Natural Beekeeping International Forum

[Che Guebuddha]

Are you treatment-free? If so join this thread and post your experience. Those of you who never tried it and are against it start another thread please (PLEASE) thank you

I didnt trest the two colonies I started last year. They are 500 km away from me and a friend will update me about them. I will visit them at the end of March. I will also start my own treatment free apiary this year. Im aware that those areas who had Varroa for less than 5 years need to treat but we had them more than 10 years so bees had chance to adapt to a certain point.

Beekeepers in sweden and denmark who treat with organic acids still experience 80% losses (my father in law, my mentor and a third person i know). 2 of them live in an area without agriculture (forests) one of them not.

M. Bush, Solomon Parker, Sam Comfort, Les Crowder, Dean Stiglitz, the Bond guy Kefuss (and others) have been treatment free for at least a decade. Its possible!

[Rupert]

Hi Che,

I have been treatment free for three years, going on four.
All my bees came from swarms and there are not many other hives close to me.
I don't inspect my bees either. I take honey, but always leave at least one comb of honey next to the brood in hTB hives. I'm expecting them to abscond at some point when, and if, they decide that the combs are too old. I really like the fact that the bees are in charge. If they go, they go with my blessing. I'll get more swarms.

Rupert

[Che Guebuddha]

Kirk Webster is another treatment free name I forgot to mention above.
As well as Wyatt Mangum.

For those of you who need proof from Solomon Parker please ask him dirrectly in his thread;
http://www.beesource.com/forums/showthread.php?275827-Ask-Questions-Here!

Sam Comfort is easy to contact over his web page http://anarchyapiaries.org/hivetools/

Michael Bush on http://www.bushfarms.com/bees.htm

According to Erik Österlund bees of Africa and South America adapted to Varroa after only 5 years because no beekeepers had money for treatments and most feral colonies adapted themselves to it which they afterwards trap.

John Kefuss (Live and Let Die);
http://survivorstockqueens.org/John%20Kefuss%20Keeping%20Bees%20That%20Keep%20Themselves.pdf

[Che Guebuddha]

Thank you Rupert for joining in

If feral swarms are the solution than swarming your own area would be a good start, and keeping the hives in a "tree hollow" manner too.

My bee mentor told me that if I dont treat my hives they will die after maxx 5 years. Then I ask him why did his 13 out of 15 die last winter? He had no answer yet he religiously treat with Oxalic Acid

The same was with my wife's father, he too told me that bees will die if I dont treat yet 11 out of his 13 died last winter.

Per Eriksson, a popular beek from sweden who only feeds his bees with honey and treats with organic acids have not lost any bees for 10 years until last winter almost all colonies died. He too has no answer (he lives in a forest area no agriculture around).

Im not buying this "must treat" cr@p*! Bees must find the way and I dont care if Bernhard or any other beek sais they are not super bees! I feel they are and its time to get those of us who are not having bees for business to do something about it and let the bees keep themselves!

We do NOT OWN THE BEES! How dare we thinking like that!

Some of you say "feral bees can survive treatment free" and I ask why is that??? Because they have no owner! So, if feral bees can survive on their own so can the hive bees if we let them bee.

John Harding is another treatment free beek who place his hives on Geophaitc Stress Lines. Hollow trees are aparently found on those lines.
Placing hives onto those lines (dowsing) and stressing the hives as little as possible can be the way to go.

Erik Österlund told me that all bees which had Varroa for at least 5 years have a chance to be treatment free. But we MUST GIVE THEM A CHANCE TO DO SO, or?

[AnthonyD]

I know you requested for those who disagree to go elsewhere, but for the benefit of those who may receive misinformation I am contributing my thoughts:

Che why haven't you responded to all the advice and questions given to you here:

http://www.biobees.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=14337&highlight=

Its like you're deliberately sticking to something you really really want to be true. I find it incredible that you didn't even reply to the concrete realities and practical experience that was presented to you and then simply made a thread to see if there was anyone to support the reality you want to be true.

Wishing and wanting doesn't supply for reality.

[Gareth]

I used to treat with thymol and discussed my thymol recipe on this forum. A couple of years ago I came to the conclusion that we will never get to the point of bees being in balance with the mite until we allow the bees to find that balance in their own way and on their own terms. So I decided to institute a treatment free regime. I realised that it was only fear of losing hives that was holding me back, but I was losing hives anyway, to all sorts of causes - none of them varroa.

But I also realised that it is not enough just to stop treatment. You have to do everything you can to give bees the right conditions in their hives and to obtain, wherever possible the right sort of bees. That means hives that mimic hollow trees (I converted from horizontal hives to Warrés) and catching as many feral swarms as possible. Of course one cannot be sure that the swarms one catches are feral, but I know for sure that if I do not catch swarms I will have no feral swarms.

Has it worked? Way too early to tell. Ask me in another 5 years. What I do know is that there are quite a lot of treatment free beekeepers in the UK. Some report annual losses of around 30%, others a lot less than this. But one must expect losses, if not initially, perhaps later as things settle - swarms can easily go through their first season without loss, for example. Losses can, of course, be made good through swarms (from one's own hives and others) and, if one wants, through splits. Thus, the total number of hives might remain constant or even increase and, on this basis, one might say that no losses are incurred. This is something to hold in mind when reading reports of treatment free beekeepers who suffer no losses. Ask the question: how is that measured?

As to breeding bees that suffer no losses from varroa, ever, that is another issue. I have come to the conclusion that varroa tolerance/resistance is a highly complex thing. There is no silver bullet. A lot of different factors come into play, some of which we can guess at, others we have no idea. That is why active breeding (by 'active' I mean selection by the beekeeper) is, to my mind, not possible; we simply don't know what to look for. Over time, if we leave the bees to be bees and give them the best possible homes, allowing them to reproduce in their own way, through swarms, I feel we will gradually get there. It will happen sooner in locations where there are large numbers of feral bees and will be slower - maybe even impossible - in areas where local beekeepers use bees highly bred for 'productivity', 'non-swarming', 'docility', 'low propolis use' and all the other things, many of which may well act against varroa resistance.

Lastly, if you have only a few hives and go down the no-treatment route, you may find you lose them all and need to restock. If you are on the local swarm list and are in an area that is productive for swarms this is not a problem. If you are in an area where swarms do not occur, and bees are 'bought' in packages or nucs, this is a problem and means starting again from scratch. So look carefully at your locality before deciding on a strategy.

[andy pearce]

I am treatment free unless you count putting bees on energy line crossings.

I will see how it goes in the next few years.

My Perone is, of course, treatment free.

A

Just to add that if I had a problem I would consider my position carefully. My first intervention would be icing sugar, I have used it before.

[Che Guebuddha]

[AnthonyD]

I expected you would reply hyper-emotionally. You are only proving my point.

The only thing I have to say about any of your responses is on the integrity issue and also the issue about 80% losses (due to varroa) that you have reported as these are the only actual arguments in your response.

For the first issue, I think we've had this same discussion before. I don't doubt their integrity. Not anymore than any other man. But I certainly question their results when it conflicts what is seen on the ground by most beekeepers around the world.
When I said 'And because he told it to you it's true?' I merely meant it as a rhetorical question.
I was making the point to you that you shouldn't automatically assume everything you read on the internet is true, or accurate, however you want to look at it.
That doesn't say anything about said person's moral integrity, but rather that one should be skeptical when they see such large claims. Not dismissive, but certainly skeptical.
Which is not what you are doing. Like I said in my post, you seem to cling to certain ideas like a drowning man clings to a raft. (No sugar feeding, treatment free, 'geopathic stress lines')
All I'm getting at is, do a bit of beekeeping for a good few years and then make you're leaps and jumps.


Secondly on the 80% loss issue. If you were merely referring to 80% losses due to a variety of causes then fair enough, like I said my mentor had 66% losses, weather was weird bees didn't adjust well, its not surprising.
However,
What you implied was something different, you seemed to say that despite treating with oxalic acid or similar beekeepers still had 80% losses in your region, putting it this way gives the idea that somehow these 80% losses were due to varroa -as the acids are used to counter varroa.

If you had a percentage for losses due to varroa, you're point would make more sense. Or would make sense period.

Just because I disagree with you and offer advice or correction, doesn't mean I'm condescending or arrogant. Granted I do sometimes struggle with expressing myself in writing properly, but I've apologized for it before and I mean no offense.

Take my point, not 'the way I say it' - which I don't think was that bad anyway.

[Che Guebuddha]

Thank you Gareth and Andy for joining much appreciated!

[Gareth]

[GürkanYeniçeri]

People who think it is impossible, should stop interfering the others trying.

I am treatment free (hack, in Australia you don't need to yet...)

There is a problem on hand. There is this balance that mankind disturbed for generations and now it is time to restore it. It will not happen quickly, may be we can not see it. May be our kids will see it. Like the winter stock foragers of a bee colony, they will never get to eat what they've foraged but the super-organism will continue to be alive.

I am trying to put some guidelines for TFB and wanting to develop treatment free queens and signify the genes of that sort for varroa hygienic behavior, disease resistance etc. I found member Norm's writing back in 2009 helpfull. couple of friends that I met in our Turkish forum also interested in the subject.

[Che Guebuddha]

[zaunreiter]

[Che Guebuddha]

[AnthonyD]

[zaunreiter]

[catchercradle]

I am not quite treatment free as I use icing sugar.

[madasafish]

I am not treatment free - use Thymol strings.

I might be in 5 years time if I am alive then.

[biobee]

[Barbara]

As I stated in my post on the other thread, I am 4 years treatment free but that has not entirely been a conscious decision on my part, nor is it set in stone that I will continue not to treat, it's just that I haven't needed to. My bees are a direct line from those which arrived in my garden as a swarm 14 yrs ago and which were treated with chemicals (Apistan and Apiguard alternately) during the initial years of varroa infestation. These bees are local dark bees and have survived 14 years and I would hate to lose them now, so I confess that I would treat with thymol if I saw significant workers with Deformed Wing Virus (I don't monitor mite drop).
I'm not sure at what point you consider them survivor stock, but to my mind, if they need a little help every 4, 6 or even 10 years, then I am comfortable with that. If they needed treating every year and where showing no sign of coping on their own, I would be less precious about them perhaps.

They don't produce lots of honey but they are hardy and frugal and overwinter well. They like to swarm and cast, but they are generally mild mannered and a pleasure to live next to. Most years I am lucky to get a few jars of honey off at least one hive but there is certainly not an excess to sell.
I am fortunate, it seems, to live in hilly country with plenty of trees and wilderness, but the season is short and living in the bottom of a steep wooded valley, it takes the sun a while to reach the hives on a morning, so the days are short too. They rarely swarm before the middle of June but can survive the winter as quite a small cluster.

I feel that I am very fortunate to have such bees come to live in my hives. They don't have all the best attributes a beekeeper would want but they suit me just fine. I'm not convinced that producing large amounts of honey is necessarily an indication of a healthy colony, just that they are characteristics of a different breed. My bees don't need a lot and therefore don't produce a lot.

Anyway, that's where I am at the moment with my bees. The reason I am critical of being dogmatic about non treatment is that I almost certainly wouldn't have these bees now if I had not treated in the past. Therefore I will keep an open mind about treating a colony which has survived 4+ years without treatment, but for some reason may become overwhelmed by varroa and perhaps needs a helping hand in the future.

Dusko, ask yourself, if you were in that position where you had bees that had survived 4 years without treatment, but were obviously suddenly being overrun by varroa, would you really let them die rather than help them to get over this bad spell and hopefully go on to survive another 4+ years treatment free and maybe spawn many more colonies that were also treatment free during that time. Parasites are part of a balance, but there are other factors which affect that balance. If the host is unwell, the burdon the parasite places on it can suddenly tip the scales. That trigger might be poor nutrition, low level poisoning, bad weather or some other disease. I think it is important to always keep an open mind, so that you can make an objective decision when that time comes..... especially if you are going to be beekeeping in a less that idyllic location.

What I hate is the idea that people throw chemicals into their hives routinely, just in case!

Sorry, I've rambled on a lot I know, but I felt that you (Dusko) picked out one very small quote from my post on the other thread because it suited your purpose but ignored the remainder and I really felt that I wanted to make my position on this quite clear.

I really admire your optimism and idealism but I hope you will temper it with observation of the real world when necessary.

Sincerest regards

Barbara

[mannanin]

All I can say is that I am treatment free and sugar free for the past 4 years. My views and findings very much mirror those of Gareth and Barbara and I really cant add anything more of note.

[Bugscouter]

Well, I'm in the opposite situation as many of you. Right now I'm surrounded by 1.5 million hives (and their Varroa populations) from all over the US. I caught a feral swarm, but for all I know this colony originated in Texas, or Arkansas, or Florida, or who knows where else. And this invasion take place every year.

I think intervention is going to be the norm for me. Last year I used Honey-B-Healthy when Deformed Wing Virus showed up, but I will probably not be using chemical treatments. I think the chemical treatments just help the Varroa adapt to the chemicals and there has been a couple of reports lately showing that the miticides have a synergenic effect with the pesticides that I know my girls are taking in.

Plus we have periodic droughts that will probably necessitate feeding every once in a while.

[andy pearce]

Che.... I had a long talk with the Danish bee keeper Gareth refers to, who was at last years conference. From what Henning said it seems the agricultural land and associated ecosystems are so controlled (I got the impression it was a matter of pride) that there just is not the wild flora there in large parts of the country for bees. You can keep bees if they have access to a town and gardens but he was adamant that rural bee keeping was compromised by the behaviour of the Danish farmers making the place sterile. It seemed to be what he came to the conference to tell people. Also, is it Denmark where, if you can keep bees, you have to do a shook swarm annually on a certain day?
A

[catchercradle]

Hi Andy, that is what I have read about Denmark. Still the noises coming from the EU are promising at the moment.

[Che Guebuddha]

Andy,

[Che Guebuddha]

[Che Guebuddha]

[catchercradle]

[Che Guebuddha]