# Treatment free claims?



## biggraham610 (Jun 26, 2013)

Don't know that answer, but, i know myself, I just started re-queening with resistant stock, and letting them open mate. If there is a silver bullet box that I can buy that is TF success, I will take it. I think in reality, it is a lot more of manipulations and thinning until I find my stock. Which, at this point isn't too bad. G


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## Andrew Dewey (Aug 23, 2005)

I don't think there is any special testing going on - rather if you are going to purchase from a TF Source that is new to you, you need to somehow get a feel for the integrity of the beekeeper AND be prepared (I say this from experience) for disappointment. I think a great deal of TF success ought to be chalked up to the conditions locally where the bees were found or developed, and that bees shipped out of their area tend not to do as well as they did at home. I'm still looking for a TF Bee that will thrive in my locale.


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## Roland (Dec 14, 2008)

The OP asked:
Is there a way of testing a nuc? Frames or something that proves no chemicals were used? 

To the best of my knowledge, the cost is 322 dollars to test for pesticide residues in beehive components. 

Crazy Roland


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## exmar (Apr 30, 2015)

My bees are TF, but I can't take any credit for it. Have a farm with feral colonies down in the woods. Bought a hive and set it up and was planning on buying a package. A swarm moved in without my knowledge and have been going great for eight years. Did a split this year, as something good was happening between the "tame" and "wild" bees and wanted to continue it. All I've done is transfer frames to freshly painted, etc. hive bodies when the old ones were looking wether worn. Is there something magical in my location and the strain of feral bees? Don't have a clue. 

I wonder if I were to get in the package selling biz. if these bees who seem to thrive here would elsewhere? I've wondered if a TF queen were to mate with a drone from a "treated" hive would the "TF magic" be compromised? I do know I take minimal honey and leave them with lots for the winter. I do believe that honey is better for them than syrup, sugar cakes, etc. They've always been very strong and healthy and "seem" to take care of themselves with no assistance from me. They've been throwing at least one swarm per year which presumably heads back down in the woods. My simple goal is to have a few langs to continue this cycle.

So, am I TF? Yes, do I have any idea what I'm doing or why it's working? No. I do believe that had that swarm not moved in and I had ordered a package and not treated them, I would have joined the folks who listed hive, gloves, veil, smoker, etc. on CL the following year.


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## beepro (Dec 31, 2012)

If it isn't then you will lose some money to buy an 
experience. Either way if you can find a source then
continue to use their queens. And find other sources to
get more compatible queens. Over time you should know which queen source is
better. Don't buy too many queens from any one source because
the drones play a big role too. Better yet if you know how to graft
and have many hives to requeen then consider getting your own tf breeder
queen or the AI vsh breeder queen.


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## rookie2531 (Jul 28, 2014)

Roland said:


> The OP asked:
> Is there a way of testing a nuc? Frames or something that proves no chemicals were used?
> 
> To the best of my knowledge, the cost is 322 dollars to test for pesticide residues in beehive components.
> ...


Thanks Roland, I am going to look into this and also maybe learn to self test.


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## jwcarlson (Feb 14, 2014)

Mine are treatment free 97-98% of the year.


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## Dan P (Oct 29, 2014)

my wild african hives are treatment free.


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## Nabber86 (Apr 15, 2009)

rookie2531 said:


> Thanks Roland, I am going to look into this and also maybe learn to self test.



You are going to need a gas chromatograph to do that. They start around $2,000.


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## Oldtimer (Jul 4, 2010)

When people want to know about the bees they get from me I will refer them to past clients, that's probably about the most honest assessment of the bees you will get.


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## rookie2531 (Jul 28, 2014)

jwcarlson said:


> Mine are treatment free 97-98% of the year.


Maybe, I just didn't see the fine print


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## Mountain Bee (Apr 7, 2012)

I was just reading a article in the bee journal about breeding TF bees using open mated queens. The article mentioned the fact that as long as your neighboring beekeepers are not doing the same that it is very likely that you will breed out any characteristics that you are trying to promote. If that is the case what's the purpose of spending so much money on TF,VSH queens?


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## biggraham610 (Jun 26, 2013)

I guess it depends on the local beekeeping climate. I have virtually no other beekeepers within several miles of my apiary. G


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## Mike Gillmore (Feb 25, 2006)

Mountain Bee said:


> The article mentioned the fact that as long as your neighboring beekeepers are not doing the same that it is very likely that you will breed out any characteristics that you are trying to promote. If that is the case what's the purpose of spending so much money on TF,VSH queens?


That is a very good question. I live in one of those areas where package bees flood the region every spring. Most are not coupled with quality TF or VSH queens. With all of the "inferior" drones dominating the DCA's it is not possible for me to breed new queens off of VSH stock and expect the daughter queens to be anywhere near as effective as the mother queen. If most of the beekeepers in the area would get off the package routine and go with good queen stock it might be possible to transition the surrounding region and have a good TF bee zone. That's just not very likely here. 

As far as spending money on queens, if you plan to replace the queens each year with good VSH or TF queens the investment you make in the queens might be partially justified by the savings in eliminating the treatment expenses.


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## Mountain Bee (Apr 7, 2012)

With the increase in beekeeping I also have several beekeepers in my area,none of which are breeding queens for better qualities. I also remember reading a comment made by (don't quote me but I believe) Jay Bush stating that if you do have control over your open mating area you will likely only see a 2% gain each year in the quality that you are breeding for. If that is the case it would take 25 years to see a 50% gain. With all that in mind and the fact that I am not in position to have total control over my mating area ( which I doubt that in reality not many actually do,even ones that may think they do) I think my money is better spent on equipment and propagating stock off my best performing queens each year.


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## Mountain Bee (Apr 7, 2012)

Sorry I meant to say Jay Smith in the above post.


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## Acebird (Mar 17, 2011)

Mike Gillmore said:


> As far as spending money on queens, if you plan to replace the queens each year with good VSH or TF queens the investment you make in the queens might be partially justified by the savings in eliminating the treatment expenses.


Who is buying these queens and who is completely treatment free?


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## lemmje (Feb 23, 2015)

Acebird said:


> Who is buying these queens and who is completely treatment free?


I have bought a few of those queens, use them as breeders in my nucs that i sell. I tell all potential buyers up front that they are from TF stock, but i am not a TF beekeeper, and that the daughter queens are most likely mated with drones from treated colonies. Seems folks like the idea of at least partial treatment free genetics.


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## Mountain Bee (Apr 7, 2012)

lemmje said:


> I have bought a few of those queens, use them as breeders in my nucs that i sell. I tell all potential buyers up front that they are from TF stock, but i am not a TF beekeeper, and that the daughter queens are most likely mated with drones from treated colonies. Seems folks like the idea of at least partial treatment free genetics.


Those customers don't have no idea of what benefits their partial treatment free genetic queen has over any other queen nor will they know how much percentage of that genetic will be in the daughter from that queen after the original queen swarms or is replaced. But from a marketing stand point for a man who is selling bees it sure sounds like a good sales pitch.


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## Acebird (Mar 17, 2011)

I am sure you are not alone. But that is not what I asked.


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## Mosherd1 (Apr 17, 2011)

Mountain Bee said:


> I was just reading a article in the bee journal about breeding TF bees using open mated queens. The article mentioned the fact that as long as your neighboring beekeepers are not doing the same that it is very likely that you will breed out any characteristics that you are trying to promote. If that is the case what's the purpose of spending so much money on TF,VSH queens?


In my area there are maybe a half dozen beekeepers or so. Some of which purchase packages. I am thinking about giving them some of my daughter queens for free. My hope is that they will requeen their hives with some of my stock, and push out some of the non resistant genetics. I am going to be purchasing a VSH AI queen from Adam F., a few production queens from Mike Palmer and perhaps some from a few from other producers. This way I can diversify the drones in the area with a range of stock. In theory, I can start to build tolerant stock in my area or at the very least reduce the influence of the southern non tolerant genes.
-Dave
-Dave


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## marshmasterpat (Jun 26, 2013)

jwcarlson said:


> Mine are treatment free 97-98% of the year.


LOL - Yea, there are lots of them that are treatment free for 362 days out of 365 days a year. That is only 0.8% time treated with Oxalic Acid. Does that count?


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## Fusion_power (Jan 14, 2005)

> Seems folks like the idea of at least partial treatment free genetics.


This is a better idea than it might seem on the surface. One person who has some of my bees has been able to keep them going for 5 years now. He is in an area with several beekeepers who treat. Queens mating with an average of 17 drones has to have some impact since a few of the drones are likely to have TF genetics. I can't prove this, but have seen that queens producing 10% workers with mite tolerant traits gives a measurable difference.


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## Mike Gillmore (Feb 25, 2006)

lemmje said:


> Seems folks like the idea of at least partial treatment free genetics.


People like the "idea", but in reality, what is the probable outcome in most areas? I can tell you what it is here from my own personal experience.


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## lharder (Mar 21, 2015)

One would hardly expect improvement in a linear fashion. With almost anything, I suspect proper selection would bring big improvements at first then be subject to diminishing returns eventually converging on some asymptote. But the selection is still needed just to keep in the same place.


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## lharder (Mar 21, 2015)

When I start to sell bees, I will be explicit about where I am in the tf process and my losses. As of now I don't consider my bees survivor stock. For new beekeepers, I will encourage making increase, making some queens available so they can do so easily and refer them to other tf sources if they want to diversify. If customers can keep their bees going, they are not as likely to bring in other questionable genetics.


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## Roland (Dec 14, 2008)

To the best of my knowledge, StevenG buys TF queens from one of the Weavers, and has had continuing success with them.

Crazy Roland


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## Nabber86 (Apr 15, 2009)

marshmasterpat said:


> LOL - Yea, there are lots of them that are treatment free for 362 days out of 365 days a year. That is only 0.8% time treated with Oxalic Acid. Does that count?


YES!


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## odfrank (May 13, 2002)

Roland said:


> To the best of my knowledge, StevenG buys TF queens from one of the Weavers, and has had continuing success with them.Crazy Roland


I bought treatment free bees from BWeaver 7/13 and a few remain, but the rest lived only as long as the average swarms I catch. They were great bees while they survived. BWeaver can remain treatment free by continually starting new hives with new queens and selling off the bees and starting more new hives with new young queens. New hives with new queens don't seem to need much treatment. It is the two year old queen led hives that die. The splits I made from queen cells this year look great also treatment free but they probably won't live more than two years.


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## beepro (Dec 31, 2012)

odfrank said:


> It is the two year old queen led hives that die. The splits I made from queen cells this year look great also treatment free but they probably won't live more than two years.


How come they don't live past the 2 years?
Don't you already have one of those oav gadgets installed under 
their hives? I will test them to see if one or a few will live past the 3 year cycles.


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## Riverderwent (May 23, 2013)

"How come they don't live past the 2 years?"

_Varroa_ breed inside the capped cells with drone and, to a slightly lesser extent, worker brood. When you have a significant brood break from events such as swarming or replacing a dead queen with a virgin, this interrupts the _varroa's_ breeding cycle and allows the bees to get the jump on the mites. Once there are again brood cells within which the mites can breed, they can catch up with and surpass the bees because they have a shorter breeding cycle. For this reason, _varroa_ can overwhelm a hive with a two or three year old queen who has not given the mites a brood break other than the seasonal contraction in the amount of brood during the winter.


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## Acebird (Mar 17, 2011)

odfrank said:


> New hives with new queens don't seem to need much treatment.


So if you are replacing queens every year why do you need to treat?


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## charmd2 (May 25, 2008)

Ace, if you are just replacing queens there is likely no brood break. The point is there needs to be enough of an,interrupted brood cycle to stop mite reproduction. (I don't buy into it much either, I have extended brood breaks in the summer dearth and still have mites, but that is the idea.)


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## Lauri (Feb 1, 2012)

odfrank said:


> BWeaver can remain treatment free by continually starting new hives with new queens and selling off the bees and starting more new hives with new young queens. New hives with new queens don't seem to need much treatment.


Exactly. Although you do still need good hardy bees to be able to get away with that.

Under normal circumstances, I am also usually able to keep a good part of my apiary treatment free (Breeder queen colonies, nucs, young colonies, simulated swarm colonies, etc) It is a great way to keep mite numbers down (But isn't the best way to make a surplus honey crop without perfect timing.) 


Still, even though I probably 'technically' could, personally I would never advertise my product as totally 'Treatment Free' (for mite control) 

Why?
Because I feel it would give my beginner customers (for queens and nucs) the false sense of freedom from treating/managing. I want them to be happy long term with their bees & I want them to be happy with me _long term_ as a provider.

It also really depends on what your opinion of a 'treatments' is. And how long a colony needs to be treatment free to qualify.

Also, to be truthful, I work hard to produce a good product and don't want to see them killed through neglect or ignorance. I don't want them to buy a queen from me and drop her into a mite infested or disease suppressed hive and walk away, expecting her to work miracles. Without a good chance for her to produce a significant amount of her _own_ bees, it's unlikely she will have any impact on the colony.


If your looking for treatment free stock, better ask some questions so you have an idea of exactly How they have been managed so you can continue that on down the road. 

If you are buying queens or bees of _any kind_, better ask some questions so you know how they've been managed and how to handle them while in your care so you keep them alive long enough to _work toward your goals_

I've mentioned it quite a bit before, if you don't know the _history_ behind your bees, you'd better be careful if withholding treatments cold turkey.

With a _treatment reduced _method and good communication (Facebook agricultural page-beesourse posts) showing photos and methods, my customers know the queens they purchase come from good survivor stock that is managed for mite _tolerance_ ( viruses resistance) and natural bred in pre-disposition for mite population control. (VSH behavior, mite biting, etc) 

But in the end, when you have a colony that is a couple years old and the queens production is starting to decrease, especially during periods of stress like extended dearth periods, that's all the opportunistic mites need to get out of balance. Even in the best of colonies.

I Never say never when it comes to treating for mites (Or aggressive managing like breaking up an older hive into a simulated swarm or nucs with capped queen cells).

But choose your _genetics_ from someone with a plan and methods to support them. Not just a treatment free 'label'. 

What's much more important in my opinion is an _antibiotic treatment free apiary_. You're looking for good health and vigor from good genetic diversity instead of medications. In that instance, your quest for treatment free status is worth looking into.

A strong healthy colony can usually handle mite populations very well for a majority of the time. Fancy labels such as VSH or biters are nice, but biting videos and originating background genetics is good to have to back those claims. 

Lots of good info on this thread:
http://www.beesource.com/forums/showthread.php?306157-Treatment-free-is-it-really-that-easy




















This is a colony with a 3 year old queen, overwintered in 4 deeps, separated into a simulated swarm early spring and made to rebuild. All drawn frames except one were removed & made into nucs with capped queen cells.

One frame of open brood with the established queen was placed in the center of the 'fly back' original location with all new frames and plenty of feed. 
An example of a _method_ behind a treatment free or treatment reduced label. But again, some may consider this manipulation a 'treatment' even though it is not a chemical mite removal method.


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## lemmje (Feb 23, 2015)

Lauri, once again, your eloquence surpasses anything i could write. 

Earlier in this thread I mentioned that i sell nucs with queens that came from treatment free stock (B Weaver being among them) but tell my clients that I treat, and that the queens they are getting are bred from local, non-TF stock. 

I just feel like baselining my queens from stock that have proven (or claimed) success in TF is a good place to start. I am very small scale, so I don't have any real impact on the genetics in the area as there are 2 major honey producers very near me, and many pollinator businesses. But VSH queens are not that much more expensive than the queens the package providers put in their packages, and any way we can work to get the genetics moving in the right direction is a good thing, right?

BTW: I treat with OAV.


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## Acebird (Mar 17, 2011)

charmd2 said:


> Ace, if you are just replacing queens there is likely no brood break.


If you are willing to replace the queen what stops you from creating a brood break?


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## Lauri (Feb 1, 2012)

My previous reply was certainly long winded.

I guess what I was trying to say is if a small supplier says they are treatment free, simply because they've never treated but without long term methods to back it up and they were fairly new at beekeeping, I'd be wary.

If you are going to ask your supplier questions, you'd better do it soon. They'll be way too busy producing your bees to answer questions when the season starts. Hopefully they have a web site or other means to share their information.


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## Lauri (Feb 1, 2012)

I have many colonies I consider breeder queen quality. But each one has it's own particular natural 'management' traits that is unique. 

I know my colonies history. That is my _advantage_.

Those that are totally treatment free status, It would be interesting to hear their details exactly of how they have managed to do it long term and on what scale. Especially those with Italians in warmer climates.

I have Carniolan hybrids and live an a Northern location. Along with the genetics I've acquired, I rely on cool winters and an extended broodless period to keep my colonies mite populations manageability low.


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## Dave1958 (Mar 25, 2013)

http://i425.photobucket.com/albums/pp340/tweety4926/2015 bees/P1010063_zpsaad85tvb.jpg

Where did you get the buttons, and do they stay on well?


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## Lauri (Feb 1, 2012)

Dave1958 said:


> http://i425.photobucket.com/albums/pp340/tweety4926/2015 bees/P1010063_zpsaad85tvb.jpg
> 
> Where did you get the buttons, and do they stay on well?


Disk markers. Yes, if applied correctly.
drop of Tight bond II wood glue on thorax with a toothpick and dry in roller cage for about an hour.

http://www.beeworks.com/catalog/index.php?main_page=product_info&products_id=125

More info on gluing disks here:

Sideliners Educational Group.
https://www.facebook.com/groups/1096320300380337/


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## Michael Bush (Aug 2, 2002)

>I have to wonder after scouring the net on apiaries and their homepages, that I am coming across sites saying they are treatment free. And I have no problem at all if that is the case, but what if it isn't?

Semantics is always the actual issue. In my experience most are not trying to be dishonest. I would ask them what exactly they do or don't treat for. Amazingly some of the "treatment free" operations will then tell you that they "only use" this or that, usually essential oils, or organic acids, or powdered sugar. Some of them are using nothing, which, of course, would actually be treatment free, but some of them are treating in one way or another, but in a way they feel is "natural" so they think it doesn't count. Or they only don't treat for Varroa, but they treat for other things. My first step would be to have a conversation with them.


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## lharder (Mar 21, 2015)

Lauri said:


> My previous reply was certainly long winded.
> 
> I guess what I was trying to say is if a small supplier says they are treatment free, simply because they've never treated but without long term methods to back it up and they were fairly new at beekeeping, I'd be wary.
> 
> If you are going to ask your supplier questions, you'd better do it soon. They'll be way too busy producing your bees to answer questions when the season starts. Hopefully they have a web site or other means to share their information.


If you are treatment free and producing bees, hopefully one has a plan to test and produce longer lived hives. If you only go to step B, when there are steps C, D and E. If raising bees for others the envelope should be pushed on an ongoing basis. The goal is long lived queens, hives that build into large honey producing colonies with the minimum of intervention. Management by genetics. At the same time letting the hive ecosystem develop some of complexity lost through treatment. Its not just about the bees.


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## D Coates (Jan 6, 2006)

I put no stock in treatment free claims when buying queens. Assuming they're actually treatment free, there's no way to tell who they mated with and what their traits are. If there were treatment free queens that were truly treatment free and had treatment free daughters the world would be beating down their door, and I'd be one of the first in line. They're unicorns... buyer beware, actually it should be buyer be aware.

Along those same lines "Cage free" eggs sounds good doesn't it? It means the hens weren't in cages right? Nope. My brother in law who works in that industry showed me it actually means the hens are in cages that allow enough space for the hen to flap her wings. Cage free doesn't sound so cage free... Treatment free invariably isn't treatment free


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## HillBilly2 (Jul 26, 2015)

Well said, treatment free doesn't mean anything except for the genetics, and the queen your getting is only half of the genetic material of the sellers queen. A better question to pin him with is what were your losses last winter.


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## rookie2531 (Jul 28, 2014)

I know my main question was about proof of treatment free, but now the very depth from where that question came from seems to be popping his ugly head out. And now treatment free, doesn't really mean treatment free. Now to go even further down a path of truly treatment free, AI, seems to be the only real stab at it, no. What about freezing drones semen? Does anybody preserve a hives worth? Is it possible? Or are the AI guys just grabbing drones that are available at the time. If we like the hives performance on hygenics, is there anybody that saves every last drones semen from that hive and their mother and graft brother and sisters? AI doesn't look that complicated and I am venturing down that path. I have a lot of learning to do, but some getting 500.00 a queen, seems worth the curve.


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## jwcarlson (Feb 14, 2014)

A simple AI queen isn't fetching $500 though, right? It's some sort of pedigree/cross you're paying for as well as being a 'breeder'. An instance where you're planning on raising thousands of queens and want them of more uniform genetic make-up. 

No one is going to be lining up to buy a jwcarlson AI queen comprised of relatively random queen and random drone genetics that happened to get artificially inseminated so it can be called an 'AI' queen. Quite a lot of gear associated with that too, isn't there?


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## rookie2531 (Jul 28, 2014)

jwcarlson said:


> A simple AI queen isn't fetching $500 though, right? It's some sort of pedigree/cross you're paying for as well as being a 'breeder'. An instance where you're planning on raising thousands of queens and want them of more uniform genetic make-up.
> 
> No one is going to be lining up to buy a jwcarlson AI queen comprised of relatively random queen and random drone genetics that happened to get artificially inseminated so it can be called an 'AI' queen. Quite a lot of gear associated with that too, isn't there?


The queens that are fetching 500 came from someone just like you at some point, right? A chemist and a physicist didn't procreate a queen out of thin air. I know a lot of research went into picking the best of the best, but isn't that what they did to get started? Picking and choosing?


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## jwcarlson (Feb 14, 2014)

rookie2531 said:


> The queens that are fetching 500 came from someone just like you at some point, right? A chemist and a physicist didn't procreate a queen out of thin air. I know a lot of research went into picking the best of the best, but isn't that what they did to get started? Picking and choosing?


And importing stock or drone semen from over seas... and testing and selecting over probably thousands or tens of thousands of colonies.


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## rookie2531 (Jul 28, 2014)

Yes, and they still have mites and get mites.

Wouldn't be easier to just say hey, "there is a huge f#@@in tick on your back."


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## Fusion_power (Jan 14, 2005)

I don't get it. What part of TOTALLY TREATMENT FREE is hard to understand? I don't treat for mites. I don't artificially split my bees to manage mites, I don't use sugar rolls, I don't use organic acids, I don't use anything AT ALL. I don't even look at mites other than on a cursory level to ensure there are few to none in my colonies. I don't treat for AFB, I haven't seen a case of AFB in over 20 years and believe me, I know it when I see it. What I do is manage my bees the same as I managed them 30 years ago before tracheal mites hit in 1987/1988 and before varroa hit in 1991/1992. If they are building up very large very fast, I pull a 3 frame nucleus and start a new colony and then manage the parent colony for honey production. If they are building slower but have a good queen, I leave them alone and manage them for honey production. If they aren't building up at all, I check status on the queen and usually combine the weak colony sans queen with one of the nucs split out from a strong colony.



> A better question to pin him with is what were your losses last winter.


I lose one or two colonies each winter, in the 10 to 15 percent range which is about what I lost 30 years ago. Three other beekeepers here in the area are keeping bees the same way using my stock. One of them is going for 50 colonies next spring. He has a LOT of work to get there.

What I did that made a difference has been posted here many times. Do your due diligence. If you want to know for sure how a person is keeping bees, call and ask or go and see. There are several traits that lead to mite tolerance. Find out what they are and figure out how to use them where you can. Some will fail, some will succeed and the number of treatment free beekeepers will increase over time!

P.S. if you want cage free eggs, get some chickens and build a chicken coop for them to roost safely in at night. I have about 20 chickens and they produce enough eggs to keep 3 families supplied.


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## Riverderwent (May 23, 2013)

I like and use the Beesource definition of treatment free for the treatment free forum. At one time I thought that perhaps the removal of drone brood should not be considered treatment, but in the end, as for me, Barry got it right.
David


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## lharder (Mar 21, 2015)

Fusion_power said:


> I don't get it. What part of TOTALLY TREATMENT FREE is hard to understand? I don't treat for mites. I don't artificially split my bees to manage mites, I don't use sugar rolls, I don't use organic acids, I don't use anything AT ALL. I don't even look at mites other than on a cursory level to ensure there are few to none in my colonies. I don't treat for AFB, I haven't seen a case of AFB in over 20 years and believe me, I know it when I see it. What I do is manage my bees the same as I managed them 30 years ago before tracheal mites hit in 1987/1988 and before varroa hit in 1991/1992. If they are building up very large very fast, I pull a 3 frame nucleus and start a new colony and then manage the parent colony for honey production. If they are building slower but have a good queen, I leave them alone and manage them for honey production. If they aren't building up at all, I check status on the queen and usually combine the weak colony sans queen with one of the nucs split out from a strong colony.
> 
> 
> 
> ...


Hear, hear. And why wouldn't a beekeeper no matter what type care about the genetics in their hive? If you treat, but mess up the timing or dose, having some backup in the form of resistant bees will get at least some of your hives through.


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## Acebird (Mar 17, 2011)

Fusion_power said:


> P.S. if you want cage free eggs, get some chickens and build a chicken coop for them to roost safely in at night. I have about 20 chickens and they produce enough eggs to keep 3 families supplied.


Funny you should say that. We have 20 also with a simple automatic door that I designed using a battery operated screw driver on a timer. That way when we are away the birds get locked in or let out at the proper time.


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## Michael Bush (Aug 2, 2002)

Bottom line is to ask the right questions. If a doctor asks a patient if they smoke, they will often say no. Then he asks when the last time they had a cigarette was, and they say, this morning. If you ask why they say they don't smoke, they say they quite this morning. The right question is "when was the last time you had a cigarette" or better "when was the last time you smoked anything at all". When getting the answer to treatments, I think the right question is what have you treated for and what with. If they say nothing, you could follow up with the specific things like "did you use powdered sugar" and "did you use any organic acids" or "did you use any essential oils" etc. I don't think people in general want to lie to you they just have a different definition sometimes. I agree the definition SEEMS simple, but in people's minds they often quit smoking this morning so they are not a smoker... they don't use Apistan, so they don't treat...


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## Dave Burrup (Jul 22, 2008)

I spent almost 30 years working in plant breeding producing new barley and oat lines. Many times I made crosses with the best parents available, and got absolutely nothing that was useable. When we got into bees eight years ago we were going to be treatment free for mites at least. We spent a bunch of money buying queens from treatment free survivor stock for the first 4 years. We never got a hive that did not reach threshold levels for mites. We gave it up because of the extra cost for the queens, and the frequency of absolute dud queens. We started buying regular commercial queens with the VSH genetics. Mite levels were very similar to the treatment free queens. We got better honey producers, and all around better bees. I have heard this same story so many times from people buying treatment free stock that I really question the whole concept. If I could figure out why we cannot get our queens back from mating flights, and correct the problem, I would produce our own queens. The queens we do produce have been really good queens.


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## OhioBee (May 30, 2014)

Fusion_power said:


> This is a better idea than it might seem on the surface. One person who has some of my bees has been able to keep them going for 5 years now. He is in an area with several beekeepers who treat. Queens mating with an average of 17 drones has to have some impact since a few of the drones are likely to have TF genetics. I can't prove this, but have seen that queens producing 10% workers with mite tolerant traits gives a measurable difference.


What is a "mite tolerant trait"? Thanks


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## Clayton Huestis (Jan 6, 2013)

So what is mite tolerant traits? What is TF genetics? VSH and hygienics? It's nice to chat about on the net but what does it all mean when it comes to real field work? Why can one beekeeper claim years of TF beekeeping and another with the same bee lines can't pull it off? "If" there was an issue with modern apiary practices that "might" be making bees out of balance with host/ parasite problems what might it be if you were going to speculate?


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## Acebird (Mar 17, 2011)

Clayton Huestis said:


> "If" there was an issue with modern apiary practices that "might" be making bees out of balance with host/ parasite problems what might it be if you were going to speculate?


Pushing bees to produce more and more. Feeding would be my first speculation.


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## Fusion_power (Jan 14, 2005)

The known mechanisms for varroa tolerance include:

Varroa Selective Hygiene - disrupts the reproductive cycle of the varroa mite
a. Detect infested larvae
b. Uncap infested larvae
c. Remove infested larvae
d. selection involves testing for hygienic behavior and removal of infested larvae

Allogrooming - bees grooming each other to remove mites
a. Varroa mauling - chewing and biting the mites which kills them
b. Selection involves monitoring for chewed mites on the bottom board

Breaks in brood rearing - during brood breaks, varroa cannot reproduce.
a. Heavy pollen collection - bees that collect pollen heavily are more sensitive to lack of pollen and shut down brood rearing earlier.
b. Sensitive to nectar dearth - bees that react to nectar shortage by breaking the brood cycle
c. Selection involves monitoring for bees that reduce brood rearing when pollen is unavailable

Reduced days to worker maturity - fewer days gives mites less time to reproduce
a. some worker bees mature in 19 days vs standard 21
b. using small cell foundation and timing brood emergence
c. Selection involves identifying the small percentage of colonies that mature workers in fewer days

Mite entombment - trap and kill mites in the cell
a. pupating larvae kill mites by trapping them between the cocoon and cell base
b. selection involves measuring and selecting for number of entombed mites


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## Acebird (Mar 17, 2011)

Fusion_power said:


> The known mechanisms for varroa tolerance include:
> 
> b. selection involves measuring and selecting for number of entombed mites


This is interesting. Do you have any photos or techniques on how to do this?


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## FlowerPlanter (Aug 3, 2011)

>Why can one beekeeper claim years of TF beekeeping and another with the same bee lines can't pull it off? 

Isolation of survivor genes.


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## Juhani Lunden (Oct 3, 2013)

Dave Burrup said:


> If I could figure out why we cannot get our queens back from mating flights, and correct the problem, I would produce our own queens. The queens we do produce have been really good queens.


You mean that sometimes you can get mated queens and sometimes not?

Are the young queens disappearing or do they come back unmated?


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## Clayton Huestis (Jan 6, 2013)

> Varroa Selective Hygiene - disrupts the reproductive cycle of the varroa mite
> a. Detect infested larvae
> b. Uncap infested larvae
> c. Remove infested larvae
> d. selection involves testing for hygienic behavior and removal of infested larvae


Don't all bees do this to some degree?



> Allogrooming - bees grooming each other to remove mites
> a. Varroa mauling - chewing and biting the mites which kills them
> b. Selection involves monitoring for chewed mites on the bottom board


Forgive me if I'm wrong but honeybees have always been excellent groomers. right?



> Breaks in brood rearing - during brood breaks, varroa cannot reproduce.
> a. Heavy pollen collection - bees that collect pollen heavily are more sensitive to lack of pollen and shut down brood rearing earlier.
> b. Sensitive to nectar dearth - bees that react to nectar shortage by breaking the brood cycle
> c. Selection involves monitoring for bees that reduce brood rearing when pollen is unavailable


Doesn't this make a case for using well adapted local stock? Could shipping queens and bees from place to place be creating more issues rather than developing a stable stock for ones area?


Seems to me that honeybees are trying to survive at all costs using the "above" mechanisms some with a low degree and some with a high degree of these traits? But wouldn't you agree all colonies are trying to survive? Not saying these traits aren't important but I don't think they are at the root of unbalance of the honeybee.


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## JohnBruceLeonard (Jul 7, 2015)

Clayton Huestis said:


> "If" there was an issue with modern apiary practices that "might" be making bees out of balance with host/ parasite problems what might it be if you were going to speculate?


I do not know if this be the _root _of the unbalance, nor do I believe myself in any position to hazard even a guess as to what that root might be: but I think it fair to imagine that one potentially unbalancing element is the crowding of many hives side by side in a given apiary, _particularly _when combined with decades of treatments which must encourage virulence on the part of the parasite in question. This situation, after all, makes a radical difference from the natural dwellings of bees - widely dispersed hives which effectively isolate Varroa, giving it excellent incentive to coexist with its host.

John


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## mbevanz (Jul 23, 2012)

I wouldnt buy anything, queen nuc or otherwise, based on "treatment free"!


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## Fusion_power (Jan 14, 2005)

> "If" there was an issue with modern apiary practices that "might" be making bees out of balance with host/ parasite problems what might it be if you were going to speculate?


If you were keeping bees in 1993, you would know exactly what the impact of varroa was on honeybees and you would not have to speculate what is causing them to be out of balance. The gradual penetration of tolerance traits is what keeps feral colonies going. There were almost no ferals left past 1998. The very few that made it through the maelstrom were the colonies that exhibited one or more of the tolerance traits listed in my previous post. By 2004, there were a few feral colonies as those precious few survivors multiplied. That is when I first found mite tolerant bees and was able to get my stock going.

No, honeybees have not always been excellent groomers. No honeybees do not all exhibit selective hygiene traits. These traits could not be found in honeybees 25 years ago because there were so very few colonies that carried the traits. An article in Bee Culture 20 years ago described a 1000 colony operation in Florida that was decimated by varroa with only one single colony left alive. Beekeepers and scientists scrambled trying to find out why that single colony was resistant while the other 999 died.



> I wouldnt buy anything, queen nuc or otherwise, based on "treatment free"!


You can lead a horse to water, you can't make him drink.


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## squarepeg (Jul 9, 2010)

another great post dar, thanks for taking the time.

i suppose it's the experience of the 1000 colony operator and others like him that first spawned and has since perpetuated the use of miticides for varroa control. some might argue that by killing the mites for the bees we are impeding their ability to adapt and we probably are, while others might argue that it's just too costly when livelihoods are at stake to allow nature to take its course and it probably is.

but then there are those like jim lyon, randy oliver, and others who are selecting their breeder queens based on low mite counts. these folks have also recognized the need to get away from using the wax tainting synthetics and they acknowledge the value in working toward a bee that can handle mites off treatments.

dar and i are fortunate to be able to keep bees in an area that supports a thriving feral population. this may be happening here in part because we have a good mix of moderate weather, very complex floral diversity, and vast expanses of wooded lands. 

beekeeping has been alive and well here for many decades. i would wager that queens of every strain imaginable have been brought in over the years and their swarms have come to inhabit these wooded areas. researchers have even documented feral bees with mitochondrial dna indicating queenlines that predate the commercially introduced strains. 

so in addition to having good habitat we probably have decent genetic diversity as well. it seems plausible that having this diversity would have provided the opportunity for resistant traits to become manifest when varroa first arrived and natural selection should be promoting the increased expression of these traits over time.

i don't doubt that this is also happening in other areas, and i don't doubt that it may not be happening in all areas. the guy i got my bees from has been treatment free for almost 20 years. he doesn't advertise and he makes no claims whatsoever. source your bees from someone like this if you can.


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## Roland (Dec 14, 2008)

Because the mite life cycle is much faster than the honeybee, I would expect the mite to inbreed and change genetically much faster than the honeybee. Remember, both have had little time to adapt to each other. Add in the fact that the mite is now a bad parasite, in that it kills it's host. It would be much better off if it only weakened it's host. As time passes, I would expect to see a shift in mite genetics to a more gentle mite. Being in isolation MAY accelerate this, because after the initial crash and recovery, it prevents the re-introduction of more virulent mites. 

Crazy Roland


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## beepro (Dec 31, 2012)

So the member from the other side of the continent use the eco box
under his hives for the first time. Because the mites can crawl back into the frames (at 25mph+ mites speed) I
would use a #8 window wire screen over the eco box. How come nobody thought of that before?
And how come nobody thought of using the composite particles board for the bottom board instead?
At least the mites will take more time to crawl back on the frames or gave up and died under the crevices before
reaching the frames. It is easy to substitute a composite LP board for the regular smooth bottom board in a hive box.
How come I don't see SP offer his tf queens for sale? And how can we get one or a few when they are available in queen rearing
season? I have 2 goals for the coming season: 1) To mass produce the tf Italians queens to counter the treated carnis drones from the local
bee association carnis bees 5 minutes away. 2) To develop more tf queens locally for the out yards.


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## Acebird (Mar 17, 2011)

beepro said:


> Because the mites can crawl back into the frames (at 25mph+ mites speed) I
> would use a #8 window wire screen over the eco box. How come nobody thought of that before?


Where did you hear that from? The successful mite jumps from one host to another. If you pull out a tray from under a SBB the live mites don't move until you jar them. They are waiting for another bee to come by and save them. This is where I learned that I had to prevent bees access to the tray otherwise it becomes useless.


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## Cloverdale (Mar 26, 2012)

jwcarlson said:


> Mine are treatment free 97-98% of the year.


I guess we all are!


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## beepro (Dec 31, 2012)

Ah, Brian. We haven't talk in a while.
If the mites can jump either from place to place or from
one bee to another then on my one summer catching and cutting the mites
with a sharp one sided razor blace will not work. During my time spent with
them I have observed some interesting findings. The mites do not have a jumping mechanism like
the fleas or grasshoppers do. They cannot jump but a fast running/gliding one. At least in my observation when pulling the frames out to find them. I have seen them running or rather sliding on the comb and on the bees in a very efficient manner. How they can do this I do not know the mechanism behind it yet. But they sure can glide from one place to another up to 25-30 mph (mite) speed. Maybe the mites I have here are not shy that was why I'm able to cut them up with a razor blade when I caught one. Oh, the eco box was discussed at another post here somewhere. Maybe you can do a search on the eco box for the thread to show up?


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## beepro (Dec 31, 2012)

Cloverdale said:


> I guess we all are!


Not anymore with the latest stationary oav gadget invention.
I can do it 365 days without regard to the 4 seasons either in a cluster
mode or free running mode. So the bee math treatment timing comes out to
be every 21 days cycle when the new bees hatched. At 2 treatment before to get the
free running mites and 2 more treatment after to try to clean them out. Shorten the treatment
cycle to 5 days instead of the recommended 7. My little bee experiment is still an on going.


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## Fusion_power (Jan 14, 2005)

> Because the mite life cycle is much faster than the honeybee, I would expect the mite to inbreed and change genetically much faster than the honeybee.


Roland, this is misleading as you have it written because varroa mites are natural inbreeders to start with. This means varroa have a much smaller genetic base compared to honeybees which are parthenocarpic outbreeders. It would take a lot more research to prove whether the mite is changing faster than the honeybee or vice versa.

Selection pressure is the actual trigger for genetic change. The chemicals that have been used over the last 24 years to kill mites produced tremendous selection pressure so that the mites in many areas are now resistant or tolerant to at least 2 of the chemicals that were approved for use.

The mites exercised tremendous selection pressure on honeybees with the result that resistance traits are now commonly found in bee populations that are not artificially propped up with chemicals. There are two ways to make mites less of a problem, either breed less virulent mites or breed more tolerant honeybees. Nature does not care which.

The person who most adamantly pooh-pooh's mite tolerance in honeybees might just be the one who is selling mite treatments!


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## Oldtimer (Jul 4, 2010)

They are not quite as inbred as everyone thinks. When I fork drone brood to check mite levels the mites are mostly more than one foundress mite per cell., ignoring most of the drone brood and congregating in a few, presumably this facilitates group mating or should I say inter family mating.
When mite populations are low in a hive there tends to be only one foundress mite per worker larva, but as population builds you can get more than one foundress mite going into worker brood also, I know this from uncapping worker larvae in hives with pms and finding more than one family in a worker cell, with the bee larva dying of pms as a result.

To know what is the normal behaviour for them in terms of inter family mating it would be necessary to study them on their original host apis cerana, but I have no information on that.


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## Roland (Dec 14, 2008)

Oldtimer - I concur. With mites sharing a cell instead of spreading out, Mite A's children get to mate with mite B's , and vise versa. Sneaky way to avoid inbreeding.

Fusion - After 30 years of mites, we sure have not made much progress yet with the bees, but the mites sure are changing fast. That is my point.

Crazy Roland


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## beepro (Dec 31, 2012)

Crazy, Roland, the last time I read that the mites only breed when still within
the same capped cells, brother mated with the sisters. If this is correct then they are inbreeding a lot too. 
With 30-35 mph speed they can glide over to the other frame to mate with other mites to avoid the inbreeding. Though I think they are
all cousins after a season or 2. But do they really care much about their future genetics like the queen bees do?
So how fast the mites are changing now? The ones I cut in half with a sharp razor blade look just the same like last summer's mites. They are not much different in their appearances. Still the same looking mite in size and running skills. I still don't know how much or how fast they have changed? What have you observed in the wild?


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## Fusion_power (Jan 14, 2005)

Oldtimer and Roland, what happens if you inbreed honeybees?

The point is that mites not only can survive inbreeding, it is a huge part of their natural lifecycle. Honeybees can't take inbreeding beyond a certain level because of issues arising from sex alleles becoming too limited. Kangaroo island bees exhibit this with 5 surviving sex alleles from the last research I read.

The fundamental issue is that varroa mites typically produce 6 to 8 generations per year with a generation represented by between 1 and 4 new female mites. Honeybees produce about 1 or 2 generations per year with each generation represented by 1 or 2 new queens. Someone will immediately point out that bees mature from egg to adult in 21 days. This is irrelevant. The queen is the only reproductive member of the colony and she typically reproduces new queens only one or two times a year during swarm season. Genetically, the queen is the only bee that matters in terms of generational cycles. This means varroa have @ 6 to 1 generational advantage over honeybees which is arguably more than enough to overcome the inherent disadvantage of natural inbreeding.

Now someone will say "what do you mean the 'disadvantage of natural inbreeding'"? The Achilles heel of natural inbreeders is that they do not have high levels of genetic diversity. Put a natural inbreeder under intense selection pressure and they are much less capable of adapting. This is easily illustrated with the tomato which is a natural inbreeder typically self-pollinating 95% of the time. As tomatoes are grown on larger acreages, more exposure to disease leads to more and more virulent diseases which can attack the tomato. This is why late blight, early blight, and septoria are such a problem with commercially produced tomatoes today. The diseases are adapting much faster than the tomato to the new environment with an abundant food source. Varroa represents a similar dichotomy, but varroa is the inbreeder which counters the effect of inbreeding by having a very short generational time.

Here is an exercise worth doing. Starting with one single foundress mite, how many mites could she produce under ideal conditions given 6 generations? Presume that each foundress mite produces 3 viable female offspring and keep in mind that the original foundress typically produces 2 or 3 broods before she dies. Somebody check my math, it is 3:00 a.m. and I'm very tired.

1 - this is the foundress mite
1->3 - multiply by 3 because she produces 3 female fertile offspring
4->12 - add the previous 1 + 3 to get 4, multiply by 3
16->48 - add the previous 4 + 12 to get 16, multiply by 3
63->189 - add the previous 16 + 48, subtract 1 because the original foundress dies
249->747 - add the previous 63 + 189, subtract 3 because the second generation foundress mites die
976->2952 - add the previous 249 + 747, subtract 12 because the 3rd generation foundress mites die

So per this example, a single mite can produce 2952 offspring in just 6 generations. Now think about a colony that carries over say 1000 of those mites into the next season and the second year the mites try to produce 2,952,000 offspring. This is why colonies collapse.


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## Oldtimer (Jul 4, 2010)

Excellent post FP and the math seems good. (And scary!)

The facts on which the math is based is in question, some NZ research admittedly a decade old now, showed mites only successfully raised 1.2 mites per generation. On the other hand a foundress mite was able to produce 5 to 6 breeding cycles in her life.

But regardless I agree with the basic idea you are trying to get across, also, mites may have adapted and improved some since that NZ research was done.

Your post should be a little sticky somewhere to show new players why they need to be serious about mites.


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## Oldtimer (Jul 4, 2010)

Oh correction to the previous post they found mites raised 1.2 mites per breeding cycle, not per generation. IE if a mite had 5 breeding cycles it would have succeeded in raising 6 offspring in it's life.
But going by what I see in my own hives I suspect they are doing better than that now.


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## aunt betty (May 4, 2015)

Don't believe you can buy TF bees from some distant land, have them shipped, set them up and you live happily ever after.
How it's done is you collect bee colonies from your area. Don't treat. Let them die and pray that a couple colonies live. Breed from the survivors and make your own "TF" bees. 

I apologize to the guys in here who are so deeply invested in the TF concept but this is just the way I see it. 

Fed my bees some sugar syrup with HbH and discovered that I had just turned all my "TF" bees into "regulars" so dove headfirst into the world of treating them. Hopefully some live until spring.


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## Oldtimer (Jul 4, 2010)

How do you know your bees had not turned into "regulars" anyway, as happens to many people from time to time.

It's the cause and effect thing - I feel sick, yesterday I ate lobster, therefore it must be the lobster made me sick.


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## Lauri (Feb 1, 2012)

UNCLE DAD!

How YOU doin'? :gh:


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## Fusion_power (Jan 14, 2005)

Yes Lauri, removing drone brood is an effective method of reducing the number of mites in a colony. I'm fortunate to no longer need to use such manipulations.


Oldtimer, if I recall correctly, your 1.2 number was from worker brood. Mites in drone brood are far more effective at producing new female mites. Please check to see if I am correct in this because the 1 produces 3 is based on drone brood with 25 days for the mites to grow.


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## Cloverdale (Mar 26, 2012)

beepro said:


> Not anymore with the latest stationary oav gadget invention.
> I can do it 365 days without regard to the 4 seasons either in a cluster
> mode or free running mode. So the bee math treatment timing comes out to
> be every 21 days cycle when the new bees hatched. At 2 treatment before to get the
> ...


I had a large 3 deep hive that had a mite problem; it seemed resistant to the OAV treatments. We treated 4 x every 6-7 days. Still had quite a bit of mites in drone brood. Treated with MAQS, or I should say under-treated because I only used 2 strips between the bottom two deeps. The hive swarmed and never seemed to do good after that and was robbed severely by YJ. It eventually absconded. It was located on a friends property so I wasn't on top of it like I should have been.


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## Lauri (Feb 1, 2012)

That colony shown above was the 'perfect storm' for a mite load. TF colony with an older queen that had overwintered three times, starting to slow down production coming into her fourth year, combined with an unusually warm winter last year that stimulated full out brood rearing in December instead of starting in February. 

No extended brood break like I usually get. 
You don't see any DWV or phoretic mites here, but the colony wasn't growing early spring like it should have. That was my sign.
Removing and checking the drone brood confirmed my suspicions. 

Cutting out capped drone brood helped get this colony back on track. 
I remember I had fractured a supercedure cell when I did all this. They rebuild another one and successfully replaced this queen not long after.


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## beepro (Dec 31, 2012)

Cloverdale, the mites have not develop resistant to the oav in 
your case. On my stationary oav gadget treatment trials and testing, without
the extended coverage on, even a 2 deep box will not kill off all the
free running mites. As you know some are still inside the capped cells if
not a lot of them there. So what to do when you want to treat the entire 3 boxes? 
I also found out that the 2 grams recommendation for 1 box is NOT ENOUGH TO COVER THE OTHER 2 BOXES AS THEY ARE TOO HIGH ABOVE for the vapors to get to the
top. The design of the current oav devices on the market need to be perfected more. I have used 2-3 teaspoons on my oav gadget although it is only on a 2 minutes timing without killing the queen or the bees. I am using it on 2 deeps with good results so far. This new finding using my oav gadget is still in its testing and on going development stage to collect more data. And make improvements on the design and treatment plan. Right now I am sure that using it on a single deep hive on the 21 days bee hatch cycle is very effective on the mites. And they have not develop resistance to the oav treatment yet. When the young mites (light yellowish) are dying when I treated then I know the older mites are mostly dead. The day that I treat and not seeing any dead mites but still have an ongoing case of DWV and EFB symptoms (dead larvae) then I know the oav treatment is ineffective.
So far so good!
The drone broods with their longer development cycle will harbor 10-20 mites per cell at a time. You need to take them out as presented by Lauri's. Over time you should see less mites when you oav treat again. Just the other day as I was changing the old wooden frames out on a plastic drawn comb, the entire frame slid out easily from the groove. Instantly, I got an idea that you can remove the entire brood foundation and just put the 2 sides of the capped drone frame into the freezer using Lauri's method. Plug and play wouldn't you say.


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## Oldtimer (Jul 4, 2010)

Fusion_power said:


> Oldtimer, if I recall correctly, your 1.2 number was from worker brood. Mites in drone brood are far more effective at producing new female mites.


Yes you are correct.


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## Cloverdale (Mar 26, 2012)

beepro said:


> Cloverdale, the mites have not develop resistant to the oav in
> your case. On my stationary oav gadget treatment trials and testing, without
> the extended coverage on, even a 2 deep box will not kill off all the
> free running mites. As you know some are still inside the capped cells if
> ...


Bee pro, thank you for that info. Keep us posted!


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