> There has been allot of talk on Varroa control and I am looking at options... My question is this formula below which I can make at a reasonable price. Also I do have a bottle of essential oil Thymus vulgaris and wonder if I can use that in substitute for the EO's listed here.
Yes, varroa and varroa control has been discussed at length here, and maybe so much that the topic gets confusing.
Let me boil down what I think is the consensus here on BEE-L, a list that tends to demand proof, not false hope.
1. Without some measure of the levels, no one can have any idea what measures, if any are required, and whether there is even a prayer of the bees surviving a winter.
2. Varroa is a funny bug. Sometimes it kills hives quickly and other times, it can stay at low enough levels that hives may survive several years without treatment. This can either indicate tolerance, or give a beekeeper false confidence. This is one reason people who try things like the magical formula you posted think they work. Mostly they do very little, except dstract the beekeepr from real control measures until too late.
3. The gold standard test -- a quick one, too -- is to dunk 100 to 300 bees in alcohol, shake for a minute or more, and pour thru a screen. Any mites will be seen in the alcohol that comes through the screen. Count them, then shake again and repeat the count several times. Take the highest count and divide by the number of bees sampled, then convert to a percentage. (mite count/total number x 100). In the temperate zones., any number over 1% is of interest. Any number over 6% is going to be hard to control without resorting to a powerful chemical.
4. Once the levels are established, and we know also when and how any past treatments were made, this list can offer opinions based on experience and fact.
5. It is getting very late for varroa control, so lets hope the mites are at low levels.
Hope this is not too blunt, but I am short of time.
We all empathize and want to help any way we can.
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