SHB invasion

[220]

Inspected the cut out I did a week ago, they have been tidying up the frames obviously pulling out loose bit of dirt and debris.
Squashed 3 SHB I saw in the first 2 boxes I removed, when I started removing frames from the bottom box I was greeted with this

Bottom board was covered with debris and crawling with SHB larvae, bees looked to be corralling them on the bottom board. There were walls of bees around solid clumps of larvae.
Don't know if I did the right thing but I put the frames into a new clean box and bottom board and took the infested box away and tipped into a container of oil. I went back and put in apithor beetle trap.
Only found 3 more SHB in the dirty box but there were 1000's of larvae, the hive is obviously stressed with being moved and given the comb transferred across is very dirty with small bits of timber etc through it there are plenty of places for SHB to hide and lay. I didn't see any SHB or larvae on any of the comb and the beetles I squashed were all on the boxes.

Queen was on the freshly drawn foundation frames I put in, there is a nice half moon of honey on the top and I think I could see freshly laid eggs towards the centre of the frame she was on.
There is still a bit of capped brood in the comb I have transferred across but the when I inspected 3 days ago the queen was on the fresh frames and again today so if she is laying it will be on the new clean frames
Thinking the best thing to do will be get rid of the old dirty comb as soon as possible, I don't have any drawn comb so would have to give them foundation.
There is a bit of honey in all the dirty frames with brood, if I remove these as the brood hatches what is the best way to get the bees to transfer the honey to fresh comb? The hive is about 1 mile from my other hives, would it be safe to simply uncap it and hope they transfer it or is the chance of starting a robbing frenzy to great.

[BeeMaster2]

When you do a cut out or even a complete inspection, you really stress out a hive and they SHBs detect it. They then have free range of the hive and start laying their eggs all over the hive while the bees are repairing the hive. It normally takes up to 3 days for the bees to do repairs. By then the SHB larvae are starting to hatch and the bees start removing them. You did good dumping the larvae into oil but next time just change the bottom board so that there is minimal stress. I would not worry about the rest of the frames as long as it is a strong hive and they are not being stressed again they will be fine.
Jim

[Acebird]

The junk in the bottom of a hive is food for all kinds of larvae that is why I like SBB's so I can clean it out and see what is happening.  This works up here in the north.  I am not sure how well it works in the south but I think it would be an advantage temporarily for a cut out.  Cleaning the bottom tray does not stress the bees.

[BeeMaster2]

Brian,
Oil trays work real well here in the south. I kill thousands of SHBs when I put oil in them and even when they are dry, I open them up and either play wap a do or if heavy, I will vacuum them up. If i put oil in all of my hives I seriously knock down the local SHB population.
Jim

[220]

Im short on gear so these are in 5 frame nuc boxes I made. All my nuc bottom boards are attached to boxes.
Has anyone put SBB on nucs?
I do have SBB on a couple of my hives, SHB doesn't seem to be a problem on any of my other hives, I did find a few beetles in the oil of one in the week after I installed them but are yet to see a live beetle during any of my hive inspections.
The same hive that had the SHB in the oil tray were quite aggressive and I noticed what  originally thought were SHB larvae appearing in the oil regularly, after I discovered one boring into the top bar of a frame under a propolised dome I realised they were wax moth larvae.
The bees seem to have them under control, I haven't had any in the oil for a few weeks and the bees have calmed right down.

Im new to bees but it is obvious early that the bees can take care of most situations themselves. Should have taken some pics yesterday of the bees corralling the SHB larvae, when I removed the frames there were half circles of bees on the box walls around the clumps of SHB larvae on the bottom board. They were obviously holding them on the bottom board to prevent them getting to frames. Quite dedicated to their work, left them while I put the hive back together and they were all still there when I finished. I had to brush them out of the box before I could take it away.




 

[GSF]

All that happened in a week?

[Oldbeavo]

Does any one find that if the hive is well ventilated that SHB don't seem to build up.
We run a floor vent 2" wide across the bottom of the brood box and also have 1'' dia vents in each end of the lid.
We only ever find 2 or 3 beetles at the most in a hive.
Is SHB more of a problem in the humid areas rather than dry climates such as Texas?

[Dallasbeek]

Does any one find that if the hive is well ventilated that SHB don't seem to build up.
We run a floor vent 2" wide across the bottom of the brood box and also have 1'' dia vents in each end of the lid.
We only ever find 2 or 3 beetles at the most in a hive.
Is SHB more of a problem in the humid areas rather than dry climates such as Texas?

That's a good question, but you're assuming Texas is dry. Parts of Texas, like parts of Australia, are very humid.  I guess you'd have to have bees in both environments to notice a difference.  Anybody know of any scientific studies on this?

[Oldbeavo]

I spoke to a Northern Australian bee keeper who has semi tropical weather and is continually having hives wiped out by SHB.
He did not have any ventilation at all.
Advice here says that the SHB enjoys humidity in the hive.
Is any one in the US running any Paradise polystyrene hives? The have a big floor vent, greater than 50% of the floor. We have just started with 50, but haven't been running long enough to give a SHB comment.

[220]

All that happened in a week?

Less actually I gave the bottom board a quick brush out 4 days previously. Like I said the comb I transferred is a mess, tree had been eaten out by termites. Bits of timber, dirt and all sorts of crap through and on the comb. There was no solid roof in the tree, just a mat of leaves, twigs, decomposing organic matter and dirt above the hive. Bees are obviously trying to clean up the comb and dropping all sorts of crap on the bottom board.

[GSF]

That answers my question. I was looking at all that debris and was wonder how that much damage could have been done in a week. Now I know it's tree debris. If I'd been paying attention I'd caught that.