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Spider venom kills varroa mites without harming honeybees

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Re: Spider venom kills varroa mites without harming honeybees

#141

Post by [deleted] »

mrweasel wrote: post #37
shevy-java wrote: post #4

Still the honeybees keep on dying ... Perhaps it is time to stop blaming the mites for the decline of the honeybees.

The Danish beekeeping association has a list of their top four reasons for declining bee populations (both honeybees and wild bees). None of them are mites. Multiple experiments and analysis of abandoned beehives show time and time again that the bees will develop coping mechanisms against varroa mites if we let them. All four reasons are linked to a decline habitats suitable for bees. * Lose of natural habitats. * F…

[deleted]

Re: Spider venom kills varroa mites without harming honeybees

#142

Post by tamimio »

taneq wrote: post #51
tamimio wrote: post #27

Kinda related, but in my house I don’t kill spiders, as long as they are in the corners they can live rent free while cleaning other bugs. Before, one time I went and killed all of them, in less than a week I started seeing sliverfish and similar bugs, I realized I messed up the natural order, so I just keep em now!

In my old house we sprayed for spiders and ants, and a few weeks later there were cockroaches everywhere. I guess it was just a coincidence. >.>

Haha, the problem with ants is they are not solo, and they build colonies so if you keep “the explorer” one alive soon you will have hundreds of them, digging walls and floors.

Re: Spider venom kills varroa mites without harming honeybees

#143

Post by rolph »

lostlogin wrote: post #134
rolph wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

a mesh bottom board, is one part of an integrated plan. varroa mites are obligate to brood, so interruption of brood cycle should be integrated into your cultural plan. here we are on the edge of swarming season, which is perfect time for artificial splits of hives. you intercept swarming by moving roughly half the bees and the queen into a "package", and removing brood from the original hive except for one frame of…

A harsh winter probably helps with this. Where I am there is brood year round.

this is why you enforce a no brood condition by removing brood, and by rehiving your split into a new hive,with no brood.

the original hive can be kept as a queenless hive, and they will make replacement queens, if you keep a frame of brood.

if you get a gravid queen from the original hive, you can force broodless period when rehiving to a clean hive, and both sides of the split greatly reduce mite population.

if you have year round brood conditions, these maneuvers will be essential to mitigating varroa. you should also look at oxalic acid[careful!] as a mite deterrent.

Re: Spider venom kills varroa mites without harming honeybees

#144

Post by dang »

thisislife2 wrote: post #130
dang wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is one for https://news.ycombinator.com/highlights ! (I mention this so more people can know the list exists. All are welcome to let us know at hn@ycombinator.com when you see comments we should add!)

Suggestion - instead of email, perhaps you can monitor which comments are favourited frequently and then curate the highlights from it? (I frequently do this when something is really insightful / useful to me). Making it easier to "favourite" a comment would also help here (currently it is an unnecessary 2-click process).

Yes that's on the list!

> Making it easier to "favourite" a comment would also help here (currently it is an unnecessary 2-click process).

Probably also a good idea.

Re: Spider venom kills varroa mites without harming honeybees

#145

Post by lostlogin »

rolph wrote: post #143
lostlogin wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A harsh winter probably helps with this. Where I am there is brood year round.

this is why you enforce a no brood condition by removing brood, and by rehiving your split into a new hive,with no brood. the original hive can be kept as a queenless hive, and they will make replacement queens, if you keep a frame of brood. if you get a gravid queen from the original hive, you can force broodless period when rehiving to a clean hive, and both sides of the split greatly reduce mite population. if you…

Yes, this is my strategy, OA going in today. Auckland is warm and damp, so winter give health is a challenge.

Re: Spider venom kills varroa mites without harming honeybees

#146

Post by ProllyInfamous »

worldvoyageur wrote: post #78

I grew up on a farm on which the apiary and all connected with it was a major part of the farm's output. Honey, beeswax, nukes (a queen and 10K or so worker bees as a starter colony, sold to other apiaries in the spring if they'd had too many winter losses), fertilizing services (drop a couple colonies off at a berry farm after dark, pick the colonies up two weeks later, profit!) and other products. It's been over te…

Instead of letting the Varroa destructor (its scientific name, representative of its devistation) fall to the ground, place an oiltrap below the mesh/screening.

And then those V. destructor can fucking drown.

"See you in hell, tell'em who sent you you little inbred pancake bastards..."

[•] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Varroa_destructor> [•]

–Former Beekeeper (Bush-method, with Illinois mediums and screened oiltraps)

Re: Spider venom kills varroa mites without harming honeybees

#147

Post by cindyllm »

ProllyInfamous wrote: post #146
worldvoyageur wrote: post #78

I grew up on a farm on which the apiary and all connected with it was a major part of the farm's output. Honey, beeswax, nukes (a queen and 10K or so worker bees as a starter colony, sold to other apiaries in the spring if they'd had too many winter losses), fertilizing services (drop a couple colonies off at a berry farm after dark, pick the colonies up two weeks later, profit!) and other products. It's been over te…

Instead of letting the Varroa destructor ( its scientific name , representative of its devistation) fall to the ground, place an oiltrap below the mesh/screening. And then those V. destructor can fucking drown. "See you in hell, tell'em who sent you you little inbred pancake bastards ..." [•] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Varroa_destructor > [•] –Former Beekeeper (Bush-method, with Illinois mediums and screened oiltr…

[dead]

Re: Spider venom kills varroa mites without harming honeybees

#148

Post by worldvoyageur »

worldvoyageur wrote: post #108
achierius wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> We would still sometimes treat for varroa, but making it easier for the bees to handle varroa how they had evolved to was the first line of defence I thought this was very dependent on the species -- European honeybees did not evolve to deal with varroa mites, because the mites originated in Asia. Asian honeybees, and honeybees bred with them, do have better ways of dealing with the mite; you said regular Italian b…

I don't really know the bee science, but a) our bees were just the generic European bees and b) the bees on sentinel duty at the hive entrance were pretty good at noticing whatever didn't belong. Varroa mites are very noticeable, especially at the bee scale. That said, varroa absolutely could overwhelm a colony. Then you had to report it, burn the infected colonies and wait for the inspectors. Not fun.

Update: we'd burn and call the inspectors for foul brood, not varroa. Foul brood is a nasty, fatal and highly contagious bacterial infection.
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