Beekeeping: Was My Treatment Free Approach Effective?
2023 ж. 24 Қаз.
4 145 Рет қаралды
In this video, I'll share my beekeeping revelations - the truth about my treatment free experience. Ever since I started beekeeping, I've been asked a lot of questions about it. In this video, I'll discuss the revelations I've had along the way, what changes I've made, and what I plan to do for the future.
Checkout The Sustainable Beekeepers Guild of Michigan: www.sbgmi.org
Need Free Honey Bee Swarm Removal: www.mibeeswarmremoval.com
I’ve been treatment free for 8 years on a smaller scale. 5 hives. I’ve lost many hives especially early on until a friend of mine gave me a swarm. That swarm outlasted every package and every NUC I bought for 3 years until I made a mistake with the queen. I lost a few swarms from it and put out a bunch of drones from it. This year I captured a few swarms from outside of my apiary. 2 of those swarms reminded me of the survivor hive I had for years. 1 of them was much more defensive than the other so I was forced to requeen it because of the location. I purchased a VSH queen. A week later they swarmed with her and so I put them in another hive and bought another VSH queen for the bees left behind. I’ve noticed some interesting behaviors with my survivor stock. They are more ‘vocal’, they gather more resources, build bigger brood nests, they display high hygienic behavior. I’ve also noticed that they keep a lower SHB population as well. My plan is to requeen my other 2 hives with the good genetics in the spring. My guess is that good controlled genetics flooding the area over several years improves all of the apiaries in the area.
Thank you so much for sharing your experience! It's always inspiring to hear about beekeepers who have successfully maintained treatment-free hives for a long time. Your insights into the behaviors of your survivor stock are invaluable.
Are side liners in Michigan garnering a 75% survival rate? It sounds really high and out of line for even migratory commercial treating beekeepers.
Average national losses are over 40% and I'd wager those are larger operations. My target was 75% and I got close - and some losses were probably avoidable via management. Even still, I've only had to address about 10% of my colonies based on my thresholds.
Ya. I was treatment free for six years and chose to start using OAV in the fall-3 treatments 5 days apart-and it’s made a huge difference
Hey Brad - you are in Michigan? At this point I have only treated 15% of colonies with mite washes 5% or higher. Anyone else lower than that was left to themselves.
No. I’m in NY. I’m treating all my colonies. I also don’t do mite counts anymore. I know my Buckfast queens do well with mites as well as my Caucasians. Yet I’ve learned, that here in NY where I’m located, all my hives do great all year being treatment free until it comes to over wintering. It’s the winter where I find all my problems with mites. So I treat three treatments of OAV back to back in Sept and five days apart. And then one treatment again the first of January when I know my hives are 95% broodless. It works great for me. I chose to work with an organic compound rather than synthetics because of how quickly organic OAV leaves the hive. I believe in the unseen ecosystem system that lives inside a hive, which all synthetics kill off. Merry Christmas to all!
OAV is as organic, hmm take the mask and gloves off then.
@@peteGbee oAV is an organic acid. It’s not synthetic. Yet organic acids are harmful to human lungs.
Several questions - 1. What is this Harbo (spelling?) scale you mention? 2. For your 75% goal, how many hives did you have total, and over how many apiaries? 3. Did you achieve 75% at any individual apiaries, and if so, why cease the experiment at those apiaries?
1. The Harbo scale is a scientific assay (test) that you evaluate honey bee brood by to determine if the bees are suppressing mite reproduction. 2. In 2022/2023 I carried 37 colonies into the winter and emerged wit 27 - this is in 5 Apiaries. 3. One apiary was 100% survival, but that was only 2 colonies - but one was 100% loss - another 70%, etc... the one with 100% was propagated - and there are now 20 colonies in that yard. My apiaries span a 10 mile radius around a central mating yard. Work in progress :)
Are you planning in the spring to re-queen the few colonies that you treated this fall?
Yes correct. The bees will be split for spring nucs and given fresh queens.
Definitely nothing wrong with the method you described. Randy Oliver uses a similar approach. The most important thing is that you removed the weakened colonies from the breeding population and that you mitigated their impact on the rest of your stock, should the weak colonies fail regardless. Keep up the great work!
Thanks for your kind words!
I think it was either treat or do as Tom Seeley says and euthanize a colony that can't handle the mites. I think you made a difficult but correct decision
Treat or euthanize? Sounds like the plot of a bee-themed reality show! In all seriousness, it's a tough decision to make, but I'm glad you think I made the right call.
I appreciate your thoughtful approach. It is good you found some stock to breed from. My only concern is that your 75% target over three years sounds a bit too optimistic. I would be surprised if you could get there in less than 8 years. With the import of bees, maybe never. There is no shame in treating. I treat everything with OAV and retreat as needed based on mite drop ( I count every colony after treating). I have lost one colony over winter in three years. That said, winter losses are not really a thing in my area. I lose 10 to 20% in the late summer heat and dearth. That is the high stress time of year where I am.
Well, 72% is not far from 75, I think management played more of a role in my losses the previous season than Varroa. I beat the national average but when we look at what those averages represent, it is not a huge accomplishment to me. I want to do better.
I’m 5 minutes in and you are still asking the question over and over and over again! 😂
Well... technically... the intro is a clip of the question. BUT I am glad you stuck around the whole five minutes 😁
bees dont live forever. i have avg 50ish 60 % survival (real survival TF)then i am over loaded with bees the next season. swarms, cutouts , grafting, splits. 75% survival id be exploding with bees every year. im confused you saying 75% survival isnt sustainable. also i dont understand how TF was so much work and so time consuming for you. pretty damn easy for me, my proven genetics can do fine without me. dont have to do much at all. pretty easy , you get colonys that survive over 2 years then i graft and propogte them. mite counts dont mean everything, your totaly overlooking tolerance. i get bees with high mite loads that survive. but the premise here of 75% survival and the time isnt worth it. i dono man 75% is very easily overcome with propogating. and doing all the testing just seems like alot. vsh and low mite loads is not the only survival trait. i see it all the time. im in new england by the way. Goodluck!
Sounds like we have different goals. I'd like to quantify my TF stock and predict outcomes, not just gamble. I don't remember saying that 75% is not sustainable - I said it's not sustainable for my goals and the time I'm investing. I run upward to 100 hives - and if you are not spending much time in your colonies - then we are very different keepers as well. The testing isn't difficult or time consuming at all. You are doing yourself a disservice if you aren't quantifying the WHY you have survival - you're just happenstancing along. That's fine too...but not good enough for me. When I sell someone a TF queen, I can tell them why they can trust me - not just guess that it might survive and you're not sure why other than she made it through winter. Appreciate the comment and thanks for watching.
Okay, 75% survival??? I am thinking you are being really optimistic. I am thinking 50%-60% survival is great. I am including culling in the summer and fall. As it relates to accurate percentages you will needs many hives over a period of at least 5 years. I am thinking anything less than 100 hives and 5 years is just coincidence.
Coincidence implies zero management ability. I'm having a hard time understanding how you would wait 5 years to quantify survival??