WARNING: Treatments and insulation

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The possibility exists, but it is something to consider, not to panic about.

Hive insulation (and colony strength for that matter) would seem to affect the rate of vaporisation of some 'treatments' and thus presumably the vapour concentration in the hive.
Hence my personal preference for just using a single MAQS strip in a polyhive.

But I think its unlikely to change the behaviour of contact miticides. With the bees being OK with these at brood nest temperature, I doubt that a warmer box (closer to, but still below brood temperature) would increase the toxicity to bees.

So, its quite possible that there are variances with some products, but, absent specific reports of specific problems, I don't think we should just assume that there is a general problem here.
Agreed, it would be preferable if the manufacturers would check their products in polyhives …
good points yes I chose my words carefully
for poly :

In the absence of specific info Caution is required, e.g. follow instructions carefully err on underdose and not one for the pot. Observe carefully. Dose only if required rather than prophylacticly

For PIR ... It's at another level to poly, that's why I chose another level of caution
 
good points yes I chose my words carefully
for poly :

In the absence of specific info Caution is required, e.g. follow instructions carefully err on underdose and not one for the pot. Observe carefully. Dose only if required rather than prophylacticly

For PIR ... It's at another level to poly, that's why I chose another level of caution

It's a balance: underdose risks not killing the mites. As per the link I posted, the Q is the LAST bee to be killed by thymol, so there will be signs of colony distress before the colony is endangered. More subtle effects of thymol are, I admit a, different matter. But dropping 1,100 mites today (in round numbers 3,000 to date, anyone who's counting, I am dam glad I put 2 trays on my double brood mite victim.

I'm pretty POed because at this level they must have come in with the colony and I was assured it had been properly treated but that's how it goes.
 
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It not even common to find poly hives used in any scientific trials for anything.

Basic varroa treatment tests were made by European Union Varroa Group in years 1997-2003. A researcher from Finland in the group was Seppo Korpela, and he uses polyhives. And Sweden too has Polyhives.

Honey Paw poly producer Nuutero Bee Farms have tested its own thymol products carefully and it has merely polyhives. He has over 1000 hives. Honey Paw has its own formic acid product too and it has been tested how to use it.
Derekm, it is your own idea that polyhives has not been used in scientific level tests.

Bees tend to keep same conditions in brood hive what ever the hive material is.

Thymol and formic acid gazifies. Oxalic does not depend on temperature. Those all work in different hive types and on different bottom board types.


Derekm, you speak about science, but you tend to put your own ideas on forum in serious issues, and that is far from science.

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Basic varroa treatment tests were made by European Union Varroa Group in years 1997-2003. A researcher from Finland in the group was Seppo Korpela, and he uses polyhives. And Sweden too has Polyhives.

Honey Paw poly producer Nuutero Bee Farms have tested its own thymol products carefully and it has merely polyhives. He has over 1000 hives. Honey Paw has its own formic acid product too and it has been tested how to use it.
Derekm, it is your own idea that polyhives has not been used in scientific level tests.

Bees tend to keep same conditions in brood hive what ever the hive material is.

Thymol and formic acid gazifies. Oxalic does not depend on temperature. Those all work in different hive types and on different bottom board types.


Derekm, you speak about science, but you tend to put your own ideas on forum in serious issues, and that is far from science.

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Show me the literature, i am very interested. I have asked academic researchers, i have asked people in the industry who have their products tested in various locations in Europe.
The thermal performance of the Honey Paw /Paradise honey hives I tested were some of those closest to wood, so its the one of the least likely to present an issue.
I dont presume to know all of the activation factors inside a hive. There are likely to be more factors than just the means of introduction.
Searches of the internet give few hits of research involving polystyrene or styrofoam hives, I keep looking, heres the few i ve found

Biological control of Varroa destructor by fungi Lonne Gerritsen & Bram Cornelissen (note: poly apidea)

The German bee monitoring project: a long term study
to understand periodically high winter losses of honey bee
colonies

Colony condition and bee behaviour in
honey bees (Apis mellifera) housed in
wooden or polystyrene hives and fed ‘bee cake’
or syrup


SELECTION FOR UNCAPPING OF VARROA INFESTED BROOD
CELLS IN THE HONEYBEE (
APIS MELLIFERA)

A simple trap to measure worker bee mortality in small test colonies (poly apidea)
 
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We have only insulated beehives where we treat mites at same time when we feed hives for winter. Then we have over 10 years old EU varroa group test results and recipes. They work in commercial and in hobby scale. Litterature does not help in varroa treatments.
Our main teacher of Finland in beekeeping has 1500 hives. He knows what recipes he writes to beekeepers.

Europe has tens on different hive types and different size hive volumes.

Timing of treatments is essential when mite pressure arises too high. Wrong timing gives big hive losses.
Treatment does not help if mites have allready violated winter brood too much.
 
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We have only insulated beehives where we treat mites at same time when we feed hives for winter. Then we have over 10 years old EU varroa group test results and recipes. They work in commercial and in hobby scale. Litterature does not help in varroa treatments.
Our main teacher of Finland in beekeeping has 1500 hives. He knows what recipes he writes to beekeepers.

Europe has tens on different hive types and different size hive volumes.

Timing of treatments is essential when mite pressure arises too high. Wrong timing gives big hive losses.
Treatment does not help if mites have allready violated winter brood too much.

I don't doubt a word of the above. as you say there are lots of types out there.The available polystyrene hive types vary enormously in performance . The effect of small details of beekeeping practice can completely destroy the available performance or even make it worse than wood. The insulated variable, if present at all , in almost all of the literature, is limited to a statement of "insulated " or "polystyrene".
If anyone has lots of examples to contrary, please, please, show me.
 
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Was the VITA manager talking about testing in the UK? I know they conducted a lot of trials of their new hop-based Varroa treatment in Greece. How do the in-hive environments in UK and Greece differ in wood/poly/PIR etc?
 
Was the VITA manager talking about testing in the UK? I know they conducted a lot of trials of their new hop-based Varroa treatment in Greece. How do the in-hive environments in UK and Greece differ in wood/poly/PIR etc?

He definitely mentioned it was the same for European testing...
How do the environments differ? I haven't found anything that quantitively measures them. That is the reason why I did my research ( in review now for six months) I could find no answers or trace of answers so I did my own measuring.
 
maqs had had no toxicology tests in polystyrene

from the maqs website
Subject: Polystyrene Hives
Q) I use Polystyrene Bee Hives in my operation, can I use MAQS beehive strips without it melting or having some obscure chemical reaction?
A) We haven’t done any exact testing on Polystyrene hives, however we did do some testing with pieces of the poly and found no chemical reaction. Looking at a Polystyrene data sheet it gives no indication that when in contact with formic acid there would be any melting or chemical reaction.

But as said above not unusual.
 
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TTLTB - I'm glad you posted this because I had a similar experience and cannot figure out what's happening.

I have two hives: On one, I had natural drops that the Beebase Varroa Calculator estimated meant I had 90 mites in the colony on 15 August, 190 on 4 September, 290 on 11 September. I started HM's Thymol treatment on 13 September and have counted 1450 mites to date as a result of the treatment. In the other hive, the highest estimate of mites in the colony was 150 but, following the start of treatment on 14 September, that colony has dropped 820 mites and still going. With both hives, the drop seems to have plateaued out or even started to reduce but they're both dropping about 200 a day.

Where have they all come from - were they all in the brood, waiting to emerge with the bees or did I do something wrong with the Beebase Varroa Calculator? Does the calculator only estimate phoretic mites? Is the calculator considered to be accurate and if not, what sort of safety factor should be used with its results? My figures suggest a need for a safety factor of 500% - i.e. if the BBVC says there are 100 mites in the colony, there may be as many as 500 - or have I missed something?

CVB

Further to my earlier post above, I'm now three days into the final phase of three two-week treatments using Hivemakers Thymol Varroa Treatment.

One hive has dropped 2500 mites so far and the other 1350. Both hives are now dropping between 20 and 10 mites per day, but the weather has been a bit cool over the last couple of days so that may affect the efficacy of the treatment. The question is, should I keep the treatment on for the full two weeks or until I no longer get a daily mite drop?

At some point, I'd like to give them some thymolated syrup but not sure about doing it with the Varroa pads in place - thymol overload?

Any thoughts?

CVB
 
The question is, should I keep the treatment on for the full two weeks or until I no longer get a daily mite drop?

The full two weeks, or maybe even a bit more - could still be mites tucked up in a sealed brood cell somewhere. Should really be four weeks for full effectiveness
 
The full two weeks, or maybe even a bit more - could still be mites tucked up in a sealed brood cell somewhere. Should really be four weeks for full effectiveness

I've already had 2 x 14 day treatments and this should be the last - today's drops were 10 and 5. So what about starting the thymolised syrup feed now or waiting for the end of the last 14 day treatment in 8/9 days?

Temperature here today was 17.9 degrees.

CVB
 
well if you've done the full four weeks plus a bit more - that should be enough. you're not very likely to get a nil drop - a few will survive regardless. don't get this obsessive counting of mites, just treat and carry on
 
So what about starting the thymolised syrup feed now or waiting for the end of the last 14 day treatment in 8/9 days?

Feed them at any time if they need it, feeding thymolated syrup and treating at the same time will be fine.
 
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