December 2024
Useful Links & New Varroa Research - Newsletter from Alan Riach
The temperature has been up and down like a yo-yo, and some of the bees are still out and about harvesting some Ivy (Hedera helix) pollen (and some nectar). Unfortunately, the small amount of nectar harvested will hardly compensate for flight fuel, and so stores will be used.
The bees should still have plenty of stores, but keep a block of fondant or a moistened bag of sugar over the feed hole as insurance. Baker’s fondant or sugar (sucrose) is quite adequate; it doesn’t have to be inverted sugar – bees are the best wee inverters in the business, and nectar is mainly sucrose.
We can expect some windy weather from now on, and I would recommend that you secure your hives with lever ratchet straps, if possible, tied to or encircling the stand. Even if a strapped hive is blown over, the bees will survive a tumble provided the hive does not split open.
Check your colonies for varroa drop, and if over the recommended drop levels, now is the time to treat with an oxalic acid treatment either by trickle treatment or vapour. If using a vaporiser, do be sure to wear a suitable acid gas mask. Use approved materials and keep a veterinary record sheet of treatments.
There are now colonies which seem to be resistant to varroa but do not assume that your colonies are resistant. Varroa still kills more bee colonies than any other pest. Professor Stephen Martin and his team, University of Salford, have been researching varroa-resistant bees and have concluded that over a 10-year period varroa-resistant queens can appear. Maggie Mowbray has provided the following link to a YouTube lecture given by Prof. Martin See https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rxHZVQ_tWEQ. Their research has concluded that the queen’s biome changes in such a way that she produces hygienic workers, some of whom can detect varroa in cells and uncap the cells and some of whom can cannibalise the infected pupae and the developing varroa. Bees are particularly good at fast biome changes as they have very high rates of gene shuffling (crossover) when the gametes (eggs and sperm) are being formed. The cell uncapping/cannibalisation activity does not wipe out the varroa but disrupts its breeding cycles to the point where numbers don’t build up to dangerous levels. It has now been found that hygienic behaviour does not cause workers to remove phoretic (out of cell) varroa from their sisters, as varroa has very advanced mimicking capabilities – within 3 hours of attaching itself to a worker, it can mimic the smell of that worker so that antennae contact from other workers think that it is just a part of the host bee. This mimicry is not uncommon amongst pests in the insect world, but Varroa seems to have developed it to a fine art. However, being able to accurately determine whether you have resistant queens needs some training, and hopefully, the pests and diseases team at EMBA can provide some detailed protocols. But until we are confident that we have high levels of varroa resistance, be prepared to treat. Bringing in queens from outside the area should be avoided, especially from varroa-free areas, as these queens will be varroa naïve and particularly susceptible to the pest.
It is time to update your BeeBase record. Click on the link https://www.nationalbeeunit.com/hive-count/ and submit your response by 31st December 2024. It is important that you update your record, even if this is to confirm that you currently have no colonies. If you have not already signed up to BeeBase, it is very important that you do so (just click on the link above and register). Please also have a look at the updates section of the Scottish section of BeeBase: Latest updates in Scotland » APHA - National Bee Unit - BeeBase; and also any relevant podcasts (good to listen to in the wintertime) SRUC podcast | episodes list numbers 66, 57, 48, 27, 20 & 17 are all on beekeeping.
If you have any further questions, please visit the Hive Count page on BeeBase https://www.nationalbeeunit.com/bees-and-the-law/hive-count/ or email contact: bees_mailbox@gov.scot
