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  • From: Todd Walker <mtwalker AT imageray.net>
  • To: John Rintoul <beecd AT icloud.com>, Lewis Cauble <lewis.cauble AT ncagr.gov>, Randall Austin <s.randall.austin AT gmail.com>
  • Cc: Orange County Beekeepers Association <ocba AT lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [ocba] Small, ghostly bees
  • Date: Sun, 19 Feb 2017 10:52:45 -0500

They look like young, newly emerged bees to me.

From: ocba <ocba-bounces AT lists.ibiblio.org> on behalf of John Rintoul <beecd AT icloud.com>
Date: Sunday, February 19, 2017 at 10:47 AM
To: Lewis Cauble <lewis.cauble AT ncagr.gov>, Randall Austin <s.randall.austin AT gmail.com>
Cc: Orange County Beekeepers Association <ocba AT lists.ibiblio.org>
Subject: [ocba] Small, ghostly bees

Lewis and Randall,

I inspected the 2 OCBA demonstration hives at Carrboro High School yesterday. Varroa counts were 0 and 2. These hives were treated twice last fall. First with thymol (Apiguard). But a post treatment varroa test indicated that the varroa count was still too high so I retreated with formic (MAQS). 

In the hive with 0 varroa I found several small, deformed, ghost bees (see below). Clearly there is something going on. I suspect that these ghost bees didn’t overwinter. Last fall’s varroa treatments knocked down the varroa numbers, but some deforming disease appears to have survived the winter.

I would welcome comments from OCBA’s Master Beekeepers and varroa experts on what might be going on and a best guess as to the prognosis for this hive. Brood pattern and quantity was good. Bee coverage was good, so I am cautiously optimistic. But if there is something that I need to do to eliminate being overrun by ghost bees, let me know.

Thanks.


John Rintoul
(919) 414-4071 (M)

No trees or bees were killed in the distribution of this message, but countless electrons were seriously inconvenienced.

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