Chalkbrood question

[Tyro]

I have a hive that just never took off this year.  Every time I check on it, I find the landing board covered with little chalkbrood mummies.  This has been happening since early June.

So, with winter coming soon, I would like to combine the hive with my other hive (which is better, but not great).  My question is, can I do this without giving my other hive chalkbrood as well?

Thanks

Mike

[jdpro5010]

I would rather requeen the hive than combine, but if I were to combine I would be sure to kill the queen in the chalkbrood hive first.  I would not want to give her an opportunity to continue on.

[Finski]

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Only way to get rid off chalkbrood is to kill all queen which show tendency to disease.

In few years you will polish the CB genes from your genepool.

But of course, you must  get new blood to your apiary.

Milder form of Cb is that drobe brood are violated.

So, raise so much queens that you may abort all sensitive ones.

I keep extra queens over winter, and last spring I killed 4 queens which had mummies.
Disease will emerge again in some new queen hives but again same trick.



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[Finski]

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Chalkbrood does not kill hive but it reduces yield badly.

Yes, the colony mostly recover by itself, but its build up is late. When the colony is healed, it start to grow hugely when at same time other hives forage real yield. The colony will be ready to forage in late summer and it has lost a lot of honey.

If CB kills 20% of brood, you need not extract honey at all.

I say that it is a  bad disease for honey money. Disapeared swarm is as bad.
 

[kathyp]

finski!  is that really you??

remember that chalkbrood is a fungus.  you can help control it to some extent if you can make the environment unfavorable to fungal growth.  good ventilation is one way.  also keeping temps up in the hive rather than cooling the hive.

having had my own battles with chalkbrood, i would not combine.  i would probably see if they make it through the winter then put them in new equipment with a new queen.  they will still carry the fungus with them, but have a chance to get past it.  the old equipment needs to be bleach dipped and left out in the sun to cook a bit.  cut out the old foundation and melt it for wax.  to late for that now, but when it warms in the later spring.

in the mean time, if you want to save them, feed the crap out of them but do it in a way that does not introduce moisture into the hive.  no hive top feeder or baggie feeding.  a jar feeder would probably be ok if not left on over night, but remote feeding would be better.

[Tyro]

I don't think that there is any way to save the hive.  I have MAYBE two (max) brood cycles left before winter.  The hive has been struggling all summer - only 3-4 frames of bees and brood.  Very little in stores.  I am fairly certain that they won't have enough time to build up either numbers or stores before winter hits (even with feeding).  I think that the only way to salvage anything from them is to combine them with another colony that has a better chance at overwintering successfully.  I just don't want to take the bees from the chalkbrood infected hive and essentially infect my other healthy hive.

[kathyp]

i would not combine.  not worth the risk.  can you take a frame or two of brood from stronger hives to boost their numbers?  like  one frame from each of your other hives?

[kathyp]

or you could try sticking them in a nuc and wrapping it up well for winter.  depends on how much work you want to put into trying to save them.  i have had chalkbrood in several hives.  all but one eventually recovered.  one i gave up on after much effort, including requeening, etc. but i live in a very wet winter area.  i think that makes it harder to clear up.

[Tyro]

Unfortunately, I do not have the bees to pull from my other hives.  So adding bees is not really an option.  It is so late in the year, I think that requeening wouldn't produce anything but a frozen queen in January.  I just don't think that there is enough time for them to build up sufficient numbers.  I have never tried to overwinter nucs up here, but it might be a possibility.

[Farmdon]

I just have to reply to this one.

Its not useful to "fix" CB. It is a genetic weakness that must be purged from our stocks. Kill the queen. Use the CB comb anyway you want. If it "gives" CB to the next queen, kill her too. All of our hives have been exposed to the fungal spores. It is the inferior queens that are the weak link. A strong queen will not get it from the comb.

I have battled this all summer when I did splits from a hive that was "fixed", then her daughters have given me nothing but disappointment. I have two more hives to requeen with late swarms, otherwise they die. I am not doing this to raise bees that act like farm animals needing treatments and shots every quarter.

Its all about survival strong bees.

[Finski]

finski!  is that really you??

remember that chalkbrood is a fungus.  you can help control it to some extent if you can make the environment unfavorable to fungal growth.  good ventilation is one way.  also keeping temps up in the hive rather than cooling the hive.

I suffered 10 years about chalkbrood and then I start to rear queens and discard sensitive ones. That is my story. One hive's dauhgters I disgarded 90% and another one 10%.  I bought new queen from different places and looked how resistant they were.



In my country ventilation adds chalkbrood.


My advice is that get rid off CB genes. Dont's keep them in your genepool. It is possible.

[RayMarler]

Another option to you...

Shake all the bees out on the ground and remove the hive and stand. The bees will get absorbed to your other hives. Set the brood combs out to air well before re-using them next year, or recycle them. The combs with nectar or pollen or honey in them, the storage frames, add those to your other hives for winter stores. This will destroy a weak link and give a little boost the the others in your yard.

[Michael Bush]

It does seem the more I pay attention that three things seem to be the cause of chalkbrood.

1) genetics
2) chilled brood
3) too much moisture

Hence the solution of more ventilation working when it's too much mositure and making it worse when it's chilled brood...

[Finski]

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It is the fourth reason too. Varroa carries with it chalkbrood. It has been noticed in researches.

In South Africa chalkbrood was veruy rare but now it is a big nuisance after varroa arrival.

My problems started at same time when varroa came.

[Finski]

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Genetics and resistancy.

Last spring I killed 4 queen and I put the new nuc queens into hives. I do not cleaned contaminated frames from hives.
In all cases the disease healed quickly. It does not happen allways.

I renew every year my queens and I must wait if again CB arrives in some hives.
But I can see now from my drone brood areas that things are well.


Moisture depends in my country  cool hive-moist,  warm hive - dry .
It is relitive humidity which rules moisture.

If weathers are bad and rainy 2 weeks, lots of bees will die in foraging and the rest are not able to keep whole hive warm.
So disese may burst again in the middle of summer.

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