Yep. OA is great, but you need, as you said, to treat every 3-5 days at least 7 times. As soon as i pull supers, I use Apiguard. Then I clean up again with OA. Going into late fall, Apivar. In the spring OA. I switch up the Apiguard with formic pro, every year. OA works for a couple of days. When the acid condenses back into a solid the bees walk in it etc and it is around for a bit.
Thank you for this comment and the details I am shocked every year how many new beekeepers think OA can be a stand alone treatment on a very lose schedule I know your comment will help someone to avoid losing a colony Thank you
Me first year doing the treatment seems good so far I am treating at the solstices and equinoxes, 7 treatments 3 days apart. I bought a instavap to make the chore much easier.
Dribble treats bees different then Vaporization I cannot speak on dribble but I am pleased to hear your great results. Something to definitely consider I was speaking of vaporization as a stand alone treatment not dribble
Check out Tom Seeley, he is a true bee nerd. :-) He has done studies on bees in the wild away from other apiaries. He has found that they are evolving to overcome mites on their own. Treating them is most likely keeping them weak. Since you capture swarms, you may have an advantage to capture such bees. Something to ponder. I happened across a swarm earlier this year and I am not going to treat them. Currently they are thriving.
Agree. “Survivor stock” Spoke about this in another video We are exploring treatment free options outside of our production yard My traps are based on Tom Seeley research and that is where my journey began. Amazing man Thank you for the comment
Yep. OA is great, but you need, as you said, to treat every 3-5 days at least 7 times. As soon as i pull supers, I use Apiguard. Then I clean up again with OA. Going into late fall, Apivar. In the spring OA. I switch up the Apiguard with formic pro, every year. OA works for a couple of days. When the acid condenses back into a solid the bees walk in it etc and it is around for a bit.
Thank you for this comment and the details
I am shocked every year how many new beekeepers think OA can be a stand alone treatment on a very lose schedule
I know your comment will help someone to avoid losing a colony
Thank you
Me first year doing the treatment seems good so far I am treating at the solstices and equinoxes, 7 treatments 3 days apart. I bought a instavap to make the chore much easier.
I did 1 oa dribble treatment last year in late fall & seen a huge mite drop, colonies made it thru winter in ne ohio just fine
Dribble treats bees different then Vaporization
I cannot speak on dribble but I am pleased to hear your great results. Something to definitely consider
I was speaking of vaporization as a stand alone treatment not dribble
Check out Tom Seeley, he is a true bee nerd. :-) He has done studies on bees in the wild away from other apiaries. He has found that they are evolving to overcome mites on their own. Treating them is most likely keeping them weak. Since you capture swarms, you may have an advantage to capture such bees. Something to ponder. I happened across a swarm earlier this year and I am not going to treat them. Currently they are thriving.
Agree. “Survivor stock”
Spoke about this in another video
We are exploring treatment free options outside of our production yard
My traps are based on Tom Seeley research and that is where my journey began. Amazing man
Thank you for the comment
You got the first question wrong. It's, "did you do a mite wash?" With the follow up question, "what was your count?"
You are correct. That is the appropriate first question