# Overwintering Varroa



## twgun1 (Jun 26, 2015)

I've spent many many hours studying Varroa and its life cycle but I have yet to come across where the the mite goes in the northern overwintered colony with a 2 month+ break in brood. 

does she just hang on to the winter bees and ride it out? if it were that simple wouldn't we occasionally see some naturalmite drop on the tray in the winter, on warm days when they break cluster?

I did check my trays all winter. Nothing. The girls have started up brood rearing in the last two to three weeks and I had my first mite on the tray. Apivar tx pulled early Nov. after the treatment, I got maybe one to two Natural Mite drops every 3 days for a week or two and then it completely stopped until now.


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## enjambres (Jun 30, 2013)

I treat w /OAV in mid-late December. (This past winter it was in early January because of the extended flying weather here - bizarre 72 F on Christmas Eve day, for instance.)

I check sticky boards all winter long (as I do all year) every Wednesday morning. After the last treatment-induced mite drop is completed, I see about 0 to 3 mites, per month for the next 6 to 8 weeks. Once brood starts to get going in early February, there is a small uptick. Now when I probably (I don't know for sure as I haven't pulled frames, yet) a fair amount of brood I see about 2-5 mites per month.

I think mite drop is also very affected by the number of bees in a colony, so the larger colonies are generally at the high end of the drop rates. Nucs, for instance, rarely have a mite on the board during the winter. It would be interesting to see if in addition to av. mites/24 hr rates had a third variable could be developed, perhaps number of frames of brood, or seams of bees. 

My hives are very well insulated so I think my bees spend more time moving around, and perhaps in looser clusters. I find the drop rate is especially low during weeks when it's very cold and presumably there is a closer, tighter cluster. If only because any mites that may fall off find an immediate host, or even can't fall out of the scrum of bees down on to the board.

Your amitraz treatment produced exactly what I aim for with my last OAV one: a extremely low mite count during the winter (less stress on the bees) and most importantly the early rounds of brood are raised in a nearly mite-free environment so the nurse bees of my main build-up aren't affected by mite pressure - and the mite-vectored diseases. And that also means that my new 2016 queens-to-be (and drones) are not raised in colony that needs to be treated which I think makes for healthier, and longer-lived queens.

I don't find that my bees start to increase their mite levels until there is a lot of flying weather and the flows start to taper off some, when I'm sure they pick up new mites from feral and untreated bees, and also when the mites' breeding rate starts to ramp up again. As a consequence I don't have to do a spring treatment. My next one won't be until mid-summer when I start again, in order to protect the nurse bees of my wintering bees.

But I never let my guard down. I pull my sticky boards every week all year, and I do sugar rolls, on a rotating basis, every week in the season. I aim to get every colony rolled (on average) about once per month from early spring until it gets too cold to do them. I believe I know what my local mite build-up pattern is here, but I don't want to bet that nothing has changed. That would risk needing to do more frequent, and to use stronger chemicals to keep them under control.

One of the reasons I am skeptical of the theory behind brood breaks as a primary strategy for mite control is that I know my bees have a natural (4-8 week) brood break in the cold dark winter of northern NY. And yet, I know the mites survive quite well, and unless artificially reduced by an effective treatment beforehand they will just wait and pounce on the new late winter brood.

Assuming you had the temps for it, a late application of amitraz probably works the same way as the late-season one-shot of OAV: it cleans out the bulk of the remaining mites that might otherwise overwinter and starting building up again long before it would be safe to treat again. And I'm sure it gives the bees a much-needed break from the wretched pests, and just when they have other significant stressors to contend with.

I would be interested to hear how your numbers progress over the spring, and what your treatment regimen is going forward.

Enj.


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## Michael Bush (Aug 2, 2002)

>does she just hang on to the winter bees and ride it out? 

Yes.

>if it were that simple wouldn't we occasionally see some naturalmite drop on the tray in the winter, on warm days when they break cluster?

Keep in mind they start rearing brood usually shortly after Christmas, no matter where you are geographically. It's the length of days that sets it off, not the temperature. Temperature does affect the SIZE of the brood nest, but not it's existence.


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## beepro (Dec 31, 2012)

twgun1 said:


> does she just hang on to the winter bees and ride it out? if it were that simple wouldn't we occasionally see some natural mite drop on the tray in the winter, on warm days when they break cluster?


Like many beekeepers who only treat but have never actually went in to
catch the mites with a small sharp razor blade to learn more about these deadly
pests. If you have spent the amount of time that you mentioned then tell me
where do the mites hide on the bees? During the winter time which body part of
the bees do they prefer to be on? During the Spring and summer time where specifically do the
free running mites live on mostly? We're not talking about the mites that are already inside the
capped broods. 
I have intensely and in depth, all summer long until the early Spring build up, follow the life cycle of the mites.
Have caught and killed most of them while they were on the bees. Mleost beekeepers here laugh at my doing.
Somehow when things are new and out of the norm they just ridicule but have never spend the time to examine it
further. Oh, which bees do the mites prefer to be on? The young nurse bees, the newly hatched bees, or the older flying foragers? 
I also found out that there is a secret place on the bee's body that the mites can hide in. And no OAV can get to them until they come
out. I'm still experimenting on my homemade oav gadget to learn more about these deadly pests. At least for now everything is under
my control.

The answer to your question is during the winter time they are hiding under this "secret" place of the bee's body. 
Cluster safely with the rest of the bees until the next Spring brood cycle again. Last year I
on purpose leave some mites in the hives all winter long. This is to follow the mite
cycle this Spring. Specifically how they migrate during the early brood build up time.
And develop a plan to get rid of the majority of them before the main flow starts.


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## Michael Bush (Aug 2, 2002)

>If you have spent the amount of time that you mentioned then tell me
where do the mites hide on the bees? During the winter time which body part of
the bees do they prefer to be on?

http://www.bushfarms.com/images/Varroa2.jpg
http://www.bushfarms.com/images/Varroa3.jpg

They get under the tergits of their underside usually and suck their hemolymph (blood). They are hard to spot there.


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## twgun1 (Jun 26, 2015)

So the varroa female must be quite long lived....months? (In winter)Does her metabolism slow, thus feeding less, will she is not reproducing? It must. Wonder if she sticks to one bee, slowly depletely her to death then moves on to another in the cluster or does she feed on multiple bees so not kill the host she needs to survive. 

These questions are more academic to me than practical.


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## AHudd (Mar 5, 2015)

beepro said:


> The answer to your question is during the winter time they are hiding under this "secret" place of the bee's body.
> Cluster safely with the rest of the bees until the next Spring brood cycle again. Last year I
> on purpose leave some mites in the hives all winter long.


Did you mean you left all of the mites in the hives? The way it sounds, you have the ability to leave some mites, thereby leaving the impression you can choose to remove them all.

Alex


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## beepro (Dec 31, 2012)

You need to know that having one mite on a bee is like
us having a parasite worm inside the intestine. It will not
kill off the host right away but rather feed on the host's nutrient. So
the mite is feeding on the bee's blood all winter long. The bee
will continue to live but her body is very weakened after the long
winter. Then the mite will move on to another healthier bee to continue
her damage. I have read but have not confirm yet that the free running mites
can live up to 3 months inside the hive. So in the snow country with long winter months
the mites can still be alive in the bee cluster. Whenever the mite has a chance it will
move on to the next host like a big fat nurse or newly emerged uninfected bee for example. It will not
stay on a sickly infected bee that just came out of the cell. These are all my observation after spending an 
entire summer last year scooping the mites off the bees with a small sharp razor blade and cutting the mite in half on the nitrile glove.
Alex, I said "on purpose leave some mites" not all of them. If I leave them all then they will crashed
all of my hives like they did the year before. So only treat with my homemade oav gadget when needed and at
the same time leave some mites to continue my little bee experiment this Spring. I don't want to buy any mites when my hives ran out just in case. It is important for me to have an effective oav gadget to get rid of these mites. So my experiment continues. Yes, I do have the option to get rid of ALL the mites whenever I want to but I will not because I already found a way to do so this Spring. Right now I have more bees than ever before.


Growing hives after oav gadget control:


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## Oldtimer (Jul 4, 2010)

beepro said:


> I also found out that there is a secret place on the bee's body that the mites can hide in.


And will you share your secret?


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## frustrateddrone (Jan 31, 2015)

Pro-Active. I treated both my hives last fall. I pulled drone from a drone board and of the 16 I pulled I had zero this spring. I did not do a sugar shake. 
Since varroa seem to be the number 1 talk, I purchased 2 queens from California that will be VHS stock. I can prevent it from being a problem.


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## Phoebee (Jan 29, 2014)

Beepro, if you were not 3000 miles from me, I'd offer to come over there and make a video of you picking mites off of bees. Seriously. That's got to be some technique, and real dedication.


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## AHudd (Mar 5, 2015)

beepro said:


> Alex, I said "on purpose leave some mites" not all of them. If I leave them all then they will crashed
> all of my hives like they did the year before. So only treat with my homemade oav gadget when needed and at
> the same time leave some mites to continue my little bee experiment this Spring. I don't want to buy any mites when my hives ran out just in case. It is important for me to have an effective oav gadget to get rid of these mites. So my experiment continues. Yes, I do have the option to get rid of ALL the mites whenever I want to but I will not because I already found a way to do so this Spring. :


Well, I would not buy any either, I seem to get plenty for free.
Once again you are claiming to be able to get rid of all the mites with your homemade OAV gadget. When are you going to start selling them? Your gadget, that is, not mites.

Alex


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## beepro (Dec 31, 2012)

OT, it is not a secret anymore as more experienced old timer here already knew
about it. I just happen to know when picking up the little mites with a small sharp razor
blade this past summer. http://www.beesource.com/forums/showthread.php?322980-Overwintering-Varroa
Mr. Bush got the pics on his #5 response to show these mites hiding under. I agreed with him. Despite the
skepticism my quest to control these mites using my oav gadget already showing a significant progress. Pro or not
I don't care as long as I have some bees to keep and honey to collect. Last summer I have ordered many nectar
producing seeds to plant for this Spring after seeing that my oav gadget is working during the late Autumn treatment.
My thought in the past 3 years was how can I keep going when the mites had crashed my hives over the long warm winter here. Now I finally found the solution to control them. Going at this rate of expansion with the low mite numbers then I can be tf by next season. You're in business when there are solid brood pattern at every hatch
cycle with minimum mite infestation. It is as simple as lighting a match with only 2 minutes of burn time now reduced to 1 minute after the recent oav upgrade version.
Still I don't feel that right now is the time to release my plan to the public yet. Mainly it is about the safety and materials available in order to make one at your location. 
I want to make it as simple, inexpensive and universal as possible. 


Good enough brood pattern:


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