Best course of action re treatment now ?

BrianO said:

Question, can I use Apinvert as the syrup base ?

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This makes it sound like you are mixing your own.

Which invites the question of how you plan to measure out the 5ml doses?

And how small a quantity of oxalic acid crystals you can measure accurately.
A kitchen scale, reading in 1 gram 'clicks', is barely good enough for measuring out 22.5 grams ... and that's actually more than you'll need.

Commercial invert syrup is NOT really a good choice for the syrup base - its too strong, and watering it down is a waste.

You need 50:50 syrup (sugar:water by weight).
Per 1000 g water + 1000 g sugar (makes more than a litre of syrup) you need to add 75 g of Oxalic.
Having made up a quantity of 50:50, you can take off a measured (smaller) amount of syrup and add a smaller amount of crystals.
To a litre of syrup, add 45 g crystals ...
... or to half a litre, add 22.5 g.

Unless you have a better scale, I wouldn't advise weighing out a smaller quantity of crystals - you will be inaccurate.
But if you mix 400g of sugar + 400g of warm water, discard some to leave you with exactly 500 ml of syrup and then add 22.5g of Oxalic, you should have more brew than you need for 3 hives & a nuc.

As previously mentioned, a helper to handle the coverboard makes things very quick and simple. The helper advances the board to cover up each seam of bees after that seam has been trickled. The beekeeper can concentrate on measuring out the next 5ml rather than on which seam it needs to go into - the edge of the coverboard 'points out' where he needs to go.

Thanks Itma

Appreciate the detailed reply.

Will be flying solo, as with all my beekeeping endeavours, so will have to keep an eye myself on the order of things when administering, and be as quick as possible to limit exposure to the elements.

You had said

To a litre of syrup, add 45 g crystals ...
... or to half a litre, add 22.5 g.

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Another online source said to do as below

I have a API-Bioxal sachet 35g . The plan a is to make up syrup 1:1 , Ikg of sugar dry to 1 Litre of water.... normal standard refined white sugar ??

Then using 500ml of syrup I dissolve the crystals in same,


If this I correct I high tail it over to both Apiary's keeping it warm ( room temp ! ) and admin 5ml per active occupied seam.

if you think I am missing anything would be grateful for a heads up, as want to do this right not having done before.

Cheers

Brian.

No - that's all correct. all the instructions specify 1 litre of water to 1 litre of sugar although slight variations won't matter as long as the quantities of acid to syrup are correct. Although i do think it's daft forking out a lot more for those sachets rather than just buying a Kilo of oxalic acid and weighing it out yourself.

Thanks

Daft ... agreed , live and learn, next year will do a lot of things differently , having learned and still learning.

thanks again

BrianO said:

Thanks

having learned and still learning.

thanks again

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We'e all in the same boat - the day you stop learning is the day you draw your last breath - and then you learn some more

It's interesting how V.treatment has evolved. Originally all we had were Bayvarol strips and now there is a cornucopia of treatments and techniques to chose from which can't be easy for new beeks

Thanks Guys, advice was of great help done and dusted ! Here's hoping it nukes those little Gits !

Questions

How long does the Oxalic remain active in relation to killing off varroa ?

How does it work, do the bees consume it in the form of the syrup ?

When dribbling onto bees , surely it must burn / damage them ?

Thanks

Bumpty Bump up up up

1/ A few days.
2/ Unknown mechanism, but effectiveness well proven - but against phoretic mites only.
3/ It doesn't - at the right strength.

You can buy some cheap scales that will measure reasonably small quantities on ebay have a look at these for about £6. They will be accurate enough.

Depending on your tap water, hard is bad, might be best to use deionised for the solutions. Otherwise you can get a cloudy solution where it appears as if you're Oxalic acid hasn't dissolved. It's a precipitate caused by interactions with the Calcium and Magnesium, doesn't really affect things, but can get you worried that something has gone wrong. If it all dissolves fine but it's only about a quid for 5 litres of deionized.

jewelry scales accurate to 0.001g of amazon did the trick for me. and don't bother buying deionized water just collect rain water in a plastic container job done.

I'm lazy, can't be bothered to collect the rain water. Figured a quid was cheaper than a rain but and diverter.

itma said:

1/ A few days.
2/ Unknown mechanism, but effectiveness well proven - but against phoretic mites only.
3/ It doesn't - at the right strength.

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1/ link?

3/ not the whole picture, it shortens bees lifespan, "hardens" the midgut, and treated colonies tend to be slightly smaller on average than similar untreated colonies come the spring.

Hopefully someone with more internet savvy than I will be along to provide links to relevant papers.

mbc said:

3/ not the whole picture, it shortens bees lifespan, "hardens" the midgut, and treated colonies tend to be slightly smaller on average than similar untreated colonies come the spring.

Hopefully someone [...] will be along to provide links to relevant papers.

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There's an interesting discussion on BeeSource http://www.beesource.com/forums/showthread.php?291406-Oxalic-Acid-Dribble

There's a link to some papers at the bottom of this page from Scientific Beekeeping. I have neither followed the links nor read the original papers http://scientificbeekeeping.com/oxalic-acid-questions-answers-and-more-questions-part-1-of-2-parts/

This bit is, I think, relevant to the question


I suppose the next questions are

• Does OA harm the bees more than if varroa isn't dealt with?
• Are other treatment options more bee friendly?

BeeJoyful said:

[*]Does OA harm the bees more than if varroa isn't dealt with?

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The varroa should be dealt with effectively in late summer, early autumn, then there is no need to use oxalic acid trickling at all during the winter.

Hivemaker. said:

The varroa should be dealt with effectively in late summer, early autumn,

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Yes yes....
Now ....the choice is thymol(apiguard,apilife,make your own) or sublimated oxalic
decisions decisions

Hivemaker. said:

The varroa should be dealt with effectively in late summer, early autumn, then there is no need to use oxalic acid trickling at all during the winter.

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If I may ask, what treatments do you use in late summer/early autumn?

Thymallus said:

If I may ask, what treatments do you use in late summer/early autumn?

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Oxalic sublimation and thymol pads.

Thymallus said:

If I may ask, what treatments do you use in late summer/early autumn?

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Search Hivemakers threads from October this year and you will find most of what you want there.