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Strong, no-chemical-treatment hives with "good genetics" in low-pesticide environments have low loss rates. Even the loss rates we see advertised (38% or whate

Strong, no-chemical-treatment hives with "good genetics" in low-pesticide environments have low loss rates. Even the loss rates we see advertised (38% or whatever) are not existential problems for beekeeping because you can split hives (i.e., reproduce) at a higher rate anyways. So the switch to no-chemical-treatment plans is not that hard. Honeybee colonies are mainly stressed by a) pesticides (in the pollen and nectar that they gather, in the wax that beekeepers give them to accelerate comb building, in the water they drink, and in the mite treatments they are subjected to), b) the varroa mites that have inadvertently been bred to be strong while the bees have been inadvertently bred to be weak.

kurthr 3y ago
As an urban beekeeper I find this argument a bit odd and not matching my experience. I'm not trying to optimize for growth rate or monocrop pollination and frankly find that the hives grow quite fast and can swarm multiple times per season (late spring early summer). However, they seem to swarm most WHEN they start being stressed by varroa! I haven't seen a clean hive go a year without developing varroa so it's endemic in my area. I treat the hives once a year (after honey harvest) to protect other native pollinators. It's easy to know when mites boom just by looking at viral infection effects (deformed wings etc). That starts in mid-early summer (not when most people would be treating with insecticide) and builds into fall. Yes, I can count mites on sticky paper, but once you get to know the hive cycle for an area it's rarely necessary. My queens/drones mate with the local population, but I don't see significant queen/brood changes in them so they're as "natural" as a european honey bee is in the US. I prefer to alternate Apiguard ("natural" thymol) and Apivar (miticide) to minimize tolerance effects and they both work quite well (100x reduction). However, going a year without mite treatment is often a death sentence for the winter hive, and I haven't had a hive fail since I started annually treating. Winters are mild and there's barely a month without pollen so there's really no reason for a healthy hive to fail. When untreated hives do survive they are very weak going into spring and have huge mite load in summer.
- droopyEyelids 3y ago
  Have you tried oxalic acid treatment instead of apiguard/apivar? Way more effective and cheaper for me. Also there's a strong argument its more 'natural' Overall I agree with your points completely. Honeybees are not native to North America and we're doing animal husbandry and farming on what's basically an invasive species. There is no such thing as doing it "naturally"
  - lostlogin 3y ago
    How are you giving the Oa? I’ve done it with paper strips - they aren’t ideal over winter as they hold moisture at a damp time, but I did have quite good results.
    - droopyEyelids 3y ago
      I built a vaporizing device from a diesel engine glow plug, some scrap aluminum, and an old car battery. Did some practice runs to time how long i needed to apply current to get to vaporization temperature Then i do three sessions 5 days apart (to account for varroa lifecycle) starting mid september
      - cryptonector 3y ago
        I hope you wear a respirator.
        droopyEyelids 3y ago
        I did for the first few years but with the hive sealed up, and a breeze where you stand upwind, im not sure its super important
- cryptonector 3y ago
  I've overwintered once. So far so good. No treatment. I've hives that have zero mites, and hives that have moderate mite load. We'll see what happens this coming winter.
filthy-animal 3y ago
You're right - and due to panmixia and the strong capacity for beehives to spread and intermingle their genetics, a site treated with 'standard' practices with many hives acts as a genetic bomb, damaging the whole species in the region, while the owner likely complains about natural beekeepers being at fault for distributing varroa. Of course, they'll never get rid of varroa without also getting rid of all natural, feral (or wild) hives. That would be an immense natural loss, and it's the direction that commercial beekeepers (and those influenced by commercial practices) are taking things. Fortunately, there are some sharp people with a solid understanding of bees and bee genetics that are fighting this tendency, breeding bees with new behaviors, and tracking down isolated wild/feral hives that are surviving well because they have adapted characteristics that help them fight varroa. The wild/feral hives have to be pretty far from commercial facilities, because of the massive capacity of these facilities to pump out poor genetics. So far, there are brood-killing behaviors (checking on the developing bees, sniffing for varroa, and killing the immature bee of it's infected), and mite-biting behaviors (grooming other bees to remove or harm the mites directly). The sad thing is, that the bees can largely adapt to Varroa. It's the beekeepers that can't let them do it, because it means taking losses.
- cryptonector 3y ago
  The good news is that low-treatment ideas are spreading -- they might win out in due time. > The sad thing is, that the bees can largely adapt to Varroa. It's the beekeepers that can't let them do it, because it means taking losses. It's not even clear that it means taking losses. It might only mean taking losses for a while.

kurthr 3y ago

As an urban beekeeper I find this argument a bit odd and not matching my experience. I'm not trying to optimize for growth rate or monocrop pollination and frankly find that the hives grow quite fast and can swarm multiple times per season (late spring early summer). However, they seem to swarm most WHEN they start being stressed by varroa! I haven't seen a clean hive go a year without developing varroa so it's endemic in my area. I treat the hives once a year (after honey harvest) to protect other native pollinators. It's easy to know when mites boom just by looking at viral infection effects (deformed wings etc). That starts in mid-early summer (not when most people would be treating with insecticide) and builds into fall. Yes, I can count mites on sticky paper, but once you get to know the hive cycle for an area it's rarely necessary. My queens/drones mate with the local population, but I don't see significant queen/brood changes in them so they're as "natural" as a european honey bee is in the US. I prefer to alternate Apiguard ("natural" thymol) and Apivar (miticide) to minimize tolerance effects and they both work quite well (100x reduction). However, going a year without mite treatment is often a death sentence for the winter hive, and I haven't had a hive fail since I started annually treating. Winters are mild and there's barely a month without pollen so there's really no reason for a healthy hive to fail. When untreated hives do survive they are very weak going into spring and have huge mite load in summer.

droopyEyelids 3y ago
Have you tried oxalic acid treatment instead of apiguard/apivar? Way more effective and cheaper for me. Also there's a strong argument its more 'natural' Overall I agree with your points completely. Honeybees are not native to North America and we're doing animal husbandry and farming on what's basically an invasive species. There is no such thing as doing it "naturally"
- lostlogin 3y ago
  How are you giving the Oa? I’ve done it with paper strips - they aren’t ideal over winter as they hold moisture at a damp time, but I did have quite good results.
  - droopyEyelids 3y ago
    I built a vaporizing device from a diesel engine glow plug, some scrap aluminum, and an old car battery. Did some practice runs to time how long i needed to apply current to get to vaporization temperature Then i do three sessions 5 days apart (to account for varroa lifecycle) starting mid september
    - cryptonector 3y ago
      I hope you wear a respirator.
      - droopyEyelids 3y ago
        I did for the first few years but with the hive sealed up, and a breeze where you stand upwind, im not sure its super important
cryptonector 3y ago
I've overwintered once. So far so good. No treatment. I've hives that have zero mites, and hives that have moderate mite load. We'll see what happens this coming winter.

filthy-animal 3y ago

You're right - and due to panmixia and the strong capacity for beehives to spread and intermingle their genetics, a site treated with 'standard' practices with many hives acts as a genetic bomb, damaging the whole species in the region, while the owner likely complains about natural beekeepers being at fault for distributing varroa. Of course, they'll never get rid of varroa without also getting rid of all natural, feral (or wild) hives. That would be an immense natural loss, and it's the direction that commercial beekeepers (and those influenced by commercial practices) are taking things. Fortunately, there are some sharp people with a solid understanding of bees and bee genetics that are fighting this tendency, breeding bees with new behaviors, and tracking down isolated wild/feral hives that are surviving well because they have adapted characteristics that help them fight varroa. The wild/feral hives have to be pretty far from commercial facilities, because of the massive capacity of these facilities to pump out poor genetics. So far, there are brood-killing behaviors (checking on the developing bees, sniffing for varroa, and killing the immature bee of it's infected), and mite-biting behaviors (grooming other bees to remove or harm the mites directly). The sad thing is, that the bees can largely adapt to Varroa. It's the beekeepers that can't let them do it, because it means taking losses.

cryptonector 3y ago
The good news is that low-treatment ideas are spreading -- they might win out in due time. > The sad thing is, that the bees can largely adapt to Varroa. It's the beekeepers that can't let them do it, because it means taking losses. It's not even clear that it means taking losses. It might only mean taking losses for a while.