# storing hive bodies/ wax moths



## justin (Jun 16, 2007)

hi all, i just brought home a ton of equipment i bought and am working on protecting it.i bought a retiring beekeeper out and so most if the equipment is used. i am storing hive bodies and need to keep wax moths out.when i picked them up they were stored with mothballs (yes i know) and would prefer not to repeat that. it seems like to much eqipment to spray with bt (130 double deeps and 630 supers) so i am thinking crystals. they are stacked in an old house on my property along one wall floor to ceiling. could i just tarp the whole area and add crystals randomly or do they need to be in each stack? does someone have a better idea, other than buying 130 nucs and getting them in use. i get the feeling that i am suddenly going to be asking alot of questions.thanks justin


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## tecumseh (Apr 26, 2005)

justin writes:
so i am thinking crystals. they are stacked in an old house on my property along one wall floor to ceiling. could i just tarp the whole area and add crystals randomly or do they need to be in each stack?

tecumseh:
in the stack. typically about ever 4 box or so toss down some newspaper and add maybe a quarter of a cup of crystals. stack to as high as you can reach. tight covers at the top and bottom of stack is best. wrap with a tarp or plastic. redo the whole process every 60 days or so.


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## Batman (Jun 7, 2009)

That's a lot of gear and too that I add, you're gonna be busy for awhile scorching boxes. Used equipment IMO is a risky thing from all the stuff I have read...AFB is nasty crap and if you buy 130 swarms of bees, your gonna be out a lot of $ if those hive bodies have it in there.
I bought some used equipment for my first hive when a swarm rolled in, once I had a chance to start reading up on my new found hobby, AFB scared the crap outta me, still does. I constantly worry that its gonna raise it's evil head in that hive. Saw one article that said AFB can stay dormant in a hive for up to 50 years. Multiple articles say scorch the boxes with a torch to kill the spores before you use used equipment and start with completely fresh frames.


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## justin (Jun 16, 2007)

the beekeeper that i am buying them from treated for afb. the treatments were on the hives( i am also buying 47 live hives from him) when i went to inspect his operation. he also treated for mites etc...my plan is to use my 4 hives and his 47 to eventually have the 180 hives going. thanks


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## mttfleetwood (Jun 23, 2009)

Hello,

I store all my boxes in a 48 foot tractor trailer and treat about once every 3 weeks with phostoxin. It is a gas that is used in grain bins and is safe to use with food products. phostoxin is cheap and easy to use, but dangerous. You must be sure not to breath the gas. It will kill everything in the building. It is easy to use because all you do is pour some out (comes in pellet form in a sealed container) and shut the door.


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## summer1052 (Oct 21, 2007)

_phostoxin . . . is a gas that is used in grain bins and is *safe *to use with food products. _

_phostoxin is . . . *dangerous*. You must be sure not to breath the gas. It* will kill everything *in the building . . . _

 :scratch: :s

I think I'd reconsider that . . .

Summer


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## tecumseh (Apr 26, 2005)

you took the words right out of my mouth summer...

cyanide, methyl bromide, etc, etc would all seem to conform to this thinking...

oftentime the longer term problem with whatever chemical treatment you might use for wax moth is the absorbtion of chemical into the wax itself. since wax is wax no treatment is likely to get an absolutely clean bill of health.


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## Flyman (Jun 11, 2007)

Although the above descriptions of Phostoxin sound bad, it is one of the safer chemicals as far as residue goes. I would go out on a limb and say that every kernel of grain in the US has been exposed to Phostoxin. It is used very heavily by grain producers in all stages of production up to milling. 

This chemical is an oxygen depleter. That is, it drives the oxygen from the air in the ENCLOSED space in which it is released. This is why it is used in grain bins, box trailers, cargo containers, etc. It comes in an aluminum container that is tightly sealed. Upon exposure to moisture in the air, the reaction begins pretty quickly and Phosgene gas is released. The item to be treated must be in a relatively airtight box, like a shipping container (the kind used for overseas transport) that can be closed and access sealed for 24 hrs.

For anybody considering using it.....it is a controlled access chemical and available only to certified pesticide applicators. Sometimes the availability control on a chemical is BS, on this one it is not. It is a Skull and Crossbones, danger chemical. It WILL kill you if not respected. As stated above, it will kill everything in the treatment area or anything that breathes the gas. Although the target is usually weevils, worm larvae, etc., it will kill dogs, cats, mice, rats, crickets, humans, you get the idea.....anything that uses oxygen for survival. The beauty of it is that after the gas disipates, there is no residual evidence (except dead stuff, of course). Don't know of any study that found the chemical residue in a food stuff.

I have applied it with little problem when I worked with a grain farmer for several years. If I used this for beehives, I would build a special room or building, separate from anything else, so there was no chance of fumes getting into a living area or area that people could get in during the fumigation period.


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## Tom G. Laury (May 24, 2008)

Justin if you are going to keep on keeping you will need a storage room or building suitable for fumigating, in other words easy to move in & out of and also pretty airtight. Phostoxin even kills eggs, very effective and SAFE if used properly. Kind of expensive though and you need a license to purchase. You can also burn sulphur which will scavenge all the oxygen also. 
On the other hand, if you store them outside, on warehouse pallets with slats, (no plywood bottoms), with no covers, the adult moth will not find them very attractive.


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## 11x (May 14, 2009)

why not moth balls?? i use the moth ball flakes. should i stop using these?


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## Flyman (Jun 11, 2007)

Although the packaging is very similar and the same manufacturer (at least at Wal-Mart) moth balls are made of Naptha. Only the crystals are PDB (paradichlorobenzene). Naptha will not disipate like PDB and you may not be able to use the frames. The bees do not like naptha or it's residue. Learned this the hard way:doh:.


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## mttfleetwood (Jun 23, 2009)

I have used moth crystals for many years. It works. But it only works for a few weeks. It cost a lot of money. It is very labor intesive. Phostoxin is used on every grain of food that you eat, and has been for many years. This chemical was invented by the germans and was what was used in the Gas chambers in WW11. It cost about $20 for a bottle. I use 1/2 a bottle on 1500 supers. This will last about 1 month. There is no unstacking and restacking. All you do is pour half the bottle on a tray and close the door. Moth crystals were costing me several hundred dollars every month and a lot of work. This chemical is great but demands respect. Be careful.


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## Countryboy (Feb 15, 2009)

Phostoxin is commonly sold under the name PhosFume. It is aluminum phosphide. It reacts with water to form a toxic gas.

This is a restricted use pesticide. You have to be licensed to be able to buy it. The normal pesticide certification farmers have is for spraying pesticides. You have to have another level of certification to get this stuff. (But I have known farmers without the proper certification who were able to get it to fumigate groundhogs with it.)

According to this, it will kill Africanized bees and honeybees. This is NOT the kind of chemical I want being absorbed into my combs.
http://www.douglasproducts.com/agriculture/product_details.aspx?rid=4


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## tecumseh (Apr 26, 2005)

flyman writes:
Phosgene gas is released. The item to be treated must be in a relatively airtight box, like a shipping container (the kind used for overseas transport) that can be closed and access sealed for 24 hrs.

tecumseh:
this would be the same nerve gas use in wwI?

if one was determined to use a container for storage and treating comb how would you know if the box was airtight? is there any way to know?

then flyman adds:
the idea.....anything that uses oxygen for survival. The beauty of it is that after the gas disipates, there is no residual evidence (except dead stuff, of course). Don't know of any study that found the chemical residue in a food stuff.

tecumseh:
grain and comb may represent different problems. how would you know if of if not any residue was left in the wax of the comb.

the seperated gasing facilites is something like the one we used during my 'commercial days' (just a bit north of you). at the time we used methyl bromide which (if memory ain't too fogged) worked in much the same way to rob the atmosphere of oxygen.


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## snarky (Oct 6, 2006)

I think it was originally produced under the trade name "Zyklon B"


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## Flyman (Jun 11, 2007)

tecumseh Writes:
this would be the same nerve gas use in wwI?

Flyman says: Yes, it would. My grandfather suffered the effects of this gas in that war.

Tecumseh Writes:

if one was determined to use a container for storage and treating comb how would you know if the box was airtight? is there any way to know?

Flyman says: no way to know really......just more effective if all the vapors are contained.

tecumseh:
grain and comb may represent different problems. how would you know if of if not any residue was left in the wax of the comb.

Flyman: no way of knowing unless somebody does a study of beeswax. I DO know that if it is a grain or grain derivative.....you have eaten a product treated with Phostoxin.


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## Brent (Jun 22, 2009)

One of the Commercial Bee Guys in my area puts his comb up with honey residual still on it after extraction. Its in a airtight building and he uses Phosgene to fume the building. He then gives the sticky comb to his colonies in the spring for feeding/cleanup. I dont know of any problems he has had using it.


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## Tom G. Laury (May 24, 2008)

You don't need "another level" of certification to buy phostoxin, just the lowest level.

$20 a bottle? In Cal it's $130. 

There is no residual toxin. Even the dust left over in the pan can be discarded without danger.


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## Flyman (Jun 11, 2007)

Agree with Tom....about 130 a can here for about 2-3 lbs.


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## Countryboy (Feb 15, 2009)

_You don't need "another level" of certification to buy phostoxin, just the lowest level._

A farmer I knew had the certifications to buy herbicides and insecticides for spraying. He told me that for him to buy PhosFume legally, he needed to get the certification for fumigating grain bins. His basic certification wasn't good enough.

I helped him when I was laid off. One of my jobs was fumigating groundhogs. Run a chunk of garden hose down a groundhog hole, and bury around the hose with dirt. Drop 10 pellets down the hose, and then pour a quart of water or so down the hole, and then pull the hose out and move on to the next hole. In hot dry weather, about 50% would dig out. If you did it right after a rain, or it rained right after you did it, you had about a 90% success rate.

I don't recall how much it cost back then for the can. (a few years ago) I'm thinking 10 pellets was 25 cents. The cans were aluminum and about the same shape and size as the old quart milk bottles.

Just opening the can to get the pellets out would make you nauseous if the can was open very long or you had it open very many times. That stuff is just plain nasty. I wouldn't use it on any of my bee equipment.


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## Michael Bush (Aug 2, 2002)

I store them on the hives where the bees can guard them until the weather turns cold and kills the wax moths and then I stack them in the beeyard next to the hives.


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## beedeetee (Nov 27, 2004)

Pesticide applicator's licenses are issued state by state so it is possible that one state might have a couple of levels of license. I had mine in Oregon and there was only one that I saw. The next level was the license to sell pesticides. I suppose it is possible that there were things that I couldn't have got, but none that I know of.

By the way, I stack my supers on a few layers of newspapers, put a paper plate with a tablespoon of crystals on top and then add a lid. Repeat for the next stack. I actually only do this once per year since by the time the crystals are gone I think that the wax moth season around here is over. I would suspect the same in Montana.


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## justin (Jun 16, 2007)

micheal when you store them in the beeyard do you have mice problems? i could stack them on the drip boards which might mouse proof them. wouldn't some of them get partially filled after you extract? we have some tanzy type flowers that seem to keep producing even after the cold weather hits.or does it get robbed out after you stack em? thanks


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## Michael Bush (Aug 2, 2002)

>micheal when you store them in the beeyard do you have mice problems? 

Of course.  I have to try to keep the mice out, which means a bottom board and a lid. My bottom boards have no entrance so that's not an issue and my tops I can flip over if I like so there is no entrance, but I don't. I figure the bees can swarm into them if they like and once in a while they do. But actually there is no heat so the mice aren't THAT interested in them.

>i could stack them on the drip boards which might mouse proof them. 

That should work.

>wouldn't some of them get partially filled after you extract?

I don't extract until it's pretty late in the season. If they fill them, I'll extract them again.

> we have some tanzy type flowers that seem to keep producing even after the cold weather hits.or does it get robbed out after you stack em? 

I try to have them clean and dry when I stack them.


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## odfrank (May 13, 2002)

Michael Bush said:


> I store them on the hives where the bees can guard


That's what I would do. Sort the blond comb for storage and stack the black comb on hives.:thumbsup:


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## KQ6AR (May 13, 2008)

I had to get papers from my county agg, just to buy apiguard.
Thats all I can purchase, & I can only use it in my own beeyard.
I also have to give an anual report of all applications.
California's strict on thyme



beedeetee said:


> Pesticide applicator's licenses are issued state by state so it is possible that one state might have a couple of levels of license. I had mine in Oregon and there was only one that I saw. The next level was the license to sell pesticides. I suppose it is possible that there were things that I couldn't have got, but none that I know of.
> 
> By the way, I stack my supers on a few layers of newspapers, put a paper plate with a tablespoon of crystals on top and then add a lid. Repeat for the next stack. I actually only do this once per year since by the time the crystals are gone I think that the wax moth season around here is over. I would suspect the same in Montana.


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## Budvar (Feb 5, 2008)

I was reading somewhere on beesource about after the freeze (either natural or with a freezer), spray comb with Bacillus thuringiensis (Bt). It sure sounds a lot safer than than what I've just been reading the last three pages. 

anyone else try Bt, and what was your storage method after?

Thanks!

Chris,
Burbank, Wa.


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## Ravenseye (Apr 2, 2006)

Hi Chris,

I spray mine with BT and then store them up in the barn. It gets mighty cold there during the winter. I've never had a problem with wax moths yet.


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## Michael Bush (Aug 2, 2002)

I have used Bt and it worked well. But if you let the bees guard them until a hard freeze and then take them off and keep the mice out of them that works fine in my climate.


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## schmism (Feb 7, 2009)

is there something wrong with going through all the equipment and pulling out the old frames that need to be culled anyway and getting rid of it. (solar melter)

advertise with the local bee club that you have some equipment to sell. (you really foresee using all the equipment?)

Significantly reduce the number of drawn frames your going to keep around so that its less to manage.


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## justin (Jun 16, 2007)

i do plan on using all the equipment. thanks for all the great advise. justin


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