Powdered Sugar Dusting and brood/honey supers

[shadow49]

I have 2 questions: 1) does P.S. dusting harm or kill uncapped larva/ eggs or harm capped brood
and 2) can I remove the honey supers and dust my 2 deeps then return the supers. I am running 2 deeps with a queen exc. then 2 med.honey supers.

Any help is appreciated

John
Mahoning Co. Ohio

[AllenF]

Powdered sugar has corn starch in it to keep it from clumping.   That is what kills the young when they eat it.   You can make your own with a blender and your pure sugar.  And to kill mites, you need to put it on all the bees, top to bottom.   As they clean themselves, they knock the mites off and they fall though the screen on bottom. 

[indypartridge]

1) does P.S. dusting harm or kill uncapped larva/ eggs or harm capped brood

I've been dusting for several years. If there's any harm, it's not noticable.

2) can I remove the honey supers and dust my 2 deeps then return the supers.

Yes. As Allen notes, you want to get as many bees as you can, but I can understand not wanting to dump powdered sugar in your honey supers. I typically dust in late summer/early fall after my supers are off.

BTW, welcome to Beemaster!