Sunday 24th January
Mandy, Peter and Linda were at the association apiary on Sunday 24th January to do oxalic acid treatment.
The first hive (nearest the wall) was small but surviving. Oxalic acid trickle was done on about 4-5 seams of bees.
The second hive was a bit bigger and got a similar trickle treatment.
Sadly the middle hive, that has always been struggling with numbers, had died. The hive and contents were removed to be disinfected. The bees were not in a good enough state to be examined for disease but probably lack of numbers had caused this colony to fail.
The fourth hive when opened was rather too lively to do trickle treatment as the weather was rather mild. So the last two hives were not treated.
All the colonies were flying in the mild weather and all had adequate stores of fondant.
Sunday 7th February
David and Peter went to treat the remaining 2 hives with oxalic acid.
David brought his varrox vapouriser equipment, and the two (strongest) hives were treated by the oxalic acid sublimation method.
The weather was pretty wet but the treatment seemed to go ok.
The last hive had a new pack of fondant added as it had almost finished its pack.
The colonies treated 2 weeks ago showed a fair mite drop indicating that the trickle treatment had been working.
Jobs To Do
Anybody visiting the apiary should check the varroa floors for mite drop and make a note of the count on the record sheets.
New record sheets for each hive would be useful as many of them have now got damp!