Omlet Smart Autodoor - New in box

[MedusA]

Having so far been unable to get hold of our local Bee Inspector (who is a member of our local BKA) or our BKA apiary manager, I have a situation that I need urgent help with please.

 

My friend and I have a shared apiary and one of the colonies is not right. This colony was, like all the others, treated for varroa in the Autumn and went into the winter apparantly healthy. But now I think (never seen it before) they have a severe case of one of the bee paralysis viruses. We did a quick inspection yesterday and there were thousands of dead bees littering the OMF, which we disposed of. Although there are encouraging signs of brood at all stages, the colony is really tiny (on 3-4 frames) and the bees appear dark in colour, very shaky and trembly and are not crawling about "normally".

 

My questions are:

 

Do we need to get a varroa treatment on ASAP?

 

Is there anything else we can do practically or treatment-wise?

 

Is there a risk of these bees transmitting it to our (seemingly) healthy other colonies in the apiary and if so, what do we do about preventing spread?

 

We really would appreciate your advice.

[Olly]

Sorry, I can't help on this - RAB would be the best person on here to answer this. Is there anyone else in your local group you could contact? The only thing I would say is that I wouldn't put varroa treatment on until you've had someone else look at it - they sound pretty sick and that might stress them a bit too much.

 

What a shock - please let us know when you've found out a bit more, that sounds very worrying.

[Guest]

OK, my take.

 

Neither know how many colonies there might be in this apiary nor the position of the colony wrt the others, so might be a different decision dependant on that. Further, one really needs to see the bees to make a 'better informed' decision as opposed to a guess.

 

Bee inspector - yes. He/she would be the obvious choice for a diagnosis. If you were to leave a message of possible foul brood they would respond very quickly, so I am surprised you are unable to make contact, or get a response to a message. There will be others in your LBKA who could help.

 

As a weak colony, it is obviously under severe stress, trying to support brood, keeping the nest warm, possibly been severely affected by varroa, damp conditions, etc, etc.

 

If the colony were not flying in the warm weather, the prognosis would not be good. These bee viruses can be debilitating, like a dose of the 'flu for us, and they recover but are very much weakened for some time. Or they will eventually succumb and die anyway.

 

If it were mine it would probably be gone - too small to build up quickly and not healthy to unite with healthy bees.

 

RAB

[MedusA]

Thanks to Olly for the support and to RAB for the advice.

 

There are 4 colonies in an apiary enclosure 5m X 5m. They are a few metres apart from each other. The other 3 are all seemingly well (thriving in fact, with supers on already).

 

I have now managed to get hold of one of the other experienced beekeepers from our BKA. I thought I'd put his advice on here in case it's helpful to any other beekeepers. He has advised me to close down the entrance to about 1/2 inch, keep feeding them and to take a sample of 50 bees in a matchbox to him. He will take a look under the microscope and let me know what's next.

 

If the colony builds up it may get over this but if not, we may need to destroy them. As he said though "One step at a time".

 

I'll keep posting updates.

[Olly]

Thanks for posting an update, that's really helpful advice for anyone else with thus problem. Hope you can identify what it is.

[Old Speckled Hen]

MedusA, bad news.....I hope you get this sorted out.

My strongest colony into the winter.....I even robbed a frame of stores from them to help out a weaker one.... has come out the weakest. While the other two are flying well this one is much more subdued. I had a quick look in and they are on four frames with only a small amount of brood....not patchy though. Queen looks rather skinny. I'm going to move them into a poly nuc. I tested for nosema and found nothing. Lidl do a good little microscope or you could get a cheap USB one off ebay. It is really an easy test to do and something that maybe we should all be testing for three or four times a year.

If they had been infected I would have treated now.

I'm not saying nosema is the cause but all these bee diseases working together might kill a colony whereas one alone would not.

PS the advice to let your bee inspector know that you suspect foulbrood is a good one. He/she would be over like a shot!!!!

Let us know how you get on.

[Daphne]

My neighbour lost a colony last winter to nosema - I believe there it leaves physical traces as its commonly known as bee dysentary? I hope you get it identified and a plan of action underway.

[MedusA]

Well I got my sample. When I looked in the hive, even though it was only a few days since I last looked, the picture actually looked much better in that loads of healthy new spring brood appear to have hatched, there is plenty more brood in there and the dark shaky bees seemed a lot fewer. I felt quite encouraged.

 

I still followed the advice I'd been given and closed down the entrance to 1/2 inch and took a sample. In a way I was pleased as my previous attempts at getting a sample when I was practising for my BBKA Basic were laughable. At least I got a good number this time.

 

I've given them to our apiary deputy manager and he says he can't see anything obvious, just from looking at them, but he will examine them. If it is a virus he won't be able to tell me, but he will be able to rule out Nosema or Acarine. One other suggestion was that the colony may have been poisoned by treated forage. He should be able to tell me that too.

 

I've got to phone him next week, so I'll post more then.

[Daphne]

Hope it goes well for you. I was thinking about you this afternoon as we opened our hives to find the 'best' one last year seems to be queenless (at least we can't see any eggs), we may have a bit of acarine, and my co-beek got stung 3 times (new gloves!) We felt a bit despondent so abandoned any more searching and had tea and a viennese whirl instead We'll get hold of our mentor for a bit of advice.

[Old Speckled Hen]

Fingers crossed.

I supered my strongest hive. I too couldn't find the queen...I so wanted to mark her...but there were eggs.

There were bees in the remnant of the fondant into which they'd built comb. I bloomin well hope she wasn't there. I should have shaken the lot of them into the brood box but I was inspecting on my own and trying to remember all the things I'd planned to do. Never mind, it will be sorted later if needs be.

There were good stores in the brood, too good, so I bruised the cappings hoping they'll move them upstairs to the super which has some drawn frames......what a luxury compared to last year.

[MedusA]

The verdict appears to be that the colony had a heavy dose of Nosema.

 

The good news is that they are doing fine now. They even have a super on. I might try Vita Feed Gold in the autumn feed this year as that's supposed to be good against Nosema yet is still considerd suitable for organic beekeeping.

[Old Speckled Hen]

MedusA

Thymol in the autumn syrup is good for protecting against nosema.

I have a recipe (somebody else's, though) if you want it.

[MedusA]

Thanks OSH. I already add Thymol to all my syrup feeds as it also stops it going mouldy. Just wanted some extra protection for next winter.

[Old Speckled Hen]

I already add Thymol to all my syrup feeds as it also stops it going mouldy.

 

The concentration for nosema is higher than that to stop the solution going mouldy

 

30g of thymol crystals dissolved in 150 of surgical spirit or isopropyl alcohol.........will keep indefinately and you add up to five ml of this per gallon of syrup feed,or if to simply stop fermentation 5ml per 3 gallons.

Problem with the above mixture is the oil tends to float on top of the syrup,and it is more effective if emulsified.

 

Emulsified thymol pre mix

 

30g thymol crystals placed in honey jar,add 5ml of isopropyl alcohol to the crystals,place jar into a water bath of boiling water to speed up the dissolving process.

In another jar pour in 140 ml of boiling water and add 1 teaspoon of lecithin granules, stir well,and place this jar into a water bath of boiling water,stirring often for abot ten minutes or so until most of the lecithin granules have dissolved,you can then strain this mixture through a teastrainer or similar to remove any granules that have not dissolved fully,then simply add the dissolved thymol to this mix,and shake well,will look just like a jar of milk.

To use add 5ml to each gallon of syrup and stir well,syrup will go milky

 

Hope this helps

 

There's also Nosevit from Vita which I had a look at at Stoneleigh.....looked interesting though I didn't buy any