package bee blues

[backyard warrior]

Recieved a pacakge last week bees came feed them sugar syrup with fumaglin B to help stop supercedure. Queen is laying nice egg pattern but guess what you guessed it they are building supercedure cells.  Looked like they were reworking drawn out worker foundation into drone foundation. Capped brood looks like a kid with adolescent acne.   So who knows maybe they will supercede maybe they wont.   Gotta love them package queens best quality you cant get  :lau:  Maybe she is a sterile queen all drones  time will tell

[buzzbee]

I never heard of using fumagilin for supersedure.
I thought it was for nosema and dysentary.Care to elaborate?

[hankdog1]

I never heard of using fumagilin for supersedure.
I thought it was for nosema and dysentary.Care to elaborate?

I'm with you on this one Ken. 

Good thing about supersedure is you got a nice new mated queen from drones in your area always a plus.

[FRAMEshift]

If they are superseding, they are doing it for a good reason.  If you stop them, you may end up queenless.... or as you say, with a sterile queen.  Why not not let the bees do what they want?

[Michael Bush]

I think the leading cause of supersedure is poor queens.  But the other side is that a queen who has been caged doesn't make as much pheromones as one who is actively laying, so sometimes they start supersedure cells, then tear them down after the queen's pheromones get up to an acceptable level.  People used to make much of Nosema as far as queen failure but I have never seen that and lately haven't heard much about it.

[hankdog1]

I think the leading cause of supersedure is poor queens.  But the other side is that a queen who has been caged doesn't make as much pheromones as one who is actively laying, so sometimes they start supersedure cells, then tear them down after the queen's pheromones get up to an acceptable level.  People used to make much of Nosema as far as queen failure but I have never seen that and lately haven't heard much about it.

Michael talking to an entomologist out at our state university.  He said 70% of colonies in our state are infected with the new form of Nosema.  That being said it's more likely to be in a strong hive which is probably why your not seeing problems.  As for the poor queens in package bees he said they did studies that concluded mite strips with cumo flossin (hope i spelled that right) reduce the sperm in drones and also reduce the viability.  So i'm willing to lay money that is the problem with producing poor queens.

[backyard warrior]

From what i have read in a few of the abj and bee culture mags is that fumiagilin B is used in cases where the queen has nosema. If the queen has nosema she doesnt lay well and her phermones arent that strong and therefore the fumig prevents the workers from superceding the queen.

[backyard warrior]

Go to www.wikipedia.com and type in nosema apis and it tells all about how nosema causes supercedure of queens for all of you who are unaware of why we should treat with fumigalin B.  I only use it when i hive a new package to prevent supercedure as much as possible or in the fall or early spring when it is more prevalent in the north because of the confinement over the winter.  Id rather keep a good queen then have them supercede and wait another couple weeks till i get brood going in my hive again so early in the season. If it was the summer i wouldnt mind as to kill off some varroa with the interuption of brood cycles.  Its a good read so read the whole article.   Hey im all about being organic and using no chemicals and treating naturally with minipulations  just feel its a bit unrealistic at times with the varroa and all the other bee diseases, so when the bees need to be treated they need to be treated unless you are willing to loose your bees.    chris

[Brian D. Bray]

I think the leading cause of supersedure is poor queens.  But the other side is that a queen who has been caged doesn't make as much pheromones as one who is actively laying, so sometimes they start supersedure cells, then tear them down after the queen's pheromones get up to an acceptable level.  People used to make much of Nosema as far as queen failure but I have never seen that and lately haven't heard much about it.

Michael talking to an entomologist out at our state university.  He said 70% of colonies in our state are infected with the new form of Nosema.  That being said it's more likely to be in a strong hive which is probably why your not seeing problems.  As for the poor queens in package bees he said they did studies that concluded mite strips with cumo flossin (hope i spelled that right) reduce the sperm in drones and also reduce the viability.  So i'm willing to lay money that is the problem with producing poor queens.

At our last Beekeepers meeting we had an et tech from WSU give a presentation.  She informed us that over 90% of the bee samples tested show both types of Nosema plus both varroa and trach mites.  At the end she handed out sample containers for mailing bee samples for testing.  Very informative.  The worst bees were were from commercial operaters bringing bees into state off of the california Almond orchards.

IMO, the extended use of chemical treatments for varra, etc, by commercial bee producters is the major cause of queen and packaged bee failures.  If you're buying bees or queens from treated apiaries your going to see a supercedure almost immediately.  The more/longer the bees have been treated the faster the queen failure.