The Honey Factory

[Egghead_Jr]

The overpriced label name products are weak. Apivar OK most of the time. Formic Pro or Mite Away are also poorly designed.

The bottom line is they don't have a proper dosage therefore instruct you to keep them on the hive much longer to get some sort of efficacy from the meager dosage.

Amitraz kills mites period. Tac Tic and Bovitraz for livestock have been discontinued for distribution in the US. It's very effective and why there is a market for people to bring it into the United States. Appling in hives kills the phoretic mites. It needs to be reapplied a second time due to evaporation to cover the full 15 days of bees (drones) under cappings. Yet the anemic dosage in the slow release polymer strips require you to keep them in for three full brood cycles? Charging you a premium for this monopoly of anemic dose.

Formic acid kills mites under cappings. That's the beauty of this mite treatment. Formic Pro and Mite Away are not strong enough to do that unless you treat in hot weather and that's not recommended. Here is a acid that is so volatile it permeates wax in less than a half an hour to kill mites at a high enough concentration. The monopoly of this approved product provides you with a low dosage and requires you to keep it on for a full capping cycle as they know it's only killing the mites in the dispersal phase. So you are paying more money to use the foil wrapper it comes in and slow down the gasing even more so it doesn't kill so many bee larva the bees supercede the queen. A proper dosage applied in a flash treatment of 17 to 24 hours will kill 95% of the mites under cappings. The duration is short so not as many larva are killed and the bees don't supercede the queen.

Monopolies and overpaying for inferior products is the American way. At least at the EPA.

 

[5Australorpasaures]

The overpriced label name products are weak. Apivar OK most of the time. Formic Pro or Mite Away are also poorly designed.

The bottom line is they don't have a proper dosage therefore instruct you to keep them on the hive much longer to get some sort of efficacy from the meager dosage.

Amitraz kills mites period. Tac Tic and Bovitraz for livestock have been discontinued for distribution in the US. It's very effective and why there is a market for people to bring it into the United States. Appling in hives kills the phoretic mites. It needs to be reapplied a second time due to evaporation to cover the full 15 days of bees (drones) under cappings. Yet the anemic dosage in the slow release polymer strips require you to keep them in for three full brood cycles? Charging you a premium for this monopoly of anemic dose.

Formic acid kills mites under cappings. That's the beauty of this mite treatment. Formic Pro and Mite Away are not strong enough to do that unless you treat in hot weather and that's not recommended. Here is a acid that is so volatile it permeates wax in less than a half an hour to kill mites at a high enough concentration. The monopoly of this approved product provides you with a low dosage and requires you to keep it on for a full capping cycle as they know it's only killing the mites in the dispersal phase. So you are paying more money to use the foil wrapper it comes in and slow down the gasing even more so it doesn't kill so many bee larva the bees supercede the queen. A proper dosage applied in a flash treatment of 17 to 24 hours will kill 95% of the mites under cappings. The duration is short so not as many larva are killed and the bees don't supercede the queen.

Monopolies and overpaying for inferior products is the American way. At least at the EPA.

Also I have read with the Apivar and maybe, not sure, the Formic Pro the mites can become resistant. Breeders are working as are the bees on strains that are mite resistant. If I was still pollenating with 20 hives I would go with gassing but with no more than 4 I'm going with ease and convenience. As far as the EPA, I never put much stock in what they have to say.

 

[Sally PB]

Whenever I have to deal with comb that has been cut or ripped out of a frame, I take that comb that has brood in it and use rubber bands to hold it in place on a frame. Wrap the band so it runs from top to bottom and forms a bit of a wall for the comb to rest in. The bees usually build more comb to attach it to the frames.

Pardon my ignorance. Are you talking about frames with plastic foundation? That's all I have. I can't picture what you're describing using a plastic foundation.

Bees won't draw comb on poorly waxed foundation. Get wax on those frames or you will have a mess. Take the wonky comb and ball it up to rub on the plastic foundation. It's a quick fix in the field.

I'd heard that plastic foundation had crappy wax from the manufacturer, so I was going to rub some of the (very little) wax I had that I melted down. As I rubbed, I realized I was rubbing off wax from the manufacturer, so I stopped.