# Sticky  2022 Dead Larvae - Confirmed EFB



## RayMarler

If you see any shriveled wings on any bees then treat for mites. I am not sure if I see shriveled wings or not in the pics, my eyesight is not as good lately. I don't see any pinholes in brood cappings so that makes he hesitate on the mites. But, mites will start becoming more populous as a percentage of brood from now to the end of the year. Since the brood has been spotty all year, I'd say change out the queen, and maybe also mites. I can not decide if I see EFB or not.

As far as problems from lack of flows, is there any stores in the hive? The hive will normally slow down brooding if no flows and especially if low on stores as well. If situation gets desperate, they'll cannibalize the brood and everything will look dry. The larva should look moist and there should be nectar to the edges of brood frames.

Someone with better eyesight in pictures may come up with more definite answers for you.


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## msl

I would consider an EFB test kit
If you don't have some sold bands of pollen/pollen combs and larva floating in jelly I would put a pollen sup on them
you want them looking like this










> Figure 8. On the other hand, nurses enjoying good nutrition will flood the young larvae with jelly. I call this “wet brood.” I took this photo during a drought-induced pollen dearth in September, after dry-feeding the yard a pollen sub for 10 days. The nurses responded favorably, as evidenced by the larvae now “swimmin’ in jelly.”


not this










> Figure 7. When a colony is under nutritional stress, the nurses cut back on the amount of jelly that they place around the young larvae, as above. I call this “dry brood.”
> 
> *Practical application: colonies exhibiting dry brood will typically go downhill quickly, or succumb to disease.*











When To Feed Pollen Sub - Scientific Beekeeping


When To Feed Pollen Sub Randy Oliver ScientificBeekeeping.com First published in ABJ in November 2014 Introduction Beekeepers often ask me at what time of the season they “should” [1] feed colonies pollen sub. My recent trial of pollen subs demonstrated the clear benefit of feeding patties of...




scientificbeekeeping.com


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## NUBE

Did you shake bees off to take the pictures? If not, and all frames are that sparsely populated, it may not be worth trying to save them. If you do have a few frames with decent bee coverage, then I agree with what the others are saying. A requeening may be necessary, but, due to the melted look of a few of the larvae, I would test for EFB first. It could also be a bit of sac brood or PMS. It’s hard to say if this brood issue is because of a lack of good nutrition stressing the colony, or if the low resources are a result of the brood issues and low population. If you want to try to save them, I’d requeen ASAP, after an EFB test, and start mite treatments as soon as the new queen is laying.


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## JustBees

++ nube++

That laying pattern is off, is it emerging brood or a crappy lay pattern.
What created the pattern on the frame you are showing?


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## AHudd

If I see frames of brood with no pollen or nectar I assume they are starving, albeit I don't know what the rest of the frames look like. I would feed both pollen and syrup while waiting for the EFB test kit to arrive, all the while hoping I don't need it.

Alex


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## squarepeg

i sure hope for you and your bees that it's not, but that looks a lot like the efb that wiped me out in 2019, specifically the yellowing of the dead larvae. have you or any other nearby beekeepers imported bees from outside your area this spring? 

an option to waiting for a test kit in the mail might be to check with your state apiarist and see if they keep the test kits on hand. 

by the time you kit a test kit in the mail and should the test show positive, you then have to find a veterinarian to authorize a prescription for otc, and then wait for that to come in the mail. unfortunately by then it will be too late to save infected colonies and there is potential for further spreading to yours and and others nearby in the meantime.

at least that was my experience, and i'll no longer attempt trying to treat it. only 2 out of 26 colonies recovered a normal brood pattern after otc, only to have efb show back up in them the following spring.

turns out efb (mellisococcus plutonius) can live in honey for as long as two years, so may have to continue using antibiotics year after year if your test is positive and you decide to go that route.

the problem is there are many different strains of efb, some of which are orders of magnitude more virulent and harder to eradicate. some countries have a mandatory burn law if it shows up. that's going go to be my approach from now on as well.


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## crofter

I see a few of the twisted "bellyache larvae" and at least one with the dark lines of the trachea showing but a bit out of the areas in focus. Larvae perishing mostly before capping, not after, so negative toward sacbrood. Get test kits for sure but in the meantime start taking measures assuming it is european foulbrood.


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## elmer_fud

msl said:


> I would consider an EFB test kit
> If you don't have some sold bands of pollen/pollen combs and larva floating in jelly I would put a pollen sup on them
> you want them looking like this


Thanks,

I will get an EFB test on order. It does not look like EFB to me because the larve are still white and well formed, they are just dead. 

It looks a lot like dry brood. This is the hive that had a population explosion, then they started crashing. There is a lot of bee bread in the hive, but it may be old so they are ignoring it. I am going to collapse the hive down to get rid of the empty space and put the feeder and a pollen patty closer to them.


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## elmer_fud

JustBees said:


> ++ nube++
> 
> That laying pattern is off, is it emerging brood or a crappy lay pattern.
> What created the pattern on the frame you are showing?


My hives have had bad laying pattern for most of the year. Early in the season they were mixing nectar, brood, and bee bread all over in all of the hives. It would be in ajacent cells, so I have no idea what they were thinking. I think the bad laying pattern is a carry over from this.


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## elmer_fud

squarepeg said:


> i sure hope for you and your bees that it's not, but that looks a lot like the efb that wiped me out in 2019, specifically the yellowing of the dead larvae. have you or any other nearby beekeepers imported bees from outside your area this spring?


I really hope it is not EFB. None of my hives are new this year, or last year. The last time I got new bees was a packing in the spring of 2020.

I have no idea if anyone else in the area has imported bees. I would be suprised if there is not someone within a mile of me that got at least a package, if not multiple people


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## Gino45

If I saw this in my hive(s), I would assume I have a mite problem. Have you ever treated for mites?
Another question is are there any stores of honey and pollen in the hive?


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## elmer_fud

I checked the mite loads on all of my hives. The one above had about a 1% mite load with a powdered sugar roll. My other 2 hives had a 0.3% mite load. I know a powdered sugar roll is not as accurate as an alcohol wash, and may be off by a factor of 3, but this is not a huge mite load. With the hive shrinking the climbing mite counts does not suprise me. This hive got formic pro in april because they had about a 1% mite load then and my other hives were clean. 

I condensed down this hive more (removed empty boxes) to see if that helped. They were in the feeder today which is an improvement since they didn't seem to be in it last week. I think removing an empty box between the brood nest and the feeder yesterday helped. They also have a pollen patty now. 

There was some sugar/honey stored in the hive and some bee bread. I do not know how old the bee bread is though, it may be from last year or older. 

I took some more picture of the hive I was asking about today. Here they are. (it was overcast when I took the pictures)

















This is what that hive now looks like looking down. They are filling part of a medium box and that is about it. This spring when they were going gangbusters they were filling about 4 medium boxes and eating everything they could get.


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## elmer_fud

I found this on one of my other hives and it does not look good. This hive is doing ok population wise (2-3 medium boxes of bees) I shook most of the bees off this frame to use them for a mite check before taking this picture. Looks like I need to get in contact with the local veterinarian that works with bee keepers.


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## squarepeg

how many hives do you have? i would strongly consider putting robbing screens on all of them. here is one version, but some of the folks on the forum may have a diy.









10 Frame Moving/Robbing Screen


Buy 10 Frame Moving/Robbing Screen at Mann Lake. Best & Biggest Beekeeping Supplier - Best Service.




www.mannlakeltd.com





you could staple some window screen across the entrance and reduce the opening to one or two bees. i usually place a small rock in front of the opening that the bees have to climb over to get in. the idea is to make defending the entrance as easy as possible for the weakened colonies.

step one is get confirmation. as noted there are viruses that can do this too, but most viruses don't impact the larval stage like that.

step two is determined by step one. imho if it really is efb and you don't have a lot invested it's not worth trying to save them, and choosing to do so greatly increases the odds of it spreading to other hives. there's no guarantee it would reccur. a decent case can be made for euthanize and burn.


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## crofter

It sure checks off the classic examples of EFB. It pre-empts varroa reproduction so zero mite counts not surprising. Poor flow conditions leads to the nurse bees digging deeper into older supplies of pollen which is one of the main sources of re infection. This repository of the disease is hard to wipe out by any sanitizing efforts. Trying to do so probably would expose surrounding healthy bees to more infection so Squarepegs advice is worth considering.


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## elmer_fud

squarepeg said:


> how many hives do you have? i would strongly consider putting robbing screens on all of them. here is one version, but some of the folks on the forum may have a diy.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 10 Frame Moving/Robbing Screen
> 
> 
> Buy 10 Frame Moving/Robbing Screen at Mann Lake. Best & Biggest Beekeeping Supplier - Best Service.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> www.mannlakeltd.com
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> you could staple some window screen across the entrance and reduce the opening to one or two bees. i usually place a small rock in front of the opening that the bees have to climb over to get in. the idea is to make defending the entrance as easy as possible for the weakened colonies.
> 
> step one is get confirmation. as noted there are viruses that can do this too, but most viruses don't impact the larval stage like that.
> 
> step two is determined by step one. imho if it really is efb and you don't have a lot invested it's not worth trying to save them, and choosing to do so greatly increases the odds of it spreading to other hives. there's no guarantee it would reccur. a decent case can be made for euthanize and burn.


I will put robbing screens on my hives today. I have 3 full size hive and I have that many robbing screens. I can put a screen on one of my 2 nucs (that may or may not be queenless).

I am working on getting the contact info for the Vet that had presented at the local bee club. I will see where that goes. I would prefer to treat, and not burn. Right now my hives probably span 20ish boxes.

Loosing a lot of equipment and the hives would be painful. If i have EFB in one hive, I probably have it in all of them since they are a few feet apart. 

I dont think I have ever had EFB before, I usually have strong hives so I am wondering if they caught it last fall or this spring from some other hives in the area. I know there are other hives in the area, I don't know how many or where they are all at though. We have deffently had poor flows this spring. I watered one of my fruit trees yesterday because it was so dry it was dropping the unripe fruit.


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## squarepeg

i didn't burn the boxes, just the frames. and only the frames that contained any amount of sick brood, pollen, or nectar/honey. still that was 26 tall hives and ten years worth of comb. the frames that were perfectly empty were cleaned and reused. thankfully so far no efb in 4 years.

i feel your pain ef. as crofter points out efb leaves residual pathogen in the hive no matter what you do.

i can share more about how i cleaned the woodenware and empty comb if we get that far.

i called my state apiarist in right away. if they are on the ball in colorado, they will notify other beekeepers within flying distance of your yard. sometimes it's possible to them to trace the source, sometimes not.


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## elmer_fud

squarepeg said:


> i called my state apiarist in right away. if they are on the ball in colorado, they will notify other beekeepers within flying distance of your yard. sometimes it's possible to them to trace the source, sometimes not.


I dont think we have a state apiarist, so I am on my own in that regard. There is no official hive tracking in Colorado, so I have no idea how many people are within flying distance. I know of a few but I suspect there are a lot more that I do not know about. 

The more I think about it, the more I am wondering if I know the source. There is someone that parks 20-40 hives in the middle of what that is mostly corn fields about 2.75 miles north of me seasonally. I suspect these hives are heading south towards me where there is more forge, and mine probably crossed path with them heading north. Since these hives appear to be on pallets and are only there some times I suspect they are being moved all over the country for almond pollination and other jobs.


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## squarepeg

it's possible. migratory hives have a greater opportunity for crossing paths with other hives than stationary hives do, but 2.75 miles is probably far enough away do discount drifting from your hives to theirs and vice versa. plus those guys generally know what the heck they are doing, especially if their livliehood is on the line.

more likely someone closer to you who imported an infected colony and allowed the dwindling of the colony to the point of your bees gaining access to it.

gotta get a test kit asap. try the local bee club someone might have one, and someone may know the whereabouts of other beekeepers near you.


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## RayMarler

In your first post you stated that the brood has been spotty all year.
How old are your queens?
Requeening can fix a hive right up.
You are not sure of the EFB thing yet so don't assume it's so.

I've just re-looked at some of the latest pics, it looks like some larva is grey looking? I have no experience with that so can't say anything.


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## elmer_fud

RayMarler said:


> In your first post you stated that the brood has been spotty all year.
> How old are your queens?
> Requeening can fix a hive right up.
> You are not sure of the EFB thing yet so don't assume it's so.
> 
> I've just re-looked at some of the latest pics, it looks like some larva is grey looking? I have no experience with that so can't say anything.


I am not going to assume it is EFB until I get a positive test, but I am going to take measure to stop the spread if it is (robber screens)

The hive with the most problems right now had a new queen last summer. I caught them filling swarm cells so I pulled the existing queen into a nuc and let them raise a new queen. Of my other 2 hives that are doing better I know one had a new queen last summer (superseed) and I dont remember if the other one was new summer of 2020 or summer of 2021.


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## RayMarler

OK, thanks. 
Me in your shoes would be very frustrated, I hope you get this resolved quickly and easily.


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## crofter

The assumption that it may be EFB is to take max effort to prevent further spread. If you give that away you cant get it back! No problem in that respect with requeening. The dark hue showing outlines of the trachea is a symptom. I dont recall seeing it as a symptom with anything else. Coloration can have quite a variation though since a number of different opportunistic bacteria jump in and take advantage of the situation. This variation in secondary infection affects different odors.

Pics below from my colonies. Pearly white larvae may be ok; greyish or yellowed are on their way out. I did some combining of faltering colonies before I realized what I had on my hands. Duh! If I had recognized the symptoms I might have been able to limit it to the first failed nuc.
Oxytet was available then without prescription so I treated all the healthy colonies repeatedly until freezup and locked down the obviously contaminated ones for three years before eventually disposing of the frames.

I got lucky and it did not come back the following spring.


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## squarepeg

jmho, but after looking at the last photos i believe those colonies have dwindled past the point of no return, and even if you could snap your fingers and make it disappear in an instant, and considering how long otc might take to stop the 'visible' infection, you are more than three weeks from the next round of brood emerging. frank's comment about limiting spread should be the main focus right now.


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## squarepeg

i'll postulate that the bees carrying the organism are drifting into all of the hives in your yard, even neighboring hives, sharing food with those colonies, thereby spreading the pathogen. too late to nip it in the bud, do what you can to prevent a beedemic.


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## Fivej

A few years ago, I would have done everything to diagnose and treat this hive. A few years later reading here and knowing beekeepers who have dealt with EFB, I would exterminate this hive now and test as soon as I have the test kit. Even if it tests negative, this hive is a loss and a threat to your other hives. J


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## msl

No need to burn....
at this point the damage is done
If you have one symptomatic hive, 90% of the rest in the yard have it
robber screen and treat


https://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/hal-00892246/document




> EFB symptoms, where colonies are located relatively close together, more than 90% of the colonies were carriers of M. plutonius. In comparison, 39% of colonies from apiaries without EFB symptoms that neighboured an apiary with clinical cases of EFB (distance 0.5 to 1 km), were carriers of the bacterium in adult bee samples.


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## squarepeg

msl said:


> No need to burn....
> at this point the damage is done
> If you have one symptomatic hive, 90% of the rest in the yard have it
> robber screen and treat
> 
> 
> https://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/hal-00892246/document


i don't totally disagree with that msl, it's by the book and based on the historical experience with efb in switzerland. i. jmho, but that info is outdated given the learning of since 2006 that the pathogen can live for at least two years in beebread and honey.

there are documented strains of efb resistant to otc, and the scientifically acceptable way in the uk and some of the other countries in the eu, and is to first use dna testing to identify the exact strain of the pathogen is present first make sure they are otc resistant.

for otc sensitive strains and if should dna testing identify a 'low risk' strain, the beekeeper has the option to shook swarm the bees onto new empty frames of comb or foundation, apply the anitbiotic, and watch and testing the first round of brood in the new hive housing the old bees and their queen.

the conventional wisdom here is dated and victims of efb do harm to the local bee population by not eradicating the honey and pollen infected with the pathogen from the face of the planet, in particular the local bee population foraging area.

in my view, the approach suggested in your post is lacking in a few ways, but partially due to what we have and do not available in the us with our friends in state and federal departments of agriculture along with the specially dedicated resources like beltsville, baton rough, and tucson.

unfortunately we here in the us, and even despite having these resources available, it is not possible to have dna testing on the pathogen in order to identify which one of the many strains is growing in your hive. most importantly to see if the particular strain you are dealing has known resistance resistant to otc vs. ranking very low in virulance and high in good response to treatment with otc.

in my confirmed (by test kit) cases, i did everything by the book hoping more than anything to save queenline the excellent survior/honey producers. i'm a retired doctor and my application per instructions were exactly by the book. 24 out of 26 didn't make it til fall. the other two actually made it through the following winter, but there was efb in the first rounds of brood (after receiving treatment as prescribed), so they were euthanized and the frames with honey and pollen burned. (saved the perfectedly empty frames, on which my current 7 hive inherited).

because of this, i have the distinction of someone with hands on personal experience with a proven otc resistant strain, as well as provided an example of how not having shook swarm in the recipe results in a reccurrance, and proving again that there is nothing to stop even a treated hive from getting sick again, because the disease is food born. so the experts that i pay attention to are in agreement that at a very mimimum any frames with food resources in an efb positive get eradicated. and this is not only for the sake of the colony, but for the sake of every colony within flying distance of it.

for the typical back yard beekeeper, if there is such a thing, what it takes to do this with 10 hives involves a monumental labor, an even greater amount of risk to the local bee population, and comes with no guarantees. i ethanized and burned the frames, actually shook swarm a couple of the 26, dna testing could have saved me the time, the trouble, and the expense. i myself will now practice manditory burn at first sight, and increase to weekly inspections on all hives and immediately eradicate any positives on sight.

the good news is no efb since 2019, despite reusing drawn comb that i 'washed'.

the study you linked involved colonies located in switzerland in 2006. not entirely relevant to ef's case.

here's about as good a primer on efb that i can suggest if someone want's to dig in. it's well worth listening to the entirety of it.






sorry to ramble.


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## squarepeg

just spent quite a few minutes editing. should have done it before sending but that's life.


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## squarepeg

ef, all things posted so far i believe leaves us with a diagnosis of efb until proven otherwise. i hope you don't mind that i have changed the title to reflect that for now, subject to editing should you get test results back.

for those interested in the topic of efb, here is a collection of 2019 threads containing some pretting good input from the beesource membership:









2019 efb threads


i stickied a handful of threads last year having to do with efb outbreaks. i thought it would be best to organize those threads here into one sticky, and we can start over with 2020 outbreaks. https://www.beesource.com/forums/showthread.php?355225-Which-brood-disease-is-shown-in-my-photographs...




www.beesource.com


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## elmer_fud

squarepeg said:


> ef, all things posted so far i believe leaves us with a diagnosis of efb until proven otherwise. i hope you don't mind that i have changed the title to reflect that for now, subject to editing should you get test results back.
> 
> for those interested in the topic of efb, here is a collection of 2019 threads containing some pretting good input from the beesource membership:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 2019 efb threads
> 
> 
> i stickied a handful of threads last year having to do with efb outbreaks. i thought it would be best to organize those threads here into one sticky, and we can start over with 2020 outbreaks. https://www.beesource.com/forums/showthread.php?355225-Which-brood-disease-is-shown-in-my-photographs...
> 
> 
> 
> 
> www.beesource.com


I noticed the thread name change. I understand why you did it. 

I heard back from the Veterinarian. Her recommendation was to test first and go from there which is my plan. She also said that an in person visit would be required for any medication and that in her experience any hives with EFB are prone to recurrences in the future. 

I have robber screens on one of the nucs, and all 3 full size hives. I need to go put a chunk of screen in front of the other nuc, it has a rotary open/excluder/closed disk on it so I dont have a robber screen for it. 

Right now my plan is to see how the test comes out when I get it, then go from there. If I don't get a shipping notification soon, I will see if I can get out of work for 2 hours to go to the "local" bee shop and get a test kit. This week is already really busy for me (both work and personal)


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## squarepeg

i was asked in a personal message if i thought that placing the woodenware in a 300 degree oven for an hour might kill the efb pathogen. i decided to answer here instead for the sake of sharing ideas and information with the community at large.

it's been a few years since i dived deep into the literature about this, but i don't recall seeing using heat as a method used for ridding the woodenware of the pathogen.

to the best of my recollection, mellisococcus plutonius is classified as an 'obligate anaerobe'. this means it can only survive in when the level of oxygen is zero or very low. from wikipedia:

*"Obligate anaerobes* are microorganisms killed by normal atmospheric concentrations of oxygen (20.95% O2).[1][2] Oxygen tolerance varies between species, with some species capable of surviving in up to 8% oxygen, while others lose viability in environments with an oxygen concentration greater than 0.5%.[3]"



https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Obligate_anaerobe



so for the woodenware theroritically all you would have to do is scrape it clean and let it air out, atmospheric oxygen kills the pathogen.

i rinsed mine off with a high pressure hose sprayer, let it dry good, misted it with a strong bleach mixture, and let it dry good.


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## squarepeg

the reason the pathogen cannot be eradicated from frames of honey and pollen is because that no to low oxygen environment exists in the deeper recesses of honey and pollen cells, plus the beebread and honey provide a food source. that's why it recurs, because as frank pointed out the bees will eventually encounter the tainted food supply as they work their way through those stores in the winter and early spring.

for most of us weekend beekeepers finding the time to do all that is necessary to even have a chance at rehabilitating infected colonies is wishful thinking, and even so comes with an uncertain prognosis for the future. in the mean time those sick colonies are putting all the other colonies within flying distance at risk. get the test kit yesterday, and and burn all the frames with any brood, pollen or honey from hives that test positive and/or have sick larvae like in your pictures.

jmho, and my apologies for repeating myself.


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## squarepeg

oh, and it turns out there is a much higher degree of normal drifting from hives into nearby hives. this has been documented by randy oliver and others. they marked bees and later found that many of those marked bees had ended up other hives, even as far as one kilometer away. 

this goes along with the idea that an intruding bee gets a pass at the entrance if it is loaded down with nectar and/or pollen. my hunch is that adult foragers from heavily infected efb hives could very well be suffering side effects from the spoiled food, and that could possible hinder their sense of location. it wouldn't surprise me if because of that they would be more likely to 'drift' into the hive next to theirs and others.

along those same lines, we observe foragers appear to 'intentionally' move to another hive. i've seen bees drift in big numbers from nearby hives to stronger hives when the drifting bees' hive has become queenless for example, or perhaps suffering some other issue like dwindling from diseases and pests.

not only that, but to some degree drones don't locate to a single hive when there are multiple hives in the yard. they pretty much come and go as they please to neighboring hives. a drone that has shared the community food source with an infected colony will transmit the pathogen to other colonies he visits when he starts sharing food with them.

so in a sense, robbing screens really aren't enough when there is live disease in the yard. they only eliminate the intrusion of a bee from a healthy hive going into an infected one. and thinking about what i wrote above in reverse, why would a healthy bee from a healthy hive want to ask for entrance into a hive that stinks of dead larvae?


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## Fivej

Good reasons for running robber screens and having test kits in your inventory. J


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## Litsinger

@elmer_fud:

While I don't have any answers for you, I am glad you are getting some good advice and I am sorry to read about your troubles. Hopefully you are able to quickly come to a definitive diagnosis such that you can make confident decisions on what to do next. 

Russ


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## msl

squarepeg said:


> why would a healthy bee from a healthy hive want to ask for entrance into a hive that stinks of dead larvae?


to rob honey during the dearth the OP is or is about to be in... a weak hive will shortly become a "bomb" in our area

Most people in the US treat and don't burn.. I burned the 1st 2 I saw (scrap plywood topbar nucs, no value lost).. But the next spring it was in the entire yard (20+), I can't take that kind of equipment loss
2nd year(after starting treatment) I saw some reoccurrence, 3rd a few, 4th the nehorbos haves all died (varroa) and his equipment froze and I haven't see it sense...

Other yards I have had it in it did not recur 2nd year in most cases, none in the 3rd, but I kept a bag of OTC/sugar with me at all times and hit anything suspect . I have a sharp eye for it and take a very hard look at hives that aren't building up when they should be
every yard got it own hive tool that stayed in the yard and got hit with a propane torch if it touched a suspect hive, I switched to disposable gloves.
and
I never, never, never combine a weak nuc in to a strong hive unless I am 100% sure why its weak... thats what got me the 1st time.... had a bunch of nucs that I thought I had just made up too late to build up.... nope they were sick and I just didn't see it


I also changed my genetics, I had bees that were resticant to EFB.. very good at cleaning out sick larva and keeping the hive below being symptomatic... Sounds great, but they end up being reservoirs.. they look just fine till they get stresses such as with a split of a booming spring hive... then pow huge out break do to the shift in nurce bee to larva ratio..
the outher thing that would happen is the queen cells would die from it... I had a cell builder that the cells just kept dyeing... I shook out every frame and found ONE sick larva
Hit it with OTC and it was right as rain, 4 years later its still in use with the same frames/box , no reinfection


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## William Bagwell

squarepeg said:


> i was asked in a personal message if i thought that placing the woodenware in a 300 degree oven for an hour might kill the efb pathogen. i decided to answer here instead for the sake of sharing ideas and information with the community at large.


No idea about EFB, but in some countries (not the US!) heat is an acceptable treatment for AFB.

https://www.agrifutures.com.au/wp-content/uploads/publications/01-051.pdf 

Page 24, 10 minutes 150° - 160º C


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## squarepeg

msl said:


> to rob honey during the dearth the OP is or is about to be in... a weak hive will shortly become a "bomb" in our area.


agreed, it can happen that way. but with ef's experience we don't have robbing resulting in the spreading of the pathogen, we have drift. and in my own experience it was drift and not robbing.

many thanks for sharing your personal experience and success with treatment. here is a 2016 paper that discusses the 34 different strains of efb and the differences in virulence between them:









Virulence Differences among Melissococcus plutonius Strains with Different Genetic Backgrounds in Apis mellifera Larvae under an Improved Experimental Condition - Scientific Reports


European foulbrood (EFB) caused by Melissococcus plutonius is an important bacterial disease of honeybee larvae. M. plutonius strains can be grouped into three genetically distinct groups (CC3, CC12 and CC13). Because EFB could not be reproduced in artificially reared honeybee larvae by...




www.nature.com





there was/is a program in the uk that offers beekeepers free dna testing for any confirmed efb and you get a report back pretty quick telling you which strain you have. for the most virulent strains the officials come back and burn your equipment for you.

here there is no way to know for sure, and differences in strains and the resistance or not to otc could easily account for the differences in yours and my experiences. many thanks for the reply msl.


----------



## squarepeg

here's a statement about regional differences found in the uk when they first starting dna testing the efb pathogen:

"EFB prevalence differed between geographical regions, with six times more disease discovered in Norfolk and Suffolk compared with the region with the lowest prevalence, Wales (Table 1). The number of MLST profiles generated was higher in focal areas with historically high (Norfolk/Suffolk) and low (Wales) disease prevalence compared with the rest of England (Table 1). MLST profiles were obtained for 206 EFB cases across England and Wales from April 2011 to September 2012 (Supplementary Table 1). Allelic profiles demonstrated that EFB in England and Wales between 2011 and 2012 was caused by at least 15 different STs of _M. plutonius_ (Supplementary Table 1). Four new STs were discovered in the current study"

that was published in 2014 with 15 known strains as compared to the 34 known strains reported in the 2016 paper i linked above. not sure what that number is in 2022, and the number is not really as important as understanding the biology of the strain you have in your hives.


----------



## elmer_fud

The spring weather here has been such a mess, I would not be surprised if my hives were out robbing other ones. I had one of my hives kick out drones when they were running out of stores, and it has been super dry. We got no measurable rain in april, and may was dryer than normal. It has then gotten really hot early in the year. I don't think there was much producing nectar this spring.

I know of atleast 3 other places with beehives within about 2 miles, and I suspect there are a lot that I don't know about. 

I am going to run up to the "local" bee shop tomorrow and get a test kit. I will report back on how it goes and also contact the local veterinarian.


----------



## msl

if drift was the main cause (sick bees entering a healthy hive) one would not expect shook swarming sick hives with sick bees to be an effective treatment..
of the 2 I burned I took one queen (all the rest of the bees were destroyed) and dropped her in a nuc that had gone drone layer, that hive rapidity (little over a week) came down with EFB so maby the brood break had a lot to do with with shook swarming
(hmm so that means I must have burned 3 that year, lol)

your spot on about strains... I had a run in with a rapid hive killer, not the "nusance" EFB that goes away with the flow the old books talk about and just impacts your honey crop a bit

some crops (blue berry, etc) seem to trigger EFB, so some of the issues and differences may be dietary


> A high incidence of EFB has been observed in Michigan when colonies were taken to pollinate blueberries (Vaccinium corymbosurn L.). This research studied the mechanism by which blueberries seemed to initiate the disease. The successful cultivation of large quantities of the EFB causal organism was accomplished through culturing on anaerobic Brain Heart Infusion agar and broth, supplemented with 0.5% glucose, 0.5% yeast extract, and 0.05% cysteine HC1. A means to efficiently inoculate the organism into healthy larvae and induce high rates of EFB mortality was discovered. It was also found that larvae which were fed blueberry pollen or a near neutral (pH 6.5) diet were more Gordon Ira Wardell susceptible to EFB. Wide variations were found in the pH's of different pollens, with blueberry being the highest (6.4) and alfalfa being
> the lowest (4.4). Control of EFB was attained by the feeding of low-pH (4.4) lactic acidacidified soy-supplement diet during blueberry pollination. The use of terramycin extender patties, either alone or in conjunction with the soy-supplement patties also provided complete protection from EFB during blueberry pollination.





https://d.lib.msu.edu/etd/6303/datastream/OBJ/View/



and we can't ignore the elephant in the room, the dirty needle that amplifies viruses and selects them to be more virulent, the varroa mite Kanbar and Engels 2003


----------



## squarepeg

msl said:


> if drift was the main cause (sick bees entering a healthy hive) one would not expect shook swarming sick hives with sick bees to be an effective treatment..


i've lost track of some of the details regarding the protocol msl, but to the best of my recollection the shook swarms were immediately given otc dissolved in sugar syrup at the time of the shook swarm to get the medicine into the collective gut right off the bat. i believe also that treated colonies were isolated into 'hospital' yards.

the dissertation you linked is very dated haven been written in 1982, but did found some interesting correlations with respect to blueberry polllination. for the sake of relevence to this discussion, and specifically regarding drift:

"Colonies which were moved and re-oriented developed EFB before all other treatments. Early disease onset in this circumstance was *most likely due to the continual loss of field bees, due to drifting during repeated re-orientation*."

(from the link in msl's post above, bold mine)


----------



## msl

yes its very dated!!!
but, its before mites and most or all the current pesticides/fungicides, yet the EFB problem in BB pollination is still very much there, still being worked on








The Blueberries and the Bees - American Bee Journal


Thousands of honey bee colonies arrive in the Fraser Valley’s blueberry fields every spring, but beekeepers are worried this crop may be harming their bees. My alarm only managed to announce one jolting ring before I slapped it off. The clock read 3:45 am, and there was no time to waste...




americanbeejournal.com








__





Final report for GNC18-268 - SARE Grant Management System







projects.sare.org







squarepeg said:


> *most likely due to the continual loss of field bees, due to drifting during repeated re-orientation*.


And then younger bees would move up to field duty and the nurse bee to larva ratio goes down, witch seems to be a standard trigger for the onset of systms, ie my split exampe and a hive in spring build up
but its worth noting


> Moving Experiments
> The moving and re-orientation experiments clearly
> demonstrated the association between blueberry pollination and EFB. Seventy percent of the colonies moved into blueberry fields developed EFB, but none of the bees in a physiographically-similar area without blueberries showed symptoms of EFB, or S. pluton bacteria in mid-gut cultures.


on the drift subject


> Two 6-colony apiaries were situated 600 m apart at similar blueberry plantings. Three colonies at each apiary were fitted with florescent pigment dispensers which marked the bees' thorax with colored pigment as they entered or exited the colony. Each dispenser-fitted colony marked bees with a colored pigment that was unique for that colony. Counts at non-marking colony entrances were made by recording the number and color of foragers. The percentage of foragers originating from different colonies within the apiary ranged from 32 to 63 percent. Bees originating from colonies located 600 m away comprised 1.3 to 4.5 percent of the foraging force of the un-marked colonies.







__





Acta Horticulturae


ISHS Acta Horticulturae



www.actahort.org





we see in Accelerated Varroa destructor population growth in honey bee (Apis mellifera) colonies is associated with visitation from non-natal bees - Scientific Reports that robbing screens kept out drifting bees as well as robbers


----------



## squarepeg

yard wide robbing screens have been discussed here on the forum. they would also tend to reduce the drifting of mite laden foragers and drones. probably not a bad defensive/preventative strategy for weekend beekeepers that have multiple neighboring beekeepers within flying distance of their hives.


----------



## elmer_fud

yuck,

I ran a test today with this larve. I have emailed these pictures to the veterinarian. There is a second faint line that is now showing up well in the pictures :-( 



















edit: here is a (slightly) better picture


----------



## squarepeg

that's a positive in my book. it's tricky getting enough sample to get pronounced test line, but if i recall the instructions correctly the manufacturer deems even a faint line as positive. it will be interesting to hear what the vet says.


----------



## elmer_fud

squarepeg said:


> that's a positive in my book. it's tricky getting enough sample to get pronounced test line, but if i recall the instructions correctly the manufacturer deems even a faint line as positive. it will be interesting to hear what the vet says.


yeah, the instructions said a faint line is a positive


----------



## squarepeg

as i mentioned in an earlier post, i feel your pain.


----------



## elmer_fud

squarepeg said:


> as i mentioned in an earlier post, i feel your pain.


I will just go cry myself to sleep 

(I am joking/being sarcastic. I will be ok, it has just been a rough spring)


----------



## squarepeg

how many hives do you have and how many have sick larvae?


----------



## RayMarler

I know that you are planning on going the anti-biotic/vet route. I might too with the thought of losing a lot of equipment. But I'm just a little guy now, and what I'd do is shake all bees onto foundation, destroy all of the old clombs, put on a feeder, and requeen with different genetics. That's what I did a few years ago when I had 2 hives with EFB. The genetics of your line might be prone to EFB. I am of the opinion that some genetics are more resistant to EFB than others. In past years I've cleared up minor infections with just changing the genetics.


----------



## squarepeg

jmho, but should ef decide to go the antibiotic route all of what ray did with his efb experience should be mandatory. it's not either/or it's both/and.

after the shook swarm onto new/clean equipment, a quart bottle of oct syrup is placed on top with an empty hive body around it and gets the treatment into the collective gut immediately.

the bees will need to be supplied syrup for a while to get the new comb built.

pinch the queens as part of the shook swarm process. there will be a very helpful brood break and opportunity for broodless mite treatment as well.

by the time the new queens are introduced and laying the otc will have been active in the food supply long enough to kill most if not all of the pathogen circulating there.

still have to consider though, there is no way at this time in the us to have dna testing done. this means that proceeding even with the shook swarming, otc treatment, and requeening, if ef is dealing with an efb strain resistant to otc it could very well end up all for naught.

with otc the honey supers have to come off. those stores are likely contaminated with pathogen anyway.

a big consideration is amount of time and elbow grease required on the part of a weekend beekeeper who may also have their hands full with life in general,

and beyond that, and with trying to maybe save the colonies, we will still have infected bees flying out of those hives and finding their way into other hives within flying distance, sharing infected food with them.

hindsight is 20/20. if i knew then what i know now, and for the sake of time and grief, and going forward; i am going forego trying to save the colonies, (heck, we are already talking about pinching the queens anyway), and destroy bees, brood, and stores, saving only the woodenware and any completely empty drawn comb for reuse.

again, its jmho, but the sick colonies pictured above will never be productive units anyway. the hives who might have made a crop have to have their honey supers removed. how to keep contaminated unfinished honey from fermenting, and prevented from getting eaten by nearby bees?


----------



## squarepeg

did a little editing after posting


----------



## Litsinger

squarepeg said:


> ... any completely empty drawn comb for reuse.


SP: I think I know what you are saying here, but just to be sure- in this situation would you be inclined to save completely empty drawn comb that was installed on a colony with known/suspected EFB?

The rationale being that the bacterium would not be present due to the fact that the cells are empty and exposed to air?


----------



## squarepeg

good questions russ, many thanks.



Litsinger said:


> SP: I think I know what you are saying here, but just to be sure- in this situation would you be inclined to save completely empty drawn comb that was installed on a colony with known/suspected EFB?
> 
> The rationale being that the bacterium would not be present due to the fact that the cells are empty and exposed to air?


the bacterium live in the bee gut and food supply. obligate anaerobes, and so environmental oxygen would kill any exposed bacterium. it doesn't live (long) on comb or wooden ware.

on the contrary, and forgive me for repeating, but the bottom of a honey or beebread cell is the perfect breeding ground for the bug.

it doesn't hurt to wash the wooden ware and drawn comb. i accomplished this fairly easily using a garden hose and an old fashioned brazz nozzle.

after the equipment drys really good i don't see how m. plutonius could be living anywhere on it.

but if you want to take it one more step you can mist strong bleach on everything, and then let it dry real good again.


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## Litsinger

squarepeg said:


> ... environmental oxygen would kill any exposed bacterium.


That makes good sense to me- thanks, SP.


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## squarepeg

went ahead and changed the title per today's positive test result.


----------



## Balus Creek Bees

elmer_fud said:


> Thanks,
> 
> I will get an EFB test on order. It does not look like EFB to me because the larve are still white and well formed, they are just dead.
> 
> It looks a lot like dry brood. This is the hive that had a population explosion, then they started crashing. There is a lot of bee bread in the hive, but it may be old so they are ignoring it. I am going to collapse the hive down to get rid of the empty space and put the feeder and a pollen patty closer to them.


With as few bees as are shown in the pictures, there may just not be enough nurse bees to keep all the brood fed. I'm no expert, but it may be worthwhile to add a frame of soon-to-emerge capped brood to increase their numbers, preferably with the nurse bees that are on it. If the brood is dying before being capped, I would guess that the queen is laying an adequate number of eggs - they just aren't living long enough to replenish numbers. Syrup and pollen sub could also be helpful.


----------



## drummerboy

Thanks to all contributors to this thread!


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## squarepeg

ef, can you share what the veternarian had to say? it would be good to know if he/she has had any other cases this year or even last year. that information might be useful for attempting to track down the source.


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## elmer_fud

I did not ask the bee veterinarian if she has had any other local cases. I asked my dogs veterinarian if they had any interest/experience in beekeeping today and they said they did not, but other people had asked them about it. My dog's veterinarian is within about a mile from my house. This makes me suspect that there are other people in the area also having problems. 

The bee veterinarian said it also looks positive to her. She said management sometimes can fix it but if that doesn't work antibiotics are needed. I think I am at the antibiotics stage. 

At this point I am leaning towards destroying all of the frames that have honey/brood/bee bread and antibiotics. We might be in a fire ban now (I know the county 5 miles over is) so it might make burning everything harder :-/. I have some frames in my hives that are completely empty (that I could dip/spray in/with bleach water) and several boxes of drawn frames that I typically use as honey supers.


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## squarepeg

understood. frankly at this point you know more about efb than the bee veterinarian does.

you've got your work cut out for you even if you are still at 4 hives. i would definitely consider treating all you have even if you can't see diseased larvae.

might as well use those clean hive bodies and drawn comb.

it goes without saying that the removed frames have to be locked up tight so that no bees can get to them if they can't be burned right away.

still no way of testing for otc resistance here in the us, but your chances of success are greatest with:

shook swarming, pinching the queens, starting with both otc syrup and the dry form together at the time of the shook swarming, knocking down mites while broodless, requeening in a few days to a week, and frequent inspections once brood is present again.

or clean it all up and write this year off.

many thanks for sharing your experience with us ef. i hope you will keep us posted.

quoting enjambres: "efb sucks"


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## AHudd

Yes, thanks for sharing in an open and honest way, and good luck.

Alex


----------



## squarepeg

a little off topic but not really:

my first hives came from an elderly beekeeper we invited to place hives on our property. he brought hives up in the spring and in the fall we bought a case of the honey that was produced here.

sadly the beekeeper passed away that winter.

so the hive were orphaned. they were also in very old delapitated equipment sitting on untreated 2x4's. termites were eating away at the bottoms and feeder jars had been left on top from the previous fall.

a good neighbor and beekeeper from years past noticed that the hives were in trouble and offered to help. i bought new equipment rehived them.

some time later, i noticed a foul smell coming from one of the hives. turns out they all were symptomatic for afb. this was my first experience having to euthanize colonies and burn equipment.

i learned later that this beekeeper, as did many of the long time beekeepers in the area, had been treating prophylactically with antibiotics twice a year. the antibiotics were given dissolved in sugar syrup with quart feeder jars that fit into the modified top covers.

there are still quite a few of this gentleman beekeeper's cohorts keeping bees to this day. and feeding antibiotics twice a year. the antibiotics go on in the spring a few weeks before honey supers are placed, and then again just after the supers are harvested. they alternate every other time with otc and tylosin.

i bring this up here because i think this may be one of the ways that efb pops up here and there from time to time. i.e. a hive of bees that has been treated prophylactically ends up in the hands of a beekeeper that doesn't know about it and once the antibiotics are no longer suppressing the disease it flares up.


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## elmer_fud

squarepeg said:


> understood. frankly at this point you know more about efb than the bee veterinarian does.


This veterinarian has been keeping bees for a few years, so hopefully that helps. 



squarepeg said:


> you've got your work cut out for you even if you are still at 4 hives. i would definitely consider treating all you have even if you can't see diseased larvae.


:-(



squarepeg said:


> or clean it all up and write this year off.


I am trying to avoid that, I will see what I can do



squarepeg said:


> quoting enjambres: "efb sucks"


I bet there are a lot more explecitive version of that usually used ;-)


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## elmer_fud

squarepeg said:


> i bring this up here because i think this may be one of the ways that efb pops up here and there from time to time. i.e. a hive of bees that has been treated prophylactically ends up in the hands of a beekeeper that doesn't know about it and once the antibiotics are no longer suppressing the disease it flares up.


I suspect it is that or it came in with someones nuc/package. I have never treated my hives for anything other than mites. 

If it is in multiple people's yards in this area like I am sort of suspecting, it may be around for a few years :-(


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## WesternWilson

squarepeg said:


> i don't totally disagree with that msl, it's by the book and based on the historical experience with efb in switzerland. i. jmho, but that info is outdated given the learning of since 2006 that the pathogen can live for at least two years in beebread and honey...
> 
> for otc sensitive strains and if should dna testing identify a 'low risk' strain, the beekeeper has the option to shook swarm the bees onto new empty frames of comb or foundation, apply the anitbiotic, and watch and testing the first round of brood in the new hive housing the old bees and their queen.
> 
> *the conventional wisdom here is dated and victims of efb do harm to the local bee population by not eradicating the honey and pollen infected with the pathogen *from the face of the planet, in particular the local bee population foraging area.


Agreed! The UK has poured money and research into dropping EFB rates in England. Shook swarming alone is actually more effective than medicating alone...best to do both.

Because time is of the essence in a disease that spreads readily via drift and robbing, clubs should keep test kits on hand so that members can instantly diagnose their "hinky" larvae.

Here is an info sheet:








Foulbrood 101


The Foulbroods There are two different foulbroods, American Foulbrood and European Foulbrood. Both affect bee larvae, causing them to sicken and die. Left to itself, either foulbrood will weaken, t…




herewebee.wordpress.com





Another good resource, here:


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## squarepeg

many thanks westernwilson. i was really hoping you were still lurking and would chime in!


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## msl

I seem to have cursed my self




msl said:


> Hit it with OTC and it was right as rain, 4 years later its still in use with the same frames/box , no reinfection


to day I checked a buch of cells in the incubator that were a day over do, turned to brown mush... I know what that means..... I am going to guess its not form the hive but form the out side plenty of FB posts with what looks to me to be EFB...


msl said:


> I have a sharp eye for it and take a very hard look at hives that aren't building up when they should be


with that in mind, I went to one yard 4 miles away that I manage for a 501c3 (no efb history) and shook a frame off one of splits that just wouldn't build up this year (not 2 full 8f deeps yet)... I had blamed the cold snap killing the spring bloom, drought, etc
yep a few curled larva and a crapy brood pattern
could be the high heat and stress of adding the 2nd deep 2 weeks ago (they had a sold pattern then) but I bet its EFB.. they have been cleaning it out well so you have to look hard to see anything but a poor brood pattern


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## squarepeg

pervasive little boogers aren't they msl.

nuke 'em and anything they live in or on off the face of the planet, (burn)

or by nature they will remain permanent guests.


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## elmer_fud

msl said:


> I seem to have cursed my self
> 
> 
> 
> to day I checked a buch of cells in the incubator that were a day over do, turned to brown mush... I know what that means..... I am going to guess its not form the hive but form the out side plenty of FB posts with what looks to me to be EFB...
> 
> 
> with that in mind, I went to one yard 4 miles away that I manage for a 501c3 (no efb history) and shook a frame off one of splits that just wouldn't build up this year (not 2 full 8f deeps yet)... I had blamed the cold snap killing the spring bloom, drought, etc
> yep a few curled larva and a crapy brood pattern
> could be the high heat and stress of adding the 2nd deep 2 weeks ago (they had a sold pattern then) but I bet its EFB.. they have been cleaning it out well so you have to look hard to see anything but a poor brood pattern













I wonder if someone brought in a bunch of packages/nucs with EFB this year, and now it is spreading all over the front range/state. 

I am close enough to MSL that people in both of our locations could have easily gotten packages/nucs from the same supplier. The last time I bought bees was in april/may 2020 and I suspect it may have been longer than that for MSL


vet is coming to my house tomorrow. Hopefully I can get this in checki


----------



## squarepeg

elmer_fud said:


> I wonder if someone brought in a bunch of packages/nucs with EFB this year, and now it is spreading all over the front range/state


with imported chinese honey making it difficult for large commercial operations to turn a profit moving their hundreds of thousands of hives from almonds to the north country for honey production, along with with the insatiable demand for bees driving up the price of packages/nucs, more commercials are selling their bees after almond pollination (along with any associated pathogens) to become packages/nucs, which get distributed across the country.



https://www.thepacker.com/news/industry/2m-beehives-imported-california-almond-bloom





elmer_fud said:


> vet is coming to my house tomorrow.


i humbly recommend that you ask your vet to read over this thread.


----------



## elmer_fud

I met with the Vet today. One hive was so far gone that she didn't think it could be recovered, so I pulled the queen out and put it over another one for a newspaper combine. This hive was down to maybe 5 frames of bees when it was close to 40 in april. 

Both of my remaining hives also have EFB so I have antibiotics for those hives. I am going to condense down these hives and get rid of any frames that are filled with stores. I am going to rinse/dip/soak boxes and empty frames that are in the hives with bleach water. The population in the 2 remaining hives looked better. The population is still low for this time of year, but it is not crashing either. I am also going to requeen the one with a 2 year old queen in a few weeks since this should also help. 

It sounds like she has not seen a lot of EFB cases this year. In past years they traced a EFB outbreak to a specific supplier.


----------



## squarepeg

many thanks for keeping us updated ef, and we sincerely wish you success with your efb remediation efforts.

it sounds like the work load may be manageable given just two remaining hives. having clean drawn comb on hand is a plus.

one thing to keep in mind, and if the capped brood pattern in the remaining hives is spotty like the photos you shared in the earlier post, is that you might see the colonies continue to decrease in size. this is because the older bees die out and there is a diminished cohort of emerging bees to replace them.

hopefully your efb strain is not resistant to the antibiotic you are applying.

it's going to take some time to establish a solid brood pattern and even more time for the next rounds of replacement bees to emerge. in the mean time, it is likely that volume of young nurse bees is going to be less than optimal for broodrearing.

the bees you combined were likely past the age of nursing and transitioned on to foraging and guarding. if so they won't be helpful with broodrearing.

you also mentioned that your pollen and nectar flows were off so you may want to continue supplementing them.


----------



## RayMarler

I hope you can get them turned around a healthy and populous enough before winter. We are 2 weeks after summer solstice and you are in N.Colorado. The bees right now are not inclined towards increase, but consolidation and storage for the coming winter. Treat and feed syrup and pollen sub as you can to try to get them building up and healthy. Very best of luck to you, I think you'll make it. Timing of the seasons is going to make it a close call is all.


----------



## msl

RayMarler said:


> Timing of the seasons is going to make it a close call is all.


I don't agree, I am still pulling nucs to over winter with almost of of july, Aug, sept. I make lot of post flow splitshttps://projects.sare.org/sare_project/fnc15-1005/
2 frames of brood, and a cell timed to start laying about 1 week in Aug has good results for me, sometimes the nucs start swarm cells by mid Oct on warm years... yes the is with heavy feeding if they have to draw comb.



squarepeg said:


> the bees you combined were likely past the age of nursing and transitioned on to foraging and guarding. if so they won't be helpful with broodrearing.


Disagree, bees are very plastic and easily revert to nursing duties, the fly back split is a great demonstration of this in action and one of my favorit things to do post flow, take those foragers that will do notheing for me but eat honey and die and revert them in to nurse bees to rear brood in a nuc 











> Fig. 3. Means and standard deviations for (A) the number of functional
> immune cells of worker bees obtained from three replicate setups (per
> replicate, nZ15–20 for each experimental group), and (B) the proportion of
> non-functional, pycnotic hemocytes in the same samples. Data were
> collected from 26 day-old nurse bees and foragers at base line, and
> subsequently from reverted bees and continuing foragers after 4 and 8 days.
> Small letters refer to groups that were signiﬁcantly different as determined
> by Fisher Post hoc test (P!0.05). Numbers inside the bars refer to the total
> sample size of each experimental group





https://www.researchgate.net/publication/7594932_Social_reversal_of_immunosenescence_in_honey_bee_workers





elmer_fud said:


> This hive was down to maybe 5 frames of bees


Not to 2nd guess the vet, but I would have tried to salvage it... combining is a loss, so what it there to lose unless you puting 2 smalls together 



elmer_fud said:


> . I am also going to requeen the one with a 2 year old queen in a few weeks since this should also help.


keep in mind the "requeening" fix for EFB has a a lot to do with giveing it a brood break so that when brood rearing starts again the is better nurse to larva ratio


----------



## squarepeg

prior to 2017 antibiotics for farm use to include beekeeping were avalable at the local farm supply store, to any paying customer, and without a veterinarian having to prescribe or authorize it.

that all changed effective january 1, 2017 when the united states food and drug administration pulled 'medically important' antibiotics off the shelf for public consumption, and from that point on if a beekeeper wanted to purchase antibiotics for hive management it became necessary to obtain a veterinarian feed directive, or vfd.

back in 2019 when i was experiencing efb in my yards, i contacted my veterinarian about getting some otc. as a long time friend and honey customer as well, my vet knew that i was well versed in beekeeping, expressed her condolences about the efb, told me to do whatever i felt was indicated, and that she would sign off on anything i needed her to.

she explained that while bee's are managed as livestock, in her long trek to become a vet there was literally no education when it came to beekeeping. she told me that since the directive, i was the first one to ask for help obtaining a vfd. she said there are occaisionally courses offered on the subject at her continuing education meetings, but for the most part she and all of her vet friends were not interested in offering that service.

i say all that to say this, while the law requires we go through a vet to get antibiotics, we can't assume the vet knows anymore about bee management than we do, and therefore have to consider the source should the vet offer management guidance.

i would take that a step further and say that even if a vet has a more than passing interest in bees or decided to begin beekeeping doesn't necessarily mean that they are an 'expert' source for information and guidance when it comes to efb or any other bee management.

i'm really trying not to repeat too much or be long-winded, but i know what the state of the understanding is regarding efb here in the us as compared to the uk and other countries, and our understanding is very dated. if you agree with that, then you might agree with the presumption that whatever training vets are getting here since 2017 is also dated.

on the other hand, if i found a vet with as many hive/years or more as i have, and having a current understanding of efb and its management, such a vet would certainly have my ear. however and unless my understanding changes i'll still be observing a strict burn policy.


----------



## squarepeg

msl, looks like you posted your last while i was composing mine. many thanks.

i'll be digesting it and reply back.


----------



## AHudd

@squarepeg, when your trouble with efb began I reached out to our vet to see how she would respond if we had an outbreak here. I recieved a very similar response as you. She said bring in a photo for her file and she would supply the approved treatment.

Alex


----------



## squarepeg

msl said:


> Disagree, bees are very plastic and easily revert to nursing duties...


this is not at all what study you provided is reporting msl. the authors weren't looking at how easily bees revert to nursing duties, and did not compare what percentage reverted to what percentage did not revert.

they marked 1000 bees on their emergence day, divided them up between 3 hives, performed their manipulations, and then sampled *both* from bees who were apparantly performing nursing duties along with bees that were apparantly performing foraging duties.

from the study you link above:

"...our experimental procedure resulted in a differentiation of experience marked foragers into a population of reverted workers that nursed brood, *and* a population of foragers that continued to collect pollen and nectar after the reversion manipulation."

(bold mine)

the authors had no problem finding plenty of marked foragers that *did not revert *to nursing duties to make up their sample sizes for that experimental group. again, they didn't look at the question of how many revert and how many don't revert, but we can take away from what they do say that enough don't revert to support randy oliver's statement:

"if the colony is for some reason short on nurses, a nurse can prolong its nursing duties (and thus extend its life); and if the situation is desperate, mid-aged or early forager bees can *(to some extent) *even revert back to nursing duties."

i am not going to search for a study, but there may be one out there that addresses 'to what extent' foragers can revert. i am comfortable at this point to stand with my understanding that especially in certain situations such as ef's, as well as other situations such as extended queenlessness ect, the potential decrease in nursing bees is enough to consider bolstering such a colony with addition nurse bees and/or brood, especially if we are interested in reviving a dwindled colony.



msl said:


> the fly back split is a great demonstration of this in action...


this assumes that nurse bees or bees still capable of nursing have not made orientation flights yet, (have they not?) and/or the bees returning to your parent hive have undergone the physiological changes to full fledged foragers and had to revert (have they?). i don't believe we should assume either.

plus, your fly back split is utilizing a healthy hive presumably with a healthy balance of bees of all ages so it's not surprising that it works so well. ef's colonies have had their future population of young bees decimated by efb. it's apples and oranges in my book.


----------



## elmer_fud

msl said:


> I don't agree, I am still pulling nucs to over winter with almost of of july, Aug, sept. I make lot of post flow splitshttps://projects.sare.org/sare_project/fnc15-1005/
> 2 frames of brood, and a cell timed to start laying about 1 week in Aug has good results for me, sometimes the nucs start swarm cells by mid Oct on warm years... yes the is with heavy feeding if they have to draw comb.


that is my thought also. I have had nucs I started in august make it if I baby them. I have written off getting any honey this year though, because it is 8 weeks before I could collect anything, and the flow will be gone by that point. 




msl said:


> Not to 2nd guess the vet, but I would have tried to salvage it... combining is a loss, so what it there to lose unless you puting 2 smalls together


this hive was crashing quick, and I am not sure if it would recover. It had gone from 40+ frames of bees to 5 or less in 2 months, and it looked like it was down another frame or 2 from the previous week. If it was something like mites or lack of food, I might have tried, but even feeding this hive was not seeming to help them. 



msl said:


> keep in mind the "requeening" fix for EFB has a a lot to do with giveing it a brood break so that when brood rearing starts again the is better nurse to larva ratio


that makes sense. I also suspect that the break means that the nurse bees are not caring for sick larve and spreading it as much


----------



## elmer_fud

squarepeg said:


> prior to 2017 antibiotics for farm use to include beekeeping were avalable at the local farm supply store, to any paying customer, and without a veterinarian having to prescribe or authorize it.
> 
> that all changed effective january 1, 2017 when the united states food and drug administration pulled 'medically important' antibiotics off the shelf for public consumption, and from that point on if a beekeeper wanted to purchase antibiotics for hive management it became necessary to obtain a veterinarian feed directive, or vfd.
> 
> back in 2019 when i was experiencing efb in my yards, i contacted my veterinarian about getting some otc. as a long time friend and honey customer as well, my vet knew that i was well versed in beekeeping, expressed her condolences about the efb, told me to do whatever i felt was indicated, and that she would sign off on anything i needed her to.
> 
> she explained that while bee's are managed as livestock, in her long trek to become a vet there was literally no education when it came to beekeeping. she told me that since the directive, i was the first one to ask for help obtaining a vfd. she said there are occaisionally courses offered on the subject at her continuing education meetings, but for the most part she and all of her vet friends were not interested in offering that service.
> 
> i say all that to say this, while the law requires we go through a vet to get antibiotics, we can't assume the vet knows anymore about bee management than we do, and therefore have to consider the source should the vet offer management guidance.
> 
> i would take that a step further and say that even if a vet has a more than passing interest in bees or decided to begin beekeeping doesn't necessarily mean that they are an 'expert' source for information and guidance when it comes to efb or any other bee management.
> 
> i'm really trying not to repeat too much or be long-winded, but i know what the state of the understanding is regarding efb here in the us as compared to the uk and other countries, and our understanding is very dated. if you agree with that, then you might agree with the presumption that whatever training vets are getting here since 2017 is also dated.
> 
> on the other hand, if i found a vet with as many hive/years or more as i have, and having a current understanding of efb and its management, such a vet would certainly have my ear. however and unless my understanding changes i'll still be observing a strict burn policy.


I guess I should consider myself luckey that we have a few vetranarians in the area that are also active bee keepers. The cost to have the vet come out was also very reasonable.


----------



## elmer_fud

I condensed both of my remaining hives down this afternoon, and I am going to give them a few hours to settle down then start the antibiotics this evening. I pulled out the frames that were only stores and the empty ones to get both hives down to 3 boxes (deep + 2 mediums). 

I am going to clean the empty/uncapped frames, scrape the wax out of the foundationless ones and bake/bleach them, and bleach the boxes that I pulled out. I am going to store and then destroy some of the older and/or filled frames. I am also going to bleach all of the boxes


----------



## squarepeg

elmer_fud said:


> I guess I should consider myself luckey that we have a few vetranarians in the area that are also active bee keepers. The cost to have the vet come out was also very reasonable.


absolutely. that's a luxury you don't just find anywhere. the vet connection has very good potential for the beekeeping community getting tapped into state universty and state department of agriculture assets. the potential for a successful collaberation is very high. could colorado be the first in the union for having efb dna testing done? the wheel for that could get rolling if even a few veterinarian/active beekeeper types set it in motion.


----------



## msl

squarepeg said:


> our experimental procedure resulted in a differentiation of experience marked foragers into a population of reverted workers that nursed brood, *and* a population of foragers that continued to collect pollen and nectar after the reversion manipulation.


witch is what one would expect, the colony still needs forage bees




squarepeg said:


> I am not going to search for a study, but there may be one out there that addresses 'to what extent' foragers can revert.


that's actually why I chose to post this one and its details on gland size and JH levels at 4 and 8 days post reversion..
If some onw wants to go deep in to the epigenetics and DNA changes Reversible switching between epigenetic states in honeybee behavioral subcastes
but its far less easy to digest
Sadly I cant put my finger on it, some were I had a study that was showing with in 7 days it was 70% reversion so that the hive came to the "normal" 70/30 split of house bees to foragers




elmer_fud said:


> The cost to have the vet come out was also very reasonable.


what did it come to, last time (a few years back) I was quoted $200, I will be needing to get a vet visit for the 501c3 honey yard


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## squarepeg

msl said:


> ...some were I had a study that was showing with in 7 days it was 70% reversion so that the hive came to the "normal" 70/30 split of house bees to foragers


good bees!

is that from a healthy colony? having a balanced mix of brood and adults in all stages?


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## elmer_fud

msl said:


> what did it come to, last time (a few years back) I was quoted $200, I will be needing to get a vet visit for the 501c3 honey yard


I sent you a PM with her info. It was less than that, but she is about 15 minutes away from me.


----------



## elmer_fud

squarepeg said:


> absolutely. that's a luxury you don't just find anywhere. the vet connection has very good potential for the beekeeping community getting tapped into state universty and state department of agriculture assets. the potential for a successful collaberation is very high. could colorado be the first in the union for having efb dna testing done? the wheel for that could get rolling if even a few veterinarian/active beekeeper types set it in motion.


I think we may actually have 3 vetranarians in the area that work with Beekeepers. I have only contacted one, and I think another one presented at one of the club meetings. 

That is a nice idea but I think it is sort of a long shot to get EFB DNA testing one. I don't think we have any state beekeepers, and I don't think the state of CO really cares that much. We do have some good bee clubs though. I think CSU may also have a beekeeping office, but I am not sure what they are doing right now. At one point I think the office was focused on African bee genetic testing/identification in CO.


----------



## squarepeg

elmer_fud said:


> That is a nice idea but I think it is sort of a long shot to get EFB DNA testing one. I don't think we have any state beekeepers, and I don't think the state of CO really cares that much.


you may very well find that to be the case ef. or you may end up doing your state and the rest of the us a big favor. it wouldn't take much to reach cutting edge here when it comes to efb.

your state department of agriculture has an 'animal health laboratory', and especially now that veterinarians and vfd's are required, (veterinarians routinely send samples for laboratory diagnoses), dna testing would be right up their alley, and where samples would likely be submitted:






Animal Health Laboratory | Department of Agriculture


Animal Health Division Supplies//Testing Services and Fees//Submissions/Submission Protocol




ag.colorado.gov





another avenue would be to see if there is any interest with the bee people at csu. the dna testing would make a perfect thesis or dissertation project for a graduate student there. if any of the three vets have connections to csu they could possibly facilitate it.

i discussed these things with the associated alabama counter parts here, but since there were so few cases reported it didn't raise enough concern. perhaps that is how it would be in co, but perhaps not.

i thought it was important enough to try, and still is.


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## RayMarler

msl post #78
You are working with healthy hives when you make your splits for over wintering, and I agree with that. I was taking into consideration that elmer_fud is working with currently EFB infected hives in my statement that time is close but that it should be doable.


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## TelmahQ

Here is a fresh thread from Facebook about EFB in Fort Collins, I linked this discussion there as well. All my brood is pearly and wet right now, but I did bring down a nuc from Loveland last month so I am watching closely! 

Just to share links from that thread, I have no idea if this info is current or not: THE BEE DOCTORS – Dr. Amy Franklin and Dr Amanda Levesque – Northern Colorado Beekeepers Association









Colorado Backyard Beekeepers | Facebook


Community of Beekeepers in Colorado.




www.facebook.com


----------



## JeanBeeBean

elmer_fud said:


> I am wondering if what I think is going on matches what other people are seeing. I am seeing some brood that looks like it has starved and is dead. I am not having many stores coming in so I think the bees are not able to feed all of the brood, and some of it is starving before it gets capped. The larvae looks like it is properly formed.
> 
> This year the weather has been really weird. It has been really dry this spring, then it got hot so I don't think much nectar is coming in.
> 
> I have had spotty frames all year. Some of it was wet nectar placed in random cells, bee bread in random cells, and the hive not raising brood very well. I checked mites earlier this spring and all but 1 hive came back clean. I need to perform mite checks all of my hives again.
> 
> Does the lack of nectar coming in resulting in the bees not feeding all of the brood well seem like a reasonable explanation?
> 
> I know there are not many bees on this frame. This hive is having problems. I put a feeder on it last week, but I am not sure if it is helping yet.
> View attachment 70072
> 
> View attachment 70071


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## JeanBeeBean

Confirmed EFB here as well, two Layens/Langstroth hybrid type hives located in North Fort Collins. I managed a shook swarm on one hive into brand new equipment, that seemed successful (now they show some signs of chalkbrood, no signs of EFB...yet). My other hive (brand new equipment and brand new package installed a few months ago) is very symptomatic now with EFB. If anyone is able to please share the contact info of the veterinarian that would be wonderful. Thank you.


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## squarepeg

so that makes 3 confirmed cases in colorado this summer and likely other cases that we aren't privy to here on beesource.

hmm.


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## elmer_fud

JeanBeeBean said:


> Confirmed EFB here as well, two Layens/Langstroth hybrid type hives located in North Fort Collins. I managed a shook swarm on one hive into brand new equipment, that seemed successful (now they show some signs of chalkbrood, no signs of EFB...yet). My other hive (brand new equipment and brand new package installed a few months ago) is very symptomatic now with EFB. If anyone is able to please share the contact info of the veterinarian that would be wonderful. Thank you.


I will PM you the vet that I worked with


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## elmer_fud

TelmahQ said:


> Here is a fresh thread from Facebook about EFB in Fort Collins, I linked this discussion there as well. All my brood is pearly and wet right now, but I did bring down a nuc from Loveland last month so I am watching closely!
> 
> Just to share links from that thread, I have no idea if this info is current or not: THE BEE DOCTORS – Dr. Amy Franklin and Dr Amanda Levesque – Northern Colorado Beekeepers Association
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Colorado Backyard Beekeepers | Facebook
> 
> 
> Community of Beekeepers in Colorado.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> www.facebook.com


I am not sure how current it is. I believe Dr Amy Franklin is one of the 2 vets that have presented at the NCBA meetings. I beleive she presented within the last 2-3 years, so it is not terribly out of date. I worked with the other one that did a presentation at a meeting.


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## elmer_fud

I started going thru the boxes to clean today. I have about 12 boxes that may be contaminated (+6 still on hives) to work thru. 

The frames are getting sorted into 3 categories:
1. Go in a trash bag to get destroyed
2. pull the foundation and wax out of the wood frame to reuse the frames. The foundation and wax went into the trash bag to get destroyed. 
3. keep the frame, foundation, and wax if it is empty

I have about 2 boxes of frames sitting in a tote filled with bleach water, and I am going to let them sit for a few days, then repeat with the rest that I am saving. After letting the frames soak for a few days I am going to pull them out, leave them out to dry, then bag them up for use next year. I figure between soaking in bleach water and completely drying out it should kill everything. 

I also need to dip all of the boxes in bleach water. I dont think they need to soak since the bees are not eating the wood in the boxes and doing much that would drive/release EFB from the wood.


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## elmer_fud

I am thinking of throwing all of the "trash" into a turkey fryer and boiling it (in water) since this would destroy all of the EFB. If I did thins then I can just throw it out with the regular trash instead of burning it. This would be a better option with plastic foundation then burning a lot of it in a fire.

edit: so thinking about this more boiling water kills bacteria and viruses because of the heat. If I heat up all of the wooden ware above boiling water temperatures (212F) and keep it well below wax/wood igntion temperatures (over 350F) this should kill everything. If I bake everything at 250F I don't think it will hurt the wood but would get rid of the EFB spores. I dont want to bake anything with wax that I care about because going this hot will make the wax hard and unusable for the bees. It may also warp any plastic so no baking it.


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## squarepeg

efb does not leave spores like afb does.

the techniques you are describing are used to kill the long lived afb spores.

all it takes is exposure to atmospheric oxygen to kill the efb bacteria, and once dead it's dead forever. 

so no baking or soaking in bleach required for the woodenware. rinsing with a hose and letting it dry would be sufficient, but if you want to mist some concentrated bleach on the inside surfaces and let it dry it wouldn't hurt.

i tried removing plastic foundation and saving the wooden part of some frames, but it was way too labor intensive and i decided my time was worth more than i was saving so went ahead and just bought new frames.

again, please be very careful not to let any bees get access to the infected honey that has been removed before destroying it. the bacteria living there is way more of an environmental hazard than the burning of the plastic foundation.

the plastic used for foundation actually burns pretty clean and all the way down to ash.


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## elmer_fud

I understand that EFB does not leave behind spores, but I am still going to do this. It brings me some confidence/comfort that these boxes and frames will be completely clean. 

My logic is that by baking everything I can put the boxes and frames (with new foundation) back into use tomorrow (I dont need to) without any concerns about it still being contaminated. I also would not be surprised if some amount of contaminated honey/pollen has been squished into the wood and covered with wax (which is relatively non porous) when I was ripping out the foundation. I know the bleach and water will not get thru the wax, so the soaked frames need to sit longer and dry out completely. 

2 days ago when I was breaking down frames it was raining a bit in the evening so not many bees were out. Tonight I was breaking down frames after dark. I put everything in trash bags, then put those into containers with tight fitting lids (black plastic with the yellow snap on lids) and that container is in my shed (that is bee tight). I will burn these bags when it is safe to do so, it is way to dry right now for me to be comfortable having a fire large enough to burn everything well. 

At about 20 frames/$40 per hour, I think it is worth my time to keep the wood in the frames. It is not worth trying to keep the foundation.


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## crofter

Not spore forming but the bacteria can survive close to 2 years under rather special conditions re. ph, low oxygen, and presence of certain minerals.
Bee bread under honey in cells seems to best fulfill the conditions. 

I started cleaning up a few frames and decided that I was potentially exposing more bacteria than eliminating. The logistics of preventing unseen splashes, dripping, contaminated clothes, boots etc., came to my mind as an exercise in futility! Wood frames and plastic foundation was only a couple of dollars each so I would have been poorly repaid for my labor even if the result was guaranteed effective. I have a hard time getting enthusiastic about activity when the results are questionable.

The boxes, bottoms and tops are easily made reusable with a large weed burner type propane torch. Known here as _Tiger Torch._


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## Litsinger

@elmer_fud:

I hope you don't mind- I ran across this excellent primer on EFB in the latest ABJ and thought it might be helpful to hang it here since many of us are trying to learn all we can from the real life case study you unfortunately are having to deal with right now. I hope your remediation efforts are progressing succesfully.

Russ


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## squarepeg

ef, if you are willing and able please let us know how things are going with your efb remediation.


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## elmer_fud

both hives look better so far. I think one is starting to build up a bit and the brood pattern looks good. 

The second one is not doing much yet, but the bit of brood in there looks better. I put a feeder on it last weekend to see if that helps. I might need to requeen it.

I did not see any dead yellow brood, which is a good sign.


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## squarepeg

many thanks ef, keeping you and your bees in our thoughts and hoping for a successful resolution.


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## msl

I got a vet to come out to the yard I manage for a 501c3 orchard (all produce and honey goes to food banks)
young guy, not much bee experience, he asked to see what healthy larva looked like before we got started, etc. So he got the full tour.

Had to shake off quite a few frame to show him 4-5 sick larve, a few dead and dryed ones. Talked about how the brood pattern was telling, larva of different ages, bee hygienic behavior etc

I went in to how contangoes it is and that it can sit asymptomatic for long periods of time and be spreading threw an area till a stressor triggers an out break, how far the spread can be, etc

He agreed that I should treat all the colony's in the yard, and that it would be smart (and allowable ) to treat any hives in proximity to this operation as they have been exposed

3 days later two 10 pound buckets of Terra Pro showed up on my doorstep and I hit the whole yard

I have have inspected all known hives with in 1000m, and been in contact with keepers out to 1 mile.. not seeing any symptoms!!!, but the plan is to provide a course of treatment when supers come off to make sure no resovors are left

Its been a PITA but being the "big guy" sournded by BYBKs makes you a target and I am trying to avoid the "bee club potlitics" as much as possible

Now the fun stuff, I found patient zero, her and her splits this year are symptomatic while most of the other questionably ones aren't showing signs, but failed to build up..
back story, I am the 3rd keeper for this program in resent years
reaching back in time, last time the denver metro area saw an out break (2019, was a bad year USA wide) I had talked to the previous keeper in passing and they felt they were seeing the systomes I was talking about... later said they tested and all was fine.... but now I wonder.....
fall of 2019 they were let go in a bee potlics dust up
New beekeeper felt a mouthy OAV was good enuff to treat mites, all but 2 dead by end of fall 2020 (I assumed mites biased on the OAV and post mortem of the winterkilled hive, but now I wonder if it was efb), only P0 made the winter and I thought maby they had some mite restiance, but now I wonder if it was efb limiting brood production 
early spring 2021 I came on, we started 10 packages on all the drawn comb and I did 550 pounds of honey, P0 did fine, wintered well with a smaller cluster and came threw with lots of left over feed... At the time I thought is was them being thrifty...but now I wonder

My hope is that after the yard gets a spring treatment that I will have put this down, but I wonder


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## squarepeg

that's a really good update msl. good luck with your remediation.

sounds like you were able to give the vet an education in efb, good job

not surprised you were only able to find just a few symptomatic larvae, sounds like hygenic bees alright. 'not seeing any symptoms' in the other hives you inspected is better than finding signs. i know you are aware not finding diseased larvae can be deceiving with hygenic bees. hopefully the capped brood patterns were pretty solid.

i'm totally with you on the bee club politics thing. you deserve extra credit for that.


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## elmer_fud

Thanks for the update and lots of good info there.

It is nice that you have some idea who is in the area to try and get everyone checked and treated. I have no idea who is around me, and I had a mite bomb 2 doors (<500 feet) down one year that I did not find out about until much later. I know of a few hives within a mile or two of me, but not all of them.


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## squarepeg

I have a question msl, and if i'm probing my nostrils where they don't belong no worries, share what you will.

does your vfd authorize the spring preventative dose you mentioned in your post, or perhaps has the vet already authorized that or has agree to authorize that when spring comes? i'm still wondering about the 15 day thing.

also, the otc i bought from mann lake in 2019 was set to expire in less than a year. perhaps they are putting a longer expiration dates on the ten pound buckets you purchased.

expired drug may lose it's effectiveness, or even worse:

"Currently, only the antibiotic tetracycline is known to be harmful when expired. In several reported cases, expired tetracycline has caused Fanconi syndrome, a rare form of kidney damage that can lead to severe dehydration. For this reason, you should never take expired tetracycline."

cite: Is It Safe to Take Medications Past Their Expiration Date? - GoodRx


----------



## msl

all good questions
to be 100% by the book the program (its thier bees and VFD ) would have to do a Jan TX as its a 6 month VFD, in practice, it may be a "hair late, personaly I see it about the same as the splitting of hairs between labeled and unlabeled OA

but now that the vet-patient/client relationship has been estliblished the VFD can be renewed with out a follow up, (and as the vet did the visit pro bono do to the 501c3 and educational opportunity for him), he has stated a new one can be emailed over with a phone request. So sold there, I keep these guys 100% up and up, labeled OA and all...

The program/client used a fill in the blank VFD witch I attached, think it came form the norther Colorado bee club web site

as for " authorizing" a spring dose.. that's covered by the product label








it directs the user to perform a fall and spring treatment with out regard to symptoms , and it would seem a mid summer use on symptomatic hives would be "off label"... in realiry the only thing the new law changed was limit access and use to the hobiest... not a fan of any of the above, but it is what it is 

spinning back to "me" and what I do, I bought enff OTC to last me for a bit as this whole VFD change happened, I got a 1/2 pound..so [email protected] per dose (6 grams OTC to pound of powdered sugar = 29 doses) ... ya I got years and years with my small hive count. 

haven't seen a issue with old stock break down yet... and given bees don't have kidney's I am not expecting an out break of Fanconi's Syndrome in the few hives I treat any time soon.


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## squarepeg

all good answers, many thanks for sharing msl.



msl said:


> to be 100% by the book the program (its thier bees and VFD ) would have to do a Jan TX as its a 6 month VFD...
> 
> now that the vet-patient/client relationship has been estliblished the VFD can be renewed with out a follow up...
> 
> ...he has stated a new one can be emailed over with a phone request. So solid there...
> 
> I keep these guys 100% up and up, labeled OA and all...
> 
> The program/client used a fill in the blank VFD witch I attached, think it came form the norther Colorado bee club web site


it was nice the young vet inexperienced with bees provided services pro bono to the program. it was nice of you to educate him about efb, as well as help him develop a new service to augment and grow his practice. 

i don't know from personal experience or from having other outside knowledge, but in my opinion this vet is being pretty liberal with his prescribing authority if those are his policies, and not keeping within the spirit with the fda directive regarding the use of antibiotics with food producing animals.

a spring treatment without active disease present would be consider preventative use, which the directive is designed to eliminate.



msl said:


> as for " authorizing" a spring dose.. that's covered by the product label


again, i don't claim to be an expert in all this, but my understanding is that the vfd now trumps the product label. to be secure the beekeeper needs to be working off a current vfd.



msl said:


> haven't seen a issue with old stock break down yet...


how would one know if they had an issue with break down? perhaps if the drug is appearing not to work, but that can also happen if a strain of efb resistant to otc shows up. also, outdated drug may still be partially effective yet still contain the toxic breakdown product as well.



msl said:


> and given bees don't have kidney's
> 
> I am not expecting an out break of Fanconi's Syndrome in the few hives I treat any time soon.


it's not the bees we need to worry about. since beehives are producing food for human consumption, and in the event some dated otc somehow ended up in honey, and consuming that honey was proven to cause kidney failure in a human...

many countries have outlawed the use of antibiotics in beehives. i wouldn't be surprised if the u.s. ends up that way before it's over. that said, the reality is that we don't have otc police patrolling every apiary, so for now it's easy enough for rouge beekeepers to 'work around' the law.


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## AHudd

I wonder if the vet is prescribing a springtime preventative treatment only for apiaries that have had confirmed cases.

Alex


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## msl

I don't have time for a full response, you will find most of your answers here 




> *§ 558.6 Veterinary feed directive drugs.*
> 
> (a) _General requirements related to veterinary feed directive (VFD) drugs._
> (1) Animal feed bearing or containing a VFD drug or a combination VFD drug (a VFD feed or combination VFD feed) may be fed to animals only by or upon a lawful VFD issued by a licensed veterinarian.
> (2) A VFD feed or combination VFD feed must not be fed to animals after the expiration date on the VFD.
> (3) Use and labeling of a VFD drug or a combination VFD drug in feed is limited to the approved, conditionally approved, or indexed conditions of use. Use of feed containing this veterinary feed directive (VFD) drug in a manner other than as directed on the labeling (extralabel use) is not permitted.
> (4) All involved parties (the veterinarian, the distributor, and the client) must retain a copy of the VFD for 2 years. The veterinarian must retain the original VFD in its original form (electronic or hardcopy). The distributor and client copies may be kept as an electronic copy or hardcopy.
> (5) All involved parties must make the VFD and any other records specified in this section available for inspection and copying by FDA upon request.
> (6) All labeling and advertising for VFD drugs, combination VFD drugs, and feeds containing VFD drugs or combination VFD drugs must prominently and conspicuously display the following cautionary statement: “Caution: Federal law restricts medicated feed containing this veterinary feed directive (VFD) drug to use by or on the order of a licensed veterinarian.”
> 
> (b) _Responsibilities of the veterinarian issuing the VFD._
> (1) In order for a VFD to be lawful, the veterinarian issuing the VFD must:
> 
> (i) Be licensed to practice veterinary medicine; and
> (ii) Be operating in the course of the veterinarian's professional practice and in compliance with all applicable veterinary licensing and practice requirements, including issuing the VFD in the context of a veterinarian-client-patient relationship (VCPR) as defined by the State. If applicable VCPR requirements as defined by such State do not include the key elements of a valid VCPR as defined in § 530.3(i) of this chapter, the veterinarian must issue the VFD in the context of a valid VCPR as defined in § 530.3(i) of this chapter.
> (2) The veterinarian must only issue a VFD that is in compliance with the conditions for use approved, conditionally approved, or indexed for the VFD drug or combination VFD drug.
> (3) The veterinarian must ensure that the following information is fully and accurately included on the VFD:
> 
> (i) The veterinarian's name, address, and telephone number;
> (ii) The client's name, business or home address, and telephone number;
> (iii) The premises at which the animals specified in the VFD are located;
> (iv) The date of VFD issuance;
> (v) The expiration date of the VFD. This date must not extend beyond the expiration date specified in the approval, conditional approval, or index listing, if such date is specified. In cases where the expiration date is not specified in the approval, conditional approval, or index listing, the expiration date of the VFD must not exceed 6 months after the date of issuance;
> (vi) The name of the VFD drug(s);
> (vii) The species and production class of animals to be fed the VFD feed;
> (viii) The approximate number of animals to be fed the VFD feed by the expiration date of the VFD. The approximate number of animals is the potential number of animals of the species and production class identified on the VFD that will be fed the VFD feed or combination VFD feed at the specified premises by the expiration date of the VFD;
> (ix) The indication for which the VFD is issued;
> (x) The level of VFD drug in the VFD feed and duration of use;
> (xi) The withdrawal time, special instructions, and cautionary statements necessary for use of the drug in conformance with the approval;
> (xii) The number of reorders (refills) authorized, if permitted by the drug approval, conditional approval, or index listing. In cases where reorders (refills) are not specified on the labeling for an approved, conditionally approved, or index listed VFD drug, reorders (refills) are not permitted;
> *(xiii) The statement: “Use of feed containing this veterinary feed directive (VFD) drug in a manner other than as directed on the labeling (extralabel use) is not permitted.”;*
> (xiv) An affirmation of intent for combination VFD drugs as described in paragraph (6) of this section; and
> (xv) The veterinarian's electronic or written signature.
> (4) The veterinarian may, at his or her discretion, enter the following information on the VFD to more specifically identify the animals authorized to be treated/fed the VFD feed:
> 
> (i) A more specific description of the location of animals (_e.g.,_ by site, pen, barn, stall, tank, or other descriptor that the veterinarian deems appropriate);
> (ii) The approximate age range of the animals;
> (iii) The approximate weight range of the animals; and
> (iv) Any other information the veterinarian deems appropriate to identify the animals specified in the VFD.
> (5) For VFDs intended to authorize the use of an approved, conditionally approved, or indexed combination VFD drug that includes more than one VFD drug, the veterinarian must include the drug-specific information required in paragraphs (b)(3)(vi), (ix), (x), and (xi) of this section for each VFD drug in the combination.
> (6) The veterinarian may restrict VFD authorization to only include the VFD drug(s) cited on the VFD or may expand such authorization to allow the use of the cited VFD drug(s) along with one or more over-the-counter (OTC) animal drugs in an approved, conditionally approved, or indexed combination VFD drug. The veterinarian must affirm his or her intent regarding combination VFD drugs by including one of the following statements on the VFD:
> 
> (i) “This VFD only authorizes the use of the VFD drug(s) cited in this order and is not intended to authorize the use of such drug(s) in combination with any other animal drugs.”
> (ii) “This VFD authorizes the use of the VFD drug(s) cited in this order in the following FDA-approved, conditionally approved, or indexed combination(s) in medicated feed that contains the VFD drug(s) as a component.” [List specific approved, conditionally approved, or indexed combination medicated feeds following this statement.]
> (iii) “This VFD authorizes the use of the VFD drug(s) cited in this order in any FDA-approved, conditionally approved, or indexed combination(s) in medicated feed that contains the VFD drug(s) as a component.”
> (7) The veterinarian must issue a written (nonverbal) VFD.
> (8) The veterinarian must send a copy of the VFD to the distributor via hardcopy, facsimile (fax), or electronically. If in hardcopy, the veterinarian must send the copy of the VFD to the distributor either directly or through the client.
> (9) The veterinarian must provide a copy of the VFD to the client.
> 
> (c) _Responsibilities of any person who distributes an animal feed containing a VFD drug or a combination VFD drug._
> (1) The distributor is permitted to fill a VFD only if the VFD contains all the information required in paragraph (b)(3) of this section.
> (2) The distributor is permitted to distribute an animal feed containing a VFD drug or combination VFD drug only if it complies with the terms of the VFD and is manufactured and labeled in conformity with the approved, conditionally approved, or indexed conditions of use for such drug.
> (3) The distributor must keep records of the receipt and distribution of all medicated animal feed containing a VFD drug for 2 years.
> (4) In addition to other applicable recordkeeping requirements found in this section, if the distributor manufactures the animal feed bearing or containing the VFD drug, the distributor must also keep VFD feed manufacturing records for 1 year in accordance with part 225 of this chapter. Such records must be made available for inspection and copying by FDA upon request.
> (5) A distributor of animal feed containing a VFD drug must notify FDA prior to the first time it distributes animal feed containing a VFD drug. The notification is required one time per distributor and must include the following information:
> 
> (i) The distributor's complete name and business address;
> (ii) The distributor's signature or the signature of the distributor's authorized agent; and
> (iii) The date the notification was signed.
> (6) A distributor must also notify FDA within 30 days of any change in ownership, business name, or business address.
> (7) The notifications cited in paragraphs (c)(5) and (6) of this section must be submitted to the Food and Drug Administration, Center for Veterinary Medicine, Division of Animal Feeds (HFV-220), 12225 Wilkins Ave., Rockville, MD 20852, Fax: 240-453-6882, or email (via attachment): _[email protected]._
> (8) A distributor is permitted to distribute a VFD feed to another distributor only if the originating distributor (consignor) first obtains a written (nonverbal) acknowledgment letter, as defined in § 558.3(b)(11), from the receiving distributor (consignee) before the feed is shipped. Consignor distributors must retain a copy of each consignee distributor's acknowledgment letter for 2 years.


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## squarepeg

understood. i'm not trolling for any answers.

the link is the same or similar to what i believe we looked at in the 'preventative antibiotics' thread.

to the best of my understanding everything i purport on this forum should be in agreement with the u.s. title 21 archive that msl links above, which is further elucidated in the official supporting documents from u.s. agencies with whom jurisdiction for enforcement of that code lies.


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## msl

squarepeg said:


> understood. i'm not trolling for any answers.


I didn't think you were.... I was trying to make a informative post and couldn't even get a proper sentence out..... working 95.5 hours in 5 days will do that to you, so I punted  




squarepeg said:


> to the best of my understanding everything i purport on this forum should be in agreement with the u.s. title 21 archive that msl links above


the points I was going after




squarepeg said:


> but my understanding is that the vfd now trumps the product label


I beleace that is not the case with a VFD, but can be done with a prescription (one of the ways they are diffrent)



> 21 CFR 558.6(b)(3)(xiii) The statement: “Use of feed containing this veterinary feed directive (VFD) drug in a manner other than as directed on the labeling (extralabel use) is not permitted.”;





> *§ 530.3 Definitions.*
> 
> (a) _Extralabel use_ means actual use or intended use of a drug in an animal in a manner that is not in accordance with the approved labeling. This includes, but is not limited to, use in species not listed in the labeling, use for indications (disease or other conditions) not listed in the labeling, use at dosage levels, frequencies, or routes of administration other than those stated in the labeling, and deviation from the labeled withdrawal time based on these different uses.


as for the "what if it gets in the honey", I get it, food is a scarcide trust

with a proper withdraw period its shoun.d be an issue and of corce the solution to poulstion is diloustion...

say ALL of the OTC was bad... and ALL of it made its way in to a single deep frame of honey.... that's 75mg per pound at a 8 pound spit ball
the cited case study was a woman who took a self prescribed 4000mg of bad OTC in 48 hours.. so to =her dose you would have to eat 50+pounds of honey in 48 hours...
sence most hives make much more than that, it seem to be not such a huge issue... just like the pestisides, miteasides, lead, etc that is found in honey

another way to look at it is if it all went in to the honey, you would have to eat the entire crop of 6+ hives in 48 hours to receive her dose...




squarepeg said:


> a spring treatment without active disease present would be consider preventative use, which the directive is designed to eliminate.


that's not how I read it, it was more about stemming the use non medical use and puting vets in charge of the medical use, to that end a new class was created taking what was "OTC drugs" and making them "VFD Drugs" witch has a different set of rules and labels then "prescription drugs"

Given the Tera pro labe is a VFD lable, its an up to date EPA lable an reflects its intended/approved use...
givein its used for AFB as well, witch it will never cure one can take its labeled use of "control" (N the restriction of an activity, tendency, or phenomenon. "pest control") at face value



this is very different wording then


https://www.fda.gov/media/73063/download




> Oxytetracycline Sheep Ration for Treatment of Bacterial Enteritis and Bacterial Pneumonia
> Type C Medicated Feed CAUTION: Federal law restricts medicated feed containing this veterinary feed directive (VFD) drug to use by or on the order of a licensed veterinarian.
> 
> For treatment of bacterial enteritis caused by Escherichia coli and bacterial pneumonia caused by Pasteurella multocida susceptible to oxytetracycline.
> 
> |DIRECTIONS FOR USE Feed continuously for 7-14 days as the sole ration.


Control VS Treatment very different wording
anyway, as you well know from personal expeance a out break of symptoms in one hive will rapidly cause spreading to the apiary and the sounding area, and even when treated a reemergence can and will often happen, and that hive is once again a threat to long standing genetics and resources

In a larger apiary that had an outbreak, its smart money to bet that in the 2nd year you will have to re treat a number of hives for symptoms (my expeance was 30%), and that the studies say there will be symptomless ones that are also spreading it.

on the "big guy side" its $150 for a 50lb bag of Terra-pro... 50X16 /3 one oz doses per hive... is 266 hives...
$1.13 per hive to follow the label with a spring and fall dose...

Now I am not saying this yard will then get a a 2023 fall treatment, far form it

but my expeance, the label, my vet, and the economics of the sustuation all say a spring dose is warranted .... much like putting a OA treatment on a new package, very little to lose, lots to gain, and the over all result is using less chemicals in the long run..
IE this year was the 1st time I used OTC on my bees sense 2018 , I put down a outbreak in a clubs yard in 2019 and they have been untreated since ( I later inherited the yard) , so it can and does work, sometimes in one shot, some times in 2, for the $0.60 per hive it seems cheaper and... yes sadly easer, and safer (I missed this latest out break blaming the drought, that can happen again) so 2 it is

all mistakes or perceived trespasses do to sleep deprivation or the I phone

forgot to add I learned form the vet there is a OTC/amitraz drug interaction, and they sould not be used together


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## Litsinger

Good write-up from the most recent ABJ:


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## squarepeg

Litsinger said:


> Good write-up from the most recent ABJ...


what an excellent article and unbiased review from a reputable scientist.

many thanks indeed for sharing that russ.

(all of the quotes below are attributable to dr. mcafee from her article, cite the pdf linked in post #118)

regarding the role of proximity drifting in the spread of efb:

"Only apiaries with no symptomatic colonies and which were > 0.62 miles from infected colonies did not carry the pathogen."

i.e. efb is highly communicable between neighboring apiaries, which is why some countries (not the u.s.) have instituted manditory destruction by burning when efb is detected. dr. mcafee discusses the strategy of isolating infected colonies to 'hospital yards' located a sufficient distance away from other colonies. i ask: what about unmanaged feral colonies that might be located near such a 'hospital yard'?

this comment speaks for itself:

"I desperately tried to manage it in place. As you might expect, this turned into a game of whack-a-mole, with different colonies popping up with symptoms as the season progressed. This turned that whole yard into a hospital in the end..."

it appears i am not the only one questioning the conventional wisdom regarding efb:

"Most best management practices include culling old frames or those containing infected larvae as part of managing a symptomatic colony, but some of my data suggests that might not be enough...

So, if you find yourself with a colony presenting with EFB, removing only the worst-looking infected combs is still going to leave a substantial disease burden in the colony...

I would rather shake the bees onto foundation and treat them with antibiotics to give them the best chance of overcoming the disease."

i agree with dr. mcafee and remain in the burn baby burn camp:

"In light of this hardiness, managing equipment taken from symptomatic hives becomes even more important. When in doubt of how to best sterilize it, burn it, or you might be burning a lot more in your future. EFB might not always be a death sentence, but it can linger and show up year after year if it isn’t taken seriously."


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## msl

msl said:


> Now the fun stuff, I found patient zero, her and her splits this year are symptomatic while most of the other questionably ones aren't showing signs, but failed to build up..
> back story, I am the 3rd keeper for this program in resent years
> reaching back in time, last time the denver metro area saw an out break (2019, was a bad year USA wide) I had talked to the previous keeper in passing and they felt they were seeing the systomes I was talking about... later said they tested and all was fine.... but now I wonder.....


the plot thickens
little more back ground...the old beekeeper had run some of there hives on the property and a 3rd party I kept a few hives an a queen bank there for a retail store

I was recently gifted 2 colony's and wood wear that had been sold from this yard by the past keeper
today was the 1st inspection









I guess I can't rule out some on torching the gear in a OA vaporizer accident
but it makes one think


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## squarepeg

i'm with you msl, that appears to have been done with a propane torch.

how are your efb remediation efforts coming along?

elmer_fud, are you able to provide us with an update now that you are 3 months into your remediation efforts?


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## elmer_fud

msl said:


> I guess I can't rule out some on torching the gear in a OA vaporizer accident
> but it makes one think


I got annoyed with mold on one of my inner covers once and burned it off. Another possiblity, but much less likely.


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## elmer_fud

squarepeg said:


> i'm with you msl, that appears to have been done with a propane torch.
> 
> how are your efb remediation efforts coming along?
> 
> elmer_fud, are you able to provide us with an update now that you are 3 months into your remediation efforts?


so far my hives look ok. I am not seeing any more signs of EFB and they are starting to build back up. I started mite treatments a few weeks ago and am feeding both hives heavily to get them up to weight before winter. 

I am also going to go check the hive at my dads tomorrow. It seems to be clear of EFB but a bear hit it a few weeks ago and took out about an entire box of honey. This year has not gone well.


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## squarepeg

very glad to hear all is proceeding well with your colonies ef. many thanks for the update.

efb and afb are among those issues that some beekeepers don't like to share information about for a variety of reasons. we appreciate the openess that those contributing to this thread have shown.


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