Beemaster's International Beekeeping Forum

BEEKEEPING LEARNING CENTER => GENERAL BEEKEEPING - MAIN POSTING FORUM. => Topic started by: bberry on October 24, 2007, 02:47:37 pm

Title: Oxalic Acid Trickling
Post by: bberry on October 24, 2007, 02:47:37 pm
So i treated my hives a few days ago with the OA trickle method as i had quite a bad mite prob. I think it is working really well as i had a huge mite drop. The application was really easy and the bees seemed unaffected by it-business as usual about the hive. I am wondering how i proceed after this though-if i still have a large mite count is it safe to re-treat in the same manner? Will a few PS shakes after do? We just started to get a late heat wave tmps in the 70's :-\
Title: Re: Oxalic Acid Trickling
Post by: Cindi on October 25, 2007, 12:19:22 am
bberry.  You MAY NOT retreat again with the oxalic acid treatment when it is done as a syrup trickle.  It is only ALLOWED once per year.  I have read this over and over.  DO not treat again until next fall if you have to.  I don't even think that you should do any more further treatments until spring.  Leave the bees alone for the wintertime rest.

You will see by the figures in the chart that Finsky posted, the mites will keep falling for several weeks.  You can probably bet your bottom dollar that your mite levels will be extremely low, even perhaps non-existent after this time.  Oxalic acid syrup trickling is excellent mite controls, done, when you have, when there is no brood present in the hives.  Have a wonderful day, best of this life.  Cindi

 
Title: Re: Oxalic Acid Trickling
Post by: Finsky on October 25, 2007, 05:08:26 am
-if i still have a large mite count is it safe to re-treat in the same manner?

OA affects during 2 month and mites are dropping. Only what you may do is look, if hive has some brood inside. If they are, cut them off or kill in freezer.
Title: Re: Oxalic Acid Trickling
Post by: BMAC on October 25, 2007, 08:45:34 am
So how much does Oxalic Acid cost per lbs?

I have only found it in one spot here in a small enough quantity to be able to buy.  It is lab grade oxalic (99.9999% pure) and it cost me $12.00 per lbs.
Title: Re: Oxalic Acid Trickling
Post by: Finsky on October 25, 2007, 10:43:33 am

You can handle with that amount 250 hives or 10 hives during next 25 years.
Title: Re: Oxalic Acid Trickling
Post by: Dick Allen on October 25, 2007, 12:59:22 pm
Oxalic acid crystals can probably be found here in the U.S. at your local hardware/paint store. It's sold as wood bleach.

Here in Ancorage, True Value Hardware carries DAP brand Wood Bleach in 12 oz. (340 g) containers. That's plenty enough to last several years for the average hobbyist beekeeper.
Title: Re: Oxalic Acid Trickling
Post by: SteveSC on October 25, 2007, 01:28:24 pm
I bought the DAP brand wood beach ( Oxalic acid )  D.Allen mentioned. I got it at ACE hardware - $6.75  12 oz. crystals.
Title: Re: Oxalic Acid Trickling
Post by: bberry on October 25, 2007, 10:53:34 pm
I got the Ace brand Wood Bleach-99.9 % OA at Ace hardware for $7.49 Thank you Cindi for clerifying the one treatment-maybe i was reading wrong but it was not clear to me. the hives are doing great and have seemed to suffer not at all from this form of treatment.
Title: Re: Oxalic Acid Trickling
Post by: Finsky on October 25, 2007, 11:27:03 pm
Bberry, you live in California. You should look into hives and take away brood frames if you have them. Then kill brood in freezer and let bees  clean combs.  Faster way is to let birds pick up brood from combs after killing. Swarm of major tits or magpie  clean the frame in couple of hours.

A magpie according 7 years old artist Julia.


(http://www.edu.ouka.fi/koulut/myllytulli/ala-aste/kohina2003/kuvat/harakka.jpg)
Title: Re: Oxalic Acid Trickling
Post by: Cindi on October 25, 2007, 11:54:10 pm
Bberry.  By the way, Finsky is correct with what he is saying.  If you had brood in the hives when you trickled they will be damaged/dead.  To make it easier for the bees, kill the brood quickly by freezing (if you can).  I don't know how long it takes for oxalic acid trickling to kill the brood, but it does, and maybe it takes some time, so quick freezing will speed up the process.  Let us know how things continue to work out, we are all interested.  Have a great and wonderful day.  Cindi
Title: Re: Oxalic Acid Trickling
Post by: Finsky on October 26, 2007, 02:10:46 am
  If you had brood in the hives when you trickled they will be damaged/dead.   Cindi

Worse is that mites will stay alive under cappings. They may be 80% of hive's mites.
Title: Re: Oxalic Acid Trickling
Post by: Cindi on October 26, 2007, 10:28:57 am
Corraborating what Finsky says.  That is why to kill the brood, there are mites in "them thar hills", hiding, destroying baby bees, to emerge, latch onto an adult and then.......

In my understanding of the mite babies.  If you see 1 mite on a bee, you can know that the mites in the cells will be 10-fold of this.

One mite means means 10 in cells.  Two mites means 20 mites in cells.  Three mites means 30 in cells.  These are only approximations, but take it from there, do a little bit of math, and you see how colonies can become over run in no time at all.  Mites are serious, and are one of the worst plagues of the bees in these days.  Sounds like, "here we go again, time for learning and listening", but yes, here we go again, learning, and learning more.  Have a wonderful and greatest of this day on our earth.  Cindi
Title: Re: Oxalic Acid Trickling
Post by: bberry on October 26, 2007, 07:54:57 pm
Hives were clear of brood when i treated them. The mite drop is still large and hopefully this will take care of the prob. Thank you everyone for your help!
Title: Re: Oxalic Acid Trickling
Post by: bberry on October 31, 2007, 02:29:40 pm
Ok thought i'd update and seek some opinions. So the mite drop was great success-checked the hive thoroughly the other day and saw no mites anywhere-there were a couple on the bottom board. What i did see is that the empty brood cells are now full of eggs. We are having pretty warm weather here and i guess the queen is getting the green light to lay again. Will the eggs be effected by the OA treatment from before?
Also as i was going frame by frame doing an inspec. i noticed a nice plump queen cell that i had not noticed before??? This hive has been really struggling the last few months so maybe they...? If they superceded the queen is this maybe why the new queen is laying? Spotted the queen(who has been elusive the entire season) and she seemed like a diff queen-very fat and larger than the queen i remember from way back in spring.
Not really sure if i should be optimistic that they have a chance for a better queen or worried or don't worry cuz they did it already no matter how i feel about it :)
Title: Re: Oxalic Acid Trickling
Post by: Moonshae on October 31, 2007, 09:26:22 pm
I was under the impression that this treatment is not yet approved in the US...is that correct?
Title: Re: Oxalic Acid Trickling
Post by: Michael Bush on October 31, 2007, 09:49:22 pm
>I was under the impression that this treatment is not yet approved in the US...is that correct?

Neither is powdered sugar, or FGMO, or thymol crystals, or garlic powder, or vegetable oil...
Title: Re: Oxalic Acid Trickling
Post by: qa33010 on November 01, 2007, 02:02:37 am
   But I understand that powdered sugar is not intended to kill, just to knock off.  Oh yeah...and feed the ants ;)
Title: Re: Oxalic Acid Trickling
Post by: Michael Bush on November 01, 2007, 08:08:31 am
And oxalic acid is just to bleach the wood in the frames...
Title: Re: Oxalic Acid Trickling
Post by: BMAC on November 01, 2007, 09:55:53 am
So when I go to bleach my frames in my hives I can only do this once a year???

So does this also mean there in no mite treatment like Thymol in the spring time???
Title: Re: Oxalic Acid Trickling
Post by: BAStallard on November 01, 2007, 09:58:05 am
I there a thread or website that describes in detail how to do this treatment?  
Title: Re: Oxalic Acid Trickling
Post by: Dick Allen on November 01, 2007, 02:57:11 pm
This is a good site to check out:

http://www.algonet.se/~beeman/research/oxalic/oxalic-0-nf.htm
Title: Re: Oxalic Acid Trickling
Post by: Finsky on November 01, 2007, 04:16:59 pm

http://www.algonet.se/~beeman/research/oxalic/oxalic-0-nf.htm

In that site beekeeper split 2-box hive. That is not possible because often boxes are clued with burr. When you put back boxes, hundreds of bees will be crushed.  And OA affect as well if you dribble in even if you do not see bees in forst box.

OA is not legal in USA. - Is it legal to drive car too fast?  Yeah, all will be boiled in oil after all.
Title: Re: Oxalic Acid Trickling
Post by: Dick Allen on November 01, 2007, 11:50:02 pm
My hives are not so glued together that the two hive bodies cannot be pried apart fairly easy. Last season they were split apart and OA applied to both sections that contained bees. Since OA can be applied down to about 32ºF or 0º C, and if it is applied at about that temperature, and the bees are very lightly smoked prior to opening the hive, most of them will simply remain where they are. If you are crushing hundreds of bees, well you need to be more careful! :lol:

(Finsky, have you received any snow in your region yet? Only a trace amount a few times here in Anchorage, but then it has melted.)
Title: Re: Oxalic Acid Trickling
Post by: qa33010 on November 02, 2007, 01:16:32 am
   So would OA cause the bees to become stripless by the bleaching action?  If they happen to be on the wood...that is... ;)
Title: Re: Oxalic Acid Trickling
Post by: Finsky on November 02, 2007, 01:30:09 am
and the bees are very lightly smoked prior to opening the hive, most of them will simply remain where they are.

Dick, it does fine with your hives if you have 2-box colonies!  Alaska rules! ... Have you insulated boxes?

On cold weather  bees are in ball and I do not use any smoke. After disturbance hive warms up and temp may rise to 40C.

************
(Finsky, have you received any snow in your region yet? Only a trace amount a few times here in Anchorage, but then it has melted.)

Forecast has promised first snow storm to southern Finland on Sunday.
Title: Re: Oxalic Acid Trickling
Post by: Cindi on November 02, 2007, 10:20:26 am
Personally, if the bees are in the winter cluster, I would never, ever even consider to use smoke on them.  They need to be undisturbed during their wintertime clustering.  Oxalic acid trickling is about the only disturbance that in my eyes is acceptable.  When they are smoked, they are disturbed terribly, and like Finsky says, they will break cluster.  This in my eyes, again, is not good.  This is my opinion and I am stickin' to it.

We smoke the bees to prevent them from flying at us.  When they are in the winter cluster, they have no intention of breaking out of their warm little huddle, why would they?  Yes, of course you will always have some rogue bees that will break the cluster when alarmed, that is their job, but for the most part, just wear some protective gear if you are worried about the bee stings.

The job of the smoke is to mask the alarm pheromones and also to engage the bees in eating honey.  The more smoke, the more honey they eat, and yes, they do eat honey when they are smoked, we have all seen that.  The smoke is two fold in its reaction with the bees.

Hmmm.....not too sure where this post was going, just, as I see Ted says so many times, thinking out loud.  Maybe more thoughts will come into my mind later.  Have a wonderful and beautiful day in this great life.  Cindi
Title: Re: Oxalic Acid Trickling
Post by: Finsky on November 02, 2007, 11:09:29 am
  This is my opinion and I am stickin' to it.

................  Cindi

And further more ...bees are so seeping in winterball that they do not react on smoke
Title: Re: Oxalic Acid Trickling
Post by: Dick Allen on November 02, 2007, 02:02:09 pm
Come on, you guys! Stop beating up on me! I wrote that I only lightly smoke the bees. I didn't say that I pumped smoke in the hive as if it was tear gas! OK, next time I won't smoke them. But, if they break out of their cluster and come roaring out of the hive at me, well you're going to hear from me in no uncertain terms.  :lol:
Title: Re: Oxalic Acid Trickling
Post by: Finsky on November 02, 2007, 02:53:26 pm
But, if they break out of their cluster and come roaring out of the hive at me, well you're going to hear from me in no uncertain terms.  :lol:

Take weather -30C and when they attack,  they will freeze in half way to your face. If fart freezes there into pills, surely will a bee.
Title: Re: Oxalic Acid Trickling
Post by: Cindi on November 02, 2007, 05:02:09 pm
Dick, my deepest apology if you thought we were picking on you.  That was not the intention whatsoever, again, if it was perceived this way, I am sorry.  I didn't think that you fumagated  ;) :) them either, I pretty much knew that you only used some smoke.  It is so not necessary when clustered when it is really cold.  I just wanted this to be clear enough that our forum friends didn't need to use it during these deep, dark winter days.  Dick, have a great day, again, not meant you to feel like beating you up, wonderful day, too.  Cindi
Title: Re: Oxalic Acid Trickling
Post by: Michael Bush on November 02, 2007, 11:00:32 pm
>So when I go to bleach my frames in my hives I can only do this once a year???

If you trickle.  If you vaporize you can bleach them as often as you like.  :)

>So does this also mean there in no mite treatment like Thymol in the spring time??

This says that Apilife Var has bad effects on the reproductive viability of drones and queens:
http://scholar.lib.vt.edu/theses/available/etd-08162007-092313/unrestricted/lmburley.pdf
Title: Re: Oxalic Acid Trickling
Post by: Dick Allen on November 03, 2007, 12:40:04 am
Quote
Take weather -30C and when they attack,  they will freeze in half way to your face. If fart freezes there into pills, surely will a bee.

That seems it might be a little to cold to treat with OA  :shock:

Quote
Dick, my deepest apology if you thought we were picking on you.

Now come on. I was joking.






.......oh, you were too I’ll bet.....  :lol:
Title: Re: Oxalic Acid Trickling
Post by: Cindi on November 03, 2007, 11:42:47 am
Dick, nope, I seriously thought that you felt bad  :( :).  Wonderful day, Cindi
Title: Re: Oxalic Acid Trickling
Post by: Finsky on November 03, 2007, 11:59:50 am
Dick, nope, I seriously thought that you felt bad  :( :).  Wonderful day, Cindi

Remember Dick phenomenon: talents on knees!  ... Australians love collective poppy cutting
Title: Re: Oxalic Acid Trickling
Post by: Cindi on November 03, 2007, 12:01:36 pm
 :?
Title: Re: Oxalic Acid Trickling
Post by: reinbeau on November 03, 2007, 07:15:51 pm
:?
I didn't get it either, Cindi!  :?
Title: Re: Oxalic Acid Trickling
Post by: buzzbee on November 04, 2007, 02:11:42 pm
Heres a link on how to do it:
http://www.dave-cushman.net/bee/oxalicdribble.html
Title: Re: Oxalic Acid Trickling
Post by: bberry on November 06, 2007, 12:53:57 pm
Ok, so we have "frame bleaching" confusion, freezing farts and something about Aussies on their knees??? :? :evil: I love this site-you never know where a posting will go.