Noticed some moth activity in one of my hives a couple of weeks ago. Rolled a couple of moth balls into the hive. Next morning the girls had rolled them out. I waited till night and rolled them in again. Next moring, they were out agian, this time they rolled them out on the ground. I'm gonna take a guess a say they don't like moth balls much. Not that I do either.
Appears that the moths have moved on. I believe that the moth balls kill the moths, their eggs and the larva. Any opinions if we need to keep rolling those moth balls back in or a few days of it has done the job? Girls would probably be able to find things to do other than roll moth balls around.
Gunny, wow, that is a funny story, hooda thunk?
Maybe you have found an alternative method for wax moth control :) ;) The moth ball obviously only stayed on the bottomboard, and probably rolled around all over it with the bees kicking it around. How interesting!! Yeah!!!!!
I can't see that it would do any harm to the colony or honey for that matter. Have a wonderful day, best of this beautiful life. Cindi
you are lucky your bees are not dead moth balls will kill bees- :( RDY-B
RDY-B. Whew!!!!!! What a horrid thought. I have learned something that is totally great learning today, I would not have had a clue that moth balls would cause harm to the honeybee. Eee gads, so glad that you read this post, yeah!!!! Beautiful day in this life. Cindi
Quote from: gunny on September 29, 2007, 11:16:53 PM
Noticed some moth activity in one of my hives a couple of weeks ago. Rolled a couple of moth balls into the hive. Next morning the girls had rolled them out. I waited till night and rolled them in again. Next moring, they were out agian, this time they rolled them out on the ground. I'm gonna take a guess a say they don't like moth balls much. Not that I do either.
Appears that the moths have moved on. I believe that the moth balls kill the moths, their eggs and the larva. Any opinions if we need to keep rolling those moth balls back in or a few days of it has done the job? Girls would probably be able to find things to do other than roll moth balls around.
Your Girls like a clean house :-D
Quote from: rdy-b on September 29, 2007, 11:36:10 PM
you are lucky your bees are not dead moth balls will kill bees- :( RDY-B
You sure about that?
Have not seen any dead bees in or around the hive.
I'm sure it will in a high enough concentration.
They seem to not be suffering any ill effcts from rolling the 2 moth balls out every day.
A little later today I'll take a look in the hive and see whats going on and report back here.
I'm a little paranoid about moths, have lost a couple of hives to them in the past. I feel, through experience, that a strong hive will take care of itself and keep moths out. Have had good luck with entrance reducers helping with this too. This hive is from a swarm out of a trap in late June and it seems like the moths are especially attracted to it for some reason. See then on the sides and under the hive box evenings before dark. My other hives do not seem to have this problem.
>>you are lucky your bees are not dead moth balls will kill bees
>You sure about that?
Yes.
But that was only two and they removed them.
they are in the category of pesticide (weather its PARA or NAPTHA ) only difference is residue contamination. moth balls are the easiest way to put a colony down if infected with AFB. you got lucky because you did not close entrance. I do not know the number of moth balls that is required. but i think two could easily kill a queen . STOP PLAYING WITH MOTH BALLS for the sake of your bees.best of luck with the wax moths may be someone can help you out in that catigorey.only time i get them is after box is emptey dead out. 8-) RDY-B 8-)
you should never even use moth balls for storing supers, much less put any into a live hive.
If you want to kill wax moth larvae on comb with bees on the combs, then shake them off and freeze it or use Bt (Certan) on it. Also, if there are wax moths in a hive with bees, there is too much room for them to guard it and you should reduce it down to what they can take care of.
Napthalene in mothballs have also been known to cause cateracts in humans. Wonder if it would affect the bees! :lol: (J/K)
Thanks
Go the moth balls out and it appears that the bees have survived OK. They don't even seem to be upset with me.
http://www.beeworks.com/catalog/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=1&products_id=18
Michael, Certain (B401) I read is a form of Bacillus Thuringiensis. I wonder if the "regular" Bt that I have used in my gardens to combat catarpillar type invaders would work as well. I actually didn't realize that there were other formso of Bt, I thought it was just one type. Hmmm...learning stuff new always today and a day more. Have a wonderful day, best of this great life. Cindi
Aren't moth CRYSTALS the PDB and the balls Napthalene? Or do they make the PDB into balls too?
You don't want to mess with Napthalene(?) because it will be absorbed into the wax.
Two balls in the bottom of the hive for a few hours probably won't hurt much, but I don't think that it would affect the moths either, considering that the bees werent' affected much either.
Bad idea either way...sorry.... :roll:
Rick
Quote from: Cindi on October 02, 2007, 09:45:00 AM
I wonder if the "regular" Bt that I have used in my gardens to combat catarpillar type invaders would work as well.
I think there are several strains of Bt, for mosquitos, potato beetles, corn borers, etc. so it might or might not work on wax moth.
Kev
I've only used the stuff from Beeworks and the XenTari which are both labeled for wax moths.
Cindi, there are many different strains of BT - not to say that what you have wouldn't work, if it'll kill caterpillars then it should do the trick, but I'd still stick with the Certan for honey supers, only because I'm anal about stuff like that :evil:.
The people who have tried the Bt from the garden center made for cabbage worms and such say it works fine. I have not tried it.
All interesting stuff. I have not encountered the wax moth (thank goodness). I know that it exists here, but I froze all my frames last year and stored them in my husband's garage afterwards :evil: My poor husband, he was overrun with my stuff in their last year, I kind of felt sorry for him, but then, tough bananas eh!!! Oh, that was not nice. He is wonderful, he didn't mind too much, but it sure did make it hard when he wanted to head out to the open road for a ride on his Fat Boy!!!!!
He transformed one of our old box stalls into a bee house for me this spring and now I store all my stuff there. I am not going to use any chemicals in the supers. I have them stacked neatly, will be cleaning them up eventually, ha, whenever that time comes. Don't know where the time goes, but I had best get my act together.
I am going to put little strips of tuc tape to close up the supers 100% so that no moths can sneak in at any point in time. Hopefully that will work. We will have a deep freeze in January (most likely) that will kill anything that will be in the supers hanging around. The box stall is certainly not a very warm place, brrrr.....
We'll see come spring if this was a good motion or not, hopefully so. Have a wonderful day, best of this great life. Cindi
Hey Beeks , I don't have a wax moth problem here . Maybe I'm too far North, or they just haven't found me yet . Or it could be something else I do different ? Right from the start of our beekeeping adventure ( spring 2006 ) I used cedar wood in my frames and entrance blocks . Before I did that I had a concern that it might be somehow harmful to my bees . So , I went on line and googled "honeybees cedar tree" , and found numerous stories of bees taking up residence inside hollow cedar trees . My assumption is that they would not choose to inhabit a unhealthy environment , and that using cedar wood should be okay . Well , our production of honey seems good for having started out with 2 nucs , 160lbs in 2006 , 140lbs in 2007 . My colonies are thriving and I wonder if anyone else is using cedar and if they think there may be a benefit to it . I use oxalic acid to treat for mites and I use it very sparingly , When I feed them in the spring I give them Halls wintergreen cough drops in their syrup to treat for tracheal mites . Something else has occurred to me ( I am an obsessive compulsive thinker ) , termites are repelled by cedar wood , would it have a same or simular effect on varroa mites . They are both classified as "mites" . Could this explain my almost non-existant mite and moth problem . We really need to find alternatives to the chemical treatments . Have a great day , I look forward to your responses !
---Burl---
Burl, you have some good points about cedar. Responses will be interesting. Halls cough drops, hmmm....sounds good. You are pretty far north in our B.C., sounds like you have done well with your two packages. The Peace River area is where my original bee instructor takes his hives for the pollination of canola and other things, hundreds and hundreds of acres of beautiful forage for the bees. He gets masses and I mean masses, of honey from these contracts!!! Yeah, good for him, lots of work to get them there and back though, lots of bears to contend with to make the bees safe. Have a wonderful day, greatest of life. Cindi
I have a number of cedar boxes and hives. It makes no difference to the wax moths.
burl, have you ever had to store drawn wax that brood was raised in? i see this is only you second year of beekeeping so you have only had one opportunity to store comb. since you say your colonies are thriving i doubt if you have. as mr bush pointed out it makes no difference to the moths. termites and varoa are not related to one another any more than they are to a honey bee.
Old - Timer , no i have not had the chance to store drawn foundations that had brood raised in them . My shallow supers with drawn frames that held honey were stored in plastic garbage bags which were sealed . Cindi , I'm curious to hear what your instructor who kept bees up here would say about the mite and moth conditions here. I've never tasted or seen canola honey. Wonder if it's good ? We have clover and fireweed. We had an extra long winter last year ( don't they all seem extra long ? :-P ) I have heard that the v-mite can't survive if the host hive goes through an extended winter broodless period . Does anyone know if this a fact ? Don't mean to frighten anyone , but I just looked out the window and it's snowing . By the way , I built a fortified extra tall 8ft snowfence along the North side of my beeyard to reduce the howling wind that batters everything here sometimes . ---Burl---
Burl, have not had a chance to ask my instructor these questions. He only keeps his bees up north for that short time of the pollination. Canola honey, no clue of the taste. Fireweed, I hear it is the premium of honeys, light coloured, beautiful. I have gathered the Fireweed seeds again this year, I have been covered in this fluff. But I am on an agenda, to have Fireweed growing on my property, last year was a fiasco, didn't work out for me, after all the work of harvest and setting the seed. That was a joke, the birds got 99.9% of all the seeds as far as I could see. I did find one new plant of the Fireweed, right beside my vehicle where I exited it to bring the seeds home, hee, hee, only that single one, and another one in the place where I had stored the seed for a couple of days (in a paper bag). I transplanted these two plants, but I doubt if they made it, rats!!!!
The wind is an awful thing. Glad you built your barriers. The varroa mite must have brood for her eggs to hatch and suck the very life out of these poor victims and this allows this creep to keep on keepin' on. An extended broodless period will end the propogation of this nasty demon that plagues our bees. Any ideas how long your colonies would be broodless. This is just a curiosity. Nevertheless, somehow, the varroa persists. You will hear more comments.....listen to our forum friends, there is a wealth of knowlege, we only have to look, listen and learn. Have a wonderful night, day, life, and the best of health. Cindi
Quote from: Burl on October 04, 2007, 01:14:10 AMI have heard that the v-mite can't survive if the host hive goes through an extended winter broodless period . Does anyone know if this a fact ?
i believe i've heard they can live up to 80 to 100 days. someone please correct me if i'm wrong. however, i do know that a tick can live up to ten years without a host.
Quote from: Old Timer on October 04, 2007, 05:30:23 PM
i do know that a tick can live up to ten years without a host.
That would be 18 years
http://www.answers.com/topic/the-most-extreme
Scroll down to "DIETERS"
i saw that on animal planet's, the most extreme. i should have said over 10 years instead of under, i'da been covered then. but i wrote it like they narrated it on the show.