# Mite crash before Main Flow



## rsjohnson2u (Apr 23, 2012)

Missed getting to a strong three deep (ten frame) hive for three weeks due to knee surgery. During that time, three plus frames of drone brood emerged, and the hive looks like it suffered a mite crash. Spotty brood(almost like EFB), overrun with drones, visible mites on workers. Our main flow is a week to three weeks away. We're in our May dearth. Would a flash MAQS treatment or OAV be better? No supers on of course. Was going to super later this week, but need to treat now, not after flow. Interestingly, there was no mite drop a month ago through screened bottom board. Treated this hive last fall, but not since. Thanks


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## enjambres (Jun 30, 2013)

MAQS can be used even with the supers on. Treatment takes only seven days. Have lots of ventilation, partiularly for the first three days. Also, make sure the temps will be OK. I prefer daytime highs to be no more than very low 80s, again, particularly for the first three days.

There can be some brood loss, and some have reported queen issues, so I would check right after treatment that you were still QR and cooking along. Locate source of mated queens, so if necessary you can get one in there ASAP.

There is a new one-strip dosing regimen that requires subsequent re-treating, but it may be safer on your queen.

Randy Oliver's site www.sceientificbeekeeping.com is a good resource for this

Might be a good idea to learn to do sugar roll tests. Sticky boards, if used regularly, i.e. a test every week, are a useful monitorng technique. Once-a-month sugar rolls are even better. Be sure to check with a sugar roll a few weeks after treatment to make sure it worked satisfactorily.

I also use OAV, but in your case it wouldn't be my prefeence since it doesn't kill mites under cappings. Takes multiple treaments over a three week period, and can't be done with the honey supers on.

MAQS has none of these issues, plus it also will deal with any tracheal mites (not a big problem these days) that you may have. 

Once-a-year treatment for mites is, for most colonies, not effective.

Enj.


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## beemandan (Dec 5, 2005)

Understand that even if you knock those mites down today that hive will still be weak when your flow starts. The mite damage is already done. I'd think that the main objective is to get the colony into the survival mode without any great expectation of a significant honey harvest.


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## beemandan (Dec 5, 2005)

rsjohnson2u said:


> During that time, three plus frames of drone brood emerged


This is a curiosity to me. If there are three frames of drone sized cells in your brood chamber....I can't imagine how you'll ever keep up with mites.


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## FlowerPlanter (Aug 3, 2011)

>Spotty brood(almost like EFB)
Are you sure it's not EFB again, you had it last year, I would rule that out first. Same hive? Any dead larva (you may only see one or two per frame)?

>there was no mite drop a month ago through screened bottom board. Treated this hive last fall, but not since.
Most people treat once, in the late summer or fall. Are your mites counts high right now? Suggest a powder sugar roll. Do you see any DWV?

A strong hive making drones is a good thing, a hive weakened by efb usually doesn't make lots of drones.

Are the spotty cells being filled with nectar? If so your flow has started? They could be back filling the brood nest with nectar preparing to swarms.

Can you post pictures.


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## rsjohnson2u (Apr 23, 2012)

I'll go back in today. This is not the same hive, and is in a different apiary, no exchange of contaminated frames, although it's possible hive tool was contaminated. I try to use a yellow one on the EFB hives, and plain one otherwise, and torch the yellow one after use. Visible mites on workers, there is dead open larvae, no flow, no nectar in brood frames accounting for spotty pattern. My first thought was "oh, sh*t, EFB, again." This hive was a sister nuc to one from last year that had EFB from CA almond splits, but didn't show EFB. Mite crashed after pulling honey last year, saved it with formic, came out of winter as largest, driest, and strongest. Queen was a year old in April. She and her sisters lay heavier drone percentages than my other queens (I think they're Strachan). I let them draw foundationless, and they usually lay more than one frame of drones per deep-boy, when those black males emerge, they're EVERYWHERE-all you see is drones (except of capped worker brood).


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## jwcarlson (Feb 14, 2014)

rsjohnson2u said:


> I'll go back in today. This is not the same hive, and is in a different apiary, no exchange of contaminated frames, although it's possible hive tool was contaminated. I try to use a yellow one on the EFB hives, and plain one otherwise, and torch the yellow one after use. Visible mites on workers, there is dead open larvae, no flow, no nectar in brood frames accounting for spotty pattern. My first thought was "oh, sh*t, EFB, again." This hive was a sister nuc to one from last year that had EFB from CA almond splits, but didn't show EFB. Mite crashed after pulling honey last year, saved it with formic, came out of winter as largest, driest, and strongest. Queen was a year old in April. She and her sisters lay heavier drone percentages than my other queens (I think they're Strachan). I let them draw foundationless, and they usually lay more than one frame of drones per deep-boy, when those black males emerge, they're EVERYWHERE-all you see is drones (except of capped worker brood).


Can mites cause dead open larva? I thought they dropped in shortly before the brood is sealed?


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## FlowerPlanter (Aug 3, 2011)

>there is dead open larvae, no flow, no nectar in brood frames accounting for spotty pattern.
sounds like efb, I would send a sample to the lab, do a sugar roll.

>This hive was a sister nuc to one from last year that had EFB from CA almond splits, but didn't show EFB.
I would do away with that genetic line. Many reasons, EFB, mites, drone count. You got any feral genetic lines?

Out of 45 hives that made it through winter, I had 2 that had EFB reoccur. They are related mother daughter split (from last year). I requeened them by inserting a queen cell from a hive that never got efb. Hopefully it takes, I won't know for sure if it works. Maybe I will just put an extra q cell in those hives every 30 days or so, supercedure the heck out of them, lol.


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## rsjohnson2u (Apr 23, 2012)

jwcarlson said:


> Can mites cause dead open larva? I thought they dropped in shortly before the brood is sealed?


I thought PMS could show damaged larvae as well. Secondary viruses or not enough healthy nurse bees to feed/cover/remove larvae. Don't know for sure.


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## beemandan (Dec 5, 2005)

rsjohnson2u said:


> Secondary viruses or not enough healthy nurse bees to feed/cover/remove larvae.


 Yep. Even efb. Any pressure in a bee colony makes it more susceptible to every other pressure.


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## jwcarlson (Feb 14, 2014)

rsjohnson2u said:


> I thought PMS could show damaged larvae as well. Secondary viruses or not enough healthy nurse bees to feed/cover/remove larvae. Don't know for sure.





beemandan said:


> Yep. Even efb. Any pressure in a bee colony makes it more susceptible to every other pressure.


OK, that's what I was thinking. It's not mite damage, but a mite vectored virus. Makes sense.


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## beemandan (Dec 5, 2005)

jwcarlson said:


> It's not mite damage, but a mite vectored virus.


And not necessarily mite vectored. I expect that many parasites, bacteria and viri (?) exist in every bee colony. Healthy, vigorous bees overcome the effects but sickly bees can't. Poorly fed, developing larvae will surely show a variety of symptoms...including efb...again in my opinion. And, of course, sickly nurse bees will be poor caretakers for those developing larvae.
All too often we look at the symptoms and ascribe them to a specific problem when there are most likely many underlying causes.
Carrying the thought further, if mites didn't vector any virus they'd still be the number one cause of bee colony collapse. Every developing bee pupae that has mites feeding on it during its development will emerge much weakened and will never recover their lost vigor.....any mite vectored disease is just a bonus.


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## jwcarlson (Feb 14, 2014)

beemandan said:


> And not necessarily mite vectored. I expect that many parasites, bacteria and viri (?) exist in every bee colony. Healthy, vigorous bees overcome the effects but sickly bees can't. Poorly fed, developing larvae will surely show a variety of symptoms...including efb...again in my opinion. And, of course, sickly nurse bees will be poor caretakers for those developing larvae.
> All too often we look at the symptoms and ascribe them to a specific problem when there are most likely many underlying causes.
> Carrying the thought further, if mites didn't vector any virus they'd still be the number one cause of bee colony collapse. Every developing bee pupae that has mites feeding on it during its development will emerge much weakened and will never recover their lost vigor.....any mite vectored disease is just a bonus.


Well put. Thank you!


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## rsjohnson2u (Apr 23, 2012)

EFB secondary infection or PMS ?

This hive is not in the same outyard that suffered EFB last April/May, nor was there any exchange of equipment. Possibly contaminated by gloves or hive tool, or was carrying virus below noticeable levels.

Treated with formic after honey flow last August. Not tested for mites, other than natural drop. Injury prevented me from getting to this hive before drones emerged.


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## rsjohnson2u (Apr 23, 2012)

Same hive as above.

Mites on all over capped brood


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## rsjohnson2u (Apr 23, 2012)

Discolored larvae and mites

Sample frame sent to Beltsville May 19


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## jwcarlson (Feb 14, 2014)

rsjohnson2u said:


> EFB secondary infection or PMS ?
> 
> This hive is not in the same outyard that suffered EFB last April/May, nor was there any exchange of equipment. Possibly contaminated by gloves or hive tool, or was carrying virus below noticeable levels.
> 
> Treated with formic after honey flow last August. Not tested for mites, other than natural drop. Injury prevented me from getting to this hive before drones emerged.


Looks like some bees with k-wing as well?


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## rsjohnson2u (Apr 23, 2012)

You guys are gonna tear me up. 

This is an example of almost everything bad in a colony ! Hadn't noticed the K wing. There was a few, but not as many as I expected, with deformed wing as well.

Couldn't get photos of phoretic mites on workers and drones. Saw a couple of drones with TWO visible mites attached. This is by far the worst mite infestation I've had so far in four seasons.


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## beemandan (Dec 5, 2005)

You clearly have plenty of mites. If I had to guess....everything else, including k wing...which I didn't see...... is secondary.
I'd address the mites....and wouldn't be surprised if I lost the colony anyway. Ignore 'em and it is a goner for sure. My opinion.


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## rsjohnson2u (Apr 23, 2012)

I put formic on them yesterday. I think it's a goner (right before blackberry flow!), but we'll see. 

Hope other newbs can use it as a lesson. It's been common practice in my area, talking to others at club meetings, to only treat after pulling honey in early to mid August. Many here were reluctant to use oxalic off label, but there has been a small increase in it's use in December. Obviously, this hive needed help much sooner. My bad. Hopefully, lesson learned. Made a shaker jar top out of # 8 hardware cloth for sugar and alcohol rolls.


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## beemandan (Dec 5, 2005)

PS rsjohnson2u....very good photos!


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## beemandan (Dec 5, 2005)

One more PS. As long as you have multiple frames of drone comb in your brood nest....you're going to be growing a surplus of mites every spring.


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## rsjohnson2u (Apr 23, 2012)

beemandan said:


> One more PS. As long as you have multiple frames of drone comb in your brood nest....you're going to be growing a surplus of mites every spring.


This could start going off topic, but is mite related...

I'm still feeling my way through drone/drone production. I let them draw(pull) some foundationless for each hive, usually it end up drone size as most of you know. So this colony, which was into three deeps had one drone frame PER deep, plus a foundationless which was mixed worker/drone size in each box. I guessed I was headed for trouble, but a torn up knee, and subsequent surgery, kept me from getting to that yard for three weeks (I had planned to pull at least some of those frames while still capped).

I hope others will use these photos and my experience to educate themselves and new beekeepers. I feel pretty bad about it, this was my best queen last year. Her daughters were a little on the hot side, but okay.

Somewhere on here I read something like "the bigger the colony the bigger the mite load".

PS I'm not one to worship Apple , but they put good cameras in their phones


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## Backdraft70 (May 19, 2015)

Hello! I am a pretty rookie bee keeper and was wondering about the sugar roll. I understand you roll the bees in powdered sugar to check for mites, but how many bees do you do this with? How many mites dictates a really bad infestation? How many is normal (I would assume none)? Thank You


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## rsjohnson2u (Apr 23, 2012)

Backdraft70. It's probably easier for you to search a few threads using the search engine, (and I suggest YouTube as well for a visual demonstration)than for me to explain it. It's been better described than I can, in the past.

I take #8 hardware cloth and cut it to fit in a Mason jar ring. Scoop about 300-400 adult bees from a brood frame (or frames). This is 1 1/2 to 2 inches of bees in the jar. Add powdered sugar (maybe 3-4 tablespoons). Shake or roll the jar for a few minutes. invert jar, shake over white surface (some shake over a pan of clean water) count mites. There are plenty of variations on this. Many will jump on here to correct me. Consult resources (your books, this site, etc) to extrapolate amount of mites and your threshold for treatment/no treatment


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## rsjohnson2u (Apr 23, 2012)

FlowerPlanter PM sent


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## rsjohnson2u (Apr 23, 2012)

Update. Finally got results From Beltsville. Their email must have gone into my spam folder a month ago.
The frame in the photos with the mites (see above) tested positive for EFB. No mention was made by the lab of the mites, or anything else mite vectored, but the EFB.
The colony is still alive. MAQS, followed by OAV. The queen survived the MAQS, but shut down, so there was no capped brood for an OAV window.
Brood seems limited by small population to cover. Now with the positive EFB results, may cut my loses on this one, not decided yet.


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## FlowerPlanter (Aug 3, 2011)

Sorry to hear about the hive. 
Thanks for the update, was following this tread.


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## aunt betty (May 4, 2015)

I'm coming in way late here and have a question. When you sent comb in for testing how big a piece and did it cost anything other than shipping it in?


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## rsjohnson2u (Apr 23, 2012)

I sent the entire frame in a flat rate box. If you are using wax or no foundation, you send a 2" X 2" piece (at minimum).

There is no charge other than postage. Average response time is 10-14 days, by email if you give them an email address.

You can also use a swab and get samples of larvae if you suspect brood diseases, and it will cost less to mail. No honey, and want to avoid anything that will make the sample mold, as it makes it difficult for them to examine for other spores and bacteria.

Just remember, if you're concerned about BROOD diseases, send brood. I've read of others who sent brood comb, but no brood samples, and did not get accurate results.


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