't form a cluster and therefore I would find them dead. That did not happen and when I regularly examined the placement of the bees (using an infrared thermometer to locate the cluster from outside the box) I discovered they more around up and down all the time. In really cold weather the bees in the feeding space withdraw down in to the middle boxes with the others, and my bees do what bees always do: make a nice tight cluster and warm themselves.

Also, regarding unbleached muslin, buy the heaviest weight you can find, almost as sturdy as well-worn jeans wouldn't be too heavy. Canvas, however, would be too heavy I think. (And canvas would be hard to stretch tightly.) Since you're installing it late, I'd spring for applying the stick-on strips of foam weatherstripping along the top of the feeding rim as I have described in other posts. It's late for the bees to be sealing up that meeting surface with propolis and it's hard to get the fabric really smooth - the foam weatherstripping along the outer edge of the feeding rim does a perfect job and keeps the drafts out very effectively. I prefer the white rubber stuff, though I have used the grey foam, too. You just have to remember it's there when you go to open the hive the next time and remember to insert the hive tool _over_ it. It's not too late to be monkeying around with your QBs; mine aren't on yet, either, but the weather this weekend should be just fine for that task.

You will find that sliding the hive tool between the bees and the fabric to drop them softly down on to the bars is slick and easy to do. OTOH, the bees may very well be on the QE, and in that case you could pull the QB off and just snap/bang the bees down off the QE. You do have fabric somewhere about that to contain all the fine dust from the shavings, right? No point putting a mess in with your girls.

Enj.


----------



## Beregondo (Jun 21, 2011)

Phoebee said:


> Just looked at the Brushy Mountain website for oxalic acid. They only sell to states where OA is approved, but Washington is now on the list. Looks like 30 of the 50 have now done the paperwork.


You can get Oxalic acid at Brushy Mtn 35 grams for $5.95 plus shipping, or get it at the local hardware 340 grams (12 oz.) for six or seven bucks.

Savogran Wood Bleach is pure oxalic acid.


----------



## Phoebee (Jan 29, 2014)

Beregondo said:


> You can get Oxalic acid at Brushy Mtn 35 grams for $5.95 plus shipping, or get it at the local hardware 340 grams (12 oz.) for six or seven bucks.
> 
> Savogran Wood Bleach is pure oxalic acid.


Technically the wood bleach can't be used as a pesticide unless it is specifically labeled for that use.

But I won't tell if you don't tell. Its not as if half the beekeepers in the country have not been using OAV for some years now. But since it is finally approved in the US and in most of the states, we can now recommend to new beekeepers the legal way, rather than sneaking around and saying, "Hey, kid, wanna kill some mites?"


----------



## sjj (Jan 2, 2007)

funwithbees said:


> Shake them down and drizzle them. Its not a big issue. Bees are a lot more resilient than we think. I have done this many times and no issues. Drizzle only once though. The bees spread it around. Fast , simple,cheap and effective.They need to bee broodless or you are wasting your time.
> Nick
> gridleyhollow.com


After shaking put a piece of polyethylene foil upon them. 
Give them time to reorganize tight in their cluster. 
They should sit very tight when you do the OAD (low temperature near frost). 

Regards


----------



## aunt betty (May 4, 2015)

Does anyone realize that OP is in Washington (state) , it's December, and it is winter there? OAD is not a good idea imo. Figure out another way.


----------



## Kuro (Jun 18, 2015)

>it's December, and it is winter there? 

Um, not really. We had several days of freezing nights before the end of November but now it is something like 50F(H)/40F(L) and the bees are busy doing orientation flight every afternoon even in light rain. In most years we have another cold spell in December. People in my area seem to do OAV or OAD in the last 2 weeks of December. I had an impression that if I do formic acid treatment in late summer (I treated one hive with MAQS in September and the other in October) and OA in winter I won’t need another treatment in spring. But because 24-hr natural mite drops in both hives are not that bad (11 and 14, last Saturday), I might skip winter treatment altogether and see how it goes in Spring?


----------



## funwithbees (Mar 27, 2010)

11 and 14 are not good! TREAT! they should bee 0-2.
Nick
gridleyhollow.com


----------



## Kuro (Jun 18, 2015)

Thanks, I'll shop for oxalic acid vaporizer (too bad the Black Friday is over).


----------



## Phoebee (Jan 29, 2014)

Kuro said:


> Thanks, I'll shop for oxalic acid vaporizer (too bad the Black Friday is over).


OAV would be easier on the bees than OAD once things get cold, and should be at its most effective when the hive is broodless, which you expect in early winter when they're clustered.

I like formic acid a lot for late summer (kills mites on capped brood), but nothing says you can't use one in summer, test to see how it worked, and then deliver a knockout with OAV in winter if needed.


----------



## Kuro (Jun 18, 2015)

Has anybody seen a vaporizer that uses the household 110V electrical outlet (I have one near my hives)? All models I looked require a 12V car battery. Do you think I can use a car battery charger (that you plug into the 110V outlet to get 12V output, either 2A or 10A) instead of a battery?


----------



## aunt betty (May 4, 2015)

Kuro said:


> Has anybody seen a vaporizer that uses the household 110V electrical outlet (I have one near my hives)? All models I looked require a 12V car battery. Do you think I can use a car battery charger (that you plug into the 110V outlet to get 12V output, either 2A or 10A) instead of a battery?


You use a car battery charger to get the 12 volts. Plug it into your ac outlet and you're good to go. Them batteries have hundreds of amps available. I'd put mine on ten and let er rip.


----------



## minz (Jan 15, 2011)

Wow that was a thread hijack by the OAV band wagon! t:
It is too warm here yet for the OAD, if it above about 40 degrees they will not be clustered. The purpose of doing it in the winter is to hit down the seams of clustered bees at 1 tsp per seam, not to chase them around the hive spraying them. We will get another cold snap this month then hit them or get them on a cold morning(Or there is always the option of going out and buying a $150 new toy, a battery to run it, and attempting a learning curve on something with your only hive). 
Intellicast shows it will be a good time for you in about a week:
http://www.intellicast.com/Local/Weather.aspx?location=USWA9741
Stick with your OA drip, Randy Oliver is kind of a cowboy and I like his info. 
http://scientificbeekeeping.com/oxalic-acid-questions-answers-and-more-questions-part-1-of-2-parts/


----------



## enjambres (Jun 30, 2013)

OAD, OAV, it doesn't matter which - it's beekeepers' choice for this time of year when it's a one-shot treatment. And yes, OAD needs to be done when it's cold enough for them to clustered. One very successful local beekeeper up here north of Albany does it only when air temps are below freezing. Seems risky to me, but he's got decades more experience than I do, so I can't argue with that. 

I have OAV equipment, so that's what I'll use in a couple of weeks.

But the OP mentioned, waiting and seeing how things are in Spring. That's really not a good idea for several reasons. (Not to pick on her/him, but I want to highlight this important point.)

First, waiting and not treating now is throwing away a golden, once-a-year, opportunity to nearly zero-out the mite population. Even though other treatments (of all kinds) are quite effective at other times of the year, nothing beats leaving your winter bees free from being parasitized all winter long. Not only does this ease their lives when they are already under stress, but also because in cold areas there is little, if any, movement around among hives, the bees will stay mite-free longer for the same treatment "cost" to the hive. So you get a big bang for your buck here.

The second reason is this: If the hives have nearly no mites in them after the broodless period treatment in December, and more mites don't come into the hive over the winter because there is little or no drift and robbing, then the first couple of rounds of brood are born into an unusually clean environment. And bees raised in mite-free (and therefore lower virus load) colonies are really strong and healthy come spring. (Sort of like I imagine bees used to be before the advent of varroa.) And it's those bees that will be the nurse bees for your honey-production bees and for the new queens you want to raise.

The third reason is exactly that: late next spring, when you are at the point of raising new queens (and to some extent the drones they might mate with) if those eggs are hatched and pupated in a hive that is not only free of mites, or has a very low-mite level, they will be healthier long-term, (and with queens long term is not six weeks, it's _years_ of life). But even more importantly you may not need to be treating for mites at all in the spring which gives a huge additional benefit to the health of your new queens: being raised w/o exposure to miticides in the egg/larval/pupal stages, as well as the lack of mites/viruses when young.

The fourth reason (though it is more variable from place to place, and sometimes year to year) is that essentially zeroing out the mites in December can have profound season-long results the following summer as it interrupts the mites' exponential growth cycle (assuming no unusual re-parasitization from outside the apiary). This means you may have more flexibility in the timing for summer/fall treatments, perhaps allowing you to skip one altogether, thereby lowering the year-long cumulative treatment load needed. To do this you MUST be vigilant in your monitoring all season long, but it is a possibility after a December, broodless period treatment. 

Think about it - mites are often considered to be a low(er) risk in the establishment year of a package or a swarm, but are a much more urgent concern when the colony emerges from its first winter. Treating in December - and zeroing the mites when they won't/can't easily be reestablished - has the potential to make every colony, every year have the reduced risk of a newly-hived one. 

Much attention is given to using brood breaks and artificial swarms as a way to interrupt the mites' breeding cycle and frustrate their dangerous late summer build-up. Winter OA treatment can leverage that since the mites will start out the summer at such a low level.

In some ways I think an OA (D or V, your option) in December is the most important treatment I do all year as it sets the stage for next year's mite conditions and thus the overall health and success of the colony, six to nine months later. Beekeeping is like chess, that way.

Enj.


----------



## Kuro (Jun 18, 2015)

After weighing the pros and cons of OAD/OAV for a while, I bought myself a Christmas present, Mannlake vaporizer at $95. I’m sure I could have done OAD without much problems thanks to useful tips I got here. But the fact that multiple applications of OAV (but not OAD) are allowed in a year, appealed to me. Both hives were treated on 12/19. I hope it helps the bees survive the winter. Thank you again for your advice and Happy Holidays. 

>You use a car battery charger to get the 12 volts…… I'd put mine on ten and let er rip.
Yes, 12V/10Amp worked perfectly.

>11 and 14 are not good! TREAT! they should bee 0-2.
>waiting and seeing how things are in Spring is really not a good idea for several reasons
Today (72hrs after treatment) I counted 81 and 94 mites on the sticky boards. I am glad I treated them. Before treatment, 24-hr natural mite drops during December were 2.3 and 7 (averages of 3 measurements, lower than the numbers I got in November). I’ll measure again in a week or so, to see if another OAV is necessary.


----------



## Harley Craig (Sep 18, 2012)

Kuro said:


> Has anybody seen a vaporizer that uses the household 110V electrical outlet (I have one near my hives)? All models I looked require a 12V car battery. Do you think I can use a car battery charger (that you plug into the 110V outlet to get 12V output, either 2A or 10A) instead of a battery?



yup 110v models are out there. http://bfy.tw/3PIU


----------

