More and more often, in social networks can be
seen such posts -
"I am
processing bees with oxalic acid (sublimation)"
"Checking our inspection boards after the
oxalic vape. We have observed 0 varroa drop on both test colonies and 0 from
the control. Not sure whether to be pleased or disappointed..."
I want to answer to such posts... Dear friends, you should be disappointed...
This suggests, that your treatement was not effective. The probability, that the bee
What is the
reason for this ... Everything is quite simple ... the bees are able to
regulate air exchange in the hive and are able to defend themselves from
unwanted influences.
Oxalic (or formic) acid does not act
selectively on the mites, or on the bees, or on human. It acts on everyone
equally negatively. Just a bee is much larger than a mite and its body is
partially protected by hairs. BUT the bee’s breathing system is open just like
a mite's, and just like a human’s. Therefore, the bees also suffers from acid,
although weaker. How much weaker is the question of dosage. The bees closest to
the evaporator definitely die as well as the mites ... An acid treatment burns
the trachea and their entire respiratory system ... A terrible and painful
death ...
Even in conditions when there are no such
effects as acid treatment, the bees protect the inside part of the cluster or
of the nest, creating a “crust” from their bodies around it. And a fortiori, they do this, when there is a
threat of poisoning by acid fumes... Bees
are perfectly able to regulate the air flows in the hive. They can let fresh
air to move into the brood "streets" for aeration, they can remove
moist air when they are “drying” honey, and they can block its passage in the
places, where they consider its passage not necessary. In the course of our
experiments with the new hive, we clearly became convinced of this ...
Secondly...
treatments of this type are made at a time, when the brood is no longer exists
in the nest
Thus,
summing up all the reasons, it can be argued, that when we use sublimated
acids, treating our bees, we get their reciprocal response. As soon as the
outer "layer" of the bees feels the influence of acid fumes, they
most likely completely block access of
the air inside the "streets" between the frames, where the young bees
and the queen are located. But the last mites of the season can mainly be found
exactly on young bees ... Thus, only bees,
which create a protective “peel” from their bodies , will be treated
when you use of such method... And this is not so much ... most of the bees
will remain untreated by the pairs of acid, and most of the mites will not
suffer from such a treatment. This is why, we do not see such huge mite's drop,
as we would like ...
Thus, it
seems, that the classical method of applying formic and oxalic acids in the
form of spraying bees, is much more effective, although much more time-consuming
... With this treatment, not only a strong drop of the mites is observed, but
also it does not cause so much damage to the bees, because the acid in this
treatment is used with dilution. But it is the concentration of any poison,
that determines its lethal effect.
As a
result, we can assume, that the popularity of this method was created by the
laziness of beekeepers and competent advertising campaign of manufacturers of
devices such as VARROJET and similar ones ...
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Have a look https://twitter.com/i/status/1204343909977120768
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