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GENERAL BEEKEEPING - MAIN POSTING FORUM. / Re: What did you do in your Apiary/Bee yard today?

« Last post by Lesgold on Today at 05:23:56 am »

An interesting comment about sugar roll tests. We were told at a recent varroa course that sugar roll tests were fatal to bees but their death is slow and is not obvious. From memory they said that the bees spiracles were blocked by the powdered sugar and it took a few days for the bees to slowly die from suffocation. I have never heard of this before but have no reason to doubt what they are saying as they are experts in this field. I?m wondering if anyone has any information in relation to this area. Most of you on this forum deal with the pest on a daily and would be well informed on such things. I only perform alcohol wash tests as it is quicker and gives more accurate results which is important in the early stages of varroa spread.

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FARMING & COUNTRY LIFE / Re: Laser projects

« Last post by Lesgold on Today at 05:05:31 am »

Just another piece of machinery that every farmer should have.

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GENERAL BEEKEEPING - MAIN POSTING FORUM. / Re: What did you do in your Apiary/Bee yard today?

« Last post by beesnweeds on Today at 12:24:16 am »

Obviously, you have confidence in the sugar roll method but I have heard others express differing positions on it. I'd like to know more about the pros and cons on it.

I use Dawn dish detergent for a mite wash. 2 tbls. per gallon of water.  Sugar rolls are not accurate.  Just swirl the bees, dont shake or it gets too soapy.  Sampling 300 bees for 6 months is only 1800 bees per colony, thats nothing.  More bees die daily from attrition and the sampling saves hundreds of thousands of bees or more in my apiary.

What causes a brood break and how long do they last?

Splits, swarms, or forced brood breaks by caging the queen 14 days.  They last as long as there is no capped brood for mites to hide in for an OA treatment.

And lastly, we are still having spring here so our weather is above and below bee flying weather. What do they all do in there when they have no-fly days?

I use slatted racks, so on no fly days, or overnight, foragers will typically cluster under the rack unless its hot out, then they will cluster on the outside of the hive even in the rain.

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WEB VIDEOS / Re: Paul Harvey; News and Comments 1987

« Last post by gww on May 10, 2024, 11:51:16 pm »

I'm not mad about it but trump flip flopped on background checks and he flip flopped on tic toc and ect.  and lots of times he says two things at the exact same time so everybody can take what they want from it.  The dumb ones only take the part they want to hear and discount the rest being said.

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WEB VIDEOS / Re: Paul Harvey; News and Comments 1987

« Last post by Terri Yaki on May 10, 2024, 09:50:58 pm »

Trump is not perfect and he has rubbed me the wrong way a time or two and done some things that he shouldn't have but one thing that is undeniable is that his message has remained the same. He does not flip flop to appease any special interest groups.

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WEB VIDEOS / Paul Harvey; News and Comments 1987

« Last post by Ben Framed on May 10, 2024, 09:30:04 pm »

Is New York?s Donald Trump running for President?

https://youtube.com/shorts/qBKhix7kj3Y?si=GGHT0iFoTAp5FviA

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GENERAL BEEKEEPING - MAIN POSTING FORUM. / Re: What did you do in your Apiary/Bee yard today?

« Last post by The15thMember on May 10, 2024, 08:42:56 pm »

Obviously, you have confidence in the sugar roll method but I have heard others express differing positions on it. I'd like to know more about the pros and cons on it. Or the whys and why nots, however you want to put it.

A sugar roll is not as accurate as an alcohol wash, so I multiply my results by 1.3 to make up for that difference in accuracy.  I find the sugar roll easier and it doesn't require me to kill bees, so I prefer it.  I like to do sugar rolls regularly because I'm someone who likes data, but I'm honestly moving away from treating based on sugar roll numbers alone.  I'd rather treat colonies with high mite loads who also are showing signs of stress, because I'm trying to breed for not only resistant bees but resilient bees.  That's my take on it anyway. 

What causes a brood break and how long do they last?

   
Anything that causes the colony to be queenless, and therefore broodless, for long enough that all the capped brood has emerged causes a brood break.  In this case, the queen in this colony had become a drone layer over the winter, so I pulled her in my first inspection of the year, but for some reason it took several weeks of me adding donor frames of eggs before they made a new queen, and therefore their population got very low.  I debated combining them with someone else, but it's early enough in the season that I decided to just let them go. 

And lastly, we are still having spring here so our weather is above and below bee flying weather. What do they all do in there when they have no-fly days?

Well the bees who are of inside work age just do their inside work like always.  I'm not sure about foragers, but I'd guess they will sometimes just rest or maybe help with guard duty.  I opened a hive once on a rainy day, I can't remember why, and there was a cluster of bees just hanging on the underside of the lid, who I think were foragers just hanging out there because they couldn't go outside.

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GENERAL BEEKEEPING - MAIN POSTING FORUM. / Re: What did you do in your Apiary/Bee yard today?

« Last post by Terri Yaki on May 10, 2024, 08:15:35 pm »

Obviously, you have confidence in the sugar roll method but I have heard others express differing positions on it. I'd like to know more about the pros and cons on it. Or the whys and why nots, however you want to put it. What causes a brood break and how long do they last? And lastly, we are still having spring here so our weather is above and below bee flying weather. What do they all do in there when they have no-fly days?

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FARMING & COUNTRY LIFE / Re: Laser projects

« Last post by The15thMember on May 10, 2024, 07:12:42 pm »

A sign you're getting old, I guess ... finding things funny that seem normal to others ... I've been noticing many "new ones" over the years.

Just curious, but who else chuckled a little ...

When they saw "Laser Projects" under the category of "Farming and Country Life"?

Ha!  That is kind of funny.    It didn't strike me until you mentioned it though.

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GENERAL BEEKEEPING - MAIN POSTING FORUM. / Re: What did you do in your Apiary/Bee yard today?

« Last post by The15thMember on May 10, 2024, 06:59:49 pm »

I inspected most of my small colonies today.  Most needed another box, and I did a sugar roll in the largest colony and only 1/300 so that's good.  I was worried because the bees in there are kind of over-groomed looking, but I think it's just that they are old because this hive is coming off a brood break.  I also got some pictures of Queen Tiana.  I've never had a queen this dark.  I have several tiger-striped queens, but she is all black.  (Sorry the picture quality isn't better, I had my phone in a plastic baggie to protect it from propolis.)