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Subject: Orange County, NC Beekeepers

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Chronological Thread  
  • From: Randall Austin <ra41717 AT gmail.com>
  • To: David Eckert <daveckert AT gmail.com>, Elizabeth Pratson <epratson AT gmail.com>
  • Cc: Orange County Beekeepers Association <ocba AT lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: [ocba] Reuse of old combs
  • Date: Tue, 22 Mar 2016 10:19:55 -0400

Coincidentally, a discussion on this topic has been going on recently on BEE-L, the so-called "informed beekeepers listserve" that academics, commercial beekeepers and other researchers use. The consensus among that group is in line with what I have always been taught by the folks at NCSU and the bee inspectors: the only long-lived pathogen that needs to be fumigated is American Foulbrood.

The viruses transmitted by varroa mites don't linger in the wax, honey or bee bread. They live and travel in the guts of bees, their hemolymph, sperm or eggs. If they were to be found in the open, they would be killed by sunlight.

Other things like chalkbrood spores aren't long-lived once the bees are gone. Putting frames with comb in sunlight will clean up lots of these sorts of things. There is no need to get rid of the comb.

Small hive beetle and wax moth eggs are easily killed by freezing the comb for a couple of days. They are also deterred by open air and sunlight.

If you acquire equipment from an unknown source or you have no clue what American Foulbrood infection looks like, then fumigation by the NCDA is wise.

Randall

 

On 3/22/2016 9:05 AM, David Eckert wrote:
CAKL48eJCyv6wwnbP2ydkDbjZGGA6k4WdyboYtLEpiKqCUx_cCg AT mail.gmail.com" type="cite">
Elizabeth,

The NC Apiary Inspection Service offers a fumigation of equipment and comb service.  I believe they only want empty comb but it's been a while since I used that service.  If you contact our bee inspector, Will Hicks then he can help you understand this service better and help make arrangements for your equipment and comb to be fumigated.  You can find his contact info at http://www.ncagr.gov/plantindustry/plant/apiary/apiaryinspectors.htm.

David 

On Tue, Mar 22, 2016 at 8:54 AM, Elizabeth Pratson <epratson AT gmail.com> wrote:
Interesting discussion.
On a similar note, I lost 2 of my 3 hives a couple weeks ago (I think due to mites) and have been cleaning up the old frames.  I want to make sure there is no remnant disease on my equipment, so I’ve removed all the old foundation and scraped as much wax off as I can.  I was wondering if anyone has done further precautions to kill any disease like heat treatment (It’s about 30+ frames, and I thought I could heat them up in batches in my oven), or with a bleach solution.  They’ve been sitting in the sun, but I just want to make sure that I get rid of whatever harmed them.

Thanks so much,
Elizabeth Pratson





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