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Date: | Thu, 9 Sep 2004 13:53:16 -0400 |
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I had read that it is rather difficult to transfer disease if you used
some precautions when going from hive to hive or apiary to apiary. I also
know that this disease is highly infectious so I wonder if my precaution
are sufficient. I flame my hive tools and scrub them as well as scorch my
smoker bellows. I wear throwaway gloves and change them between yard and
after working any infected colonies. I wash my suit each day and take
precautions to dispose of my gloves in a cardboard box that I carry with
me. However I wonder if just walking around in a heavily infected yard
and then going to another yard might spread the spores. There might be
other things I hadn't thought of and I want to be absolutely certain that
disease is not transferred to my yard or any other.
This disease really surprises me. The original apiary where the beekeeper
was leaving dead AFB infected hives to be robbed out is now disease free.
As a matter of fact I inspected it yesterday and found the four remaining
colonies out of 20 were not only disease free but one had 7 modified
supers so full of bees and honey that they had built comb up through the
inner cover and into the space between the inner cover and the raised
outer cover. The other colonies had 4,5 and 6 supers totally full. What
makes some hives thrive in the presence of so much disease and others die
out always is a surprise. I doubt these hive avoided exposure to AFB but
they never showed it and ended the year with an outstanding crop for this
area so I can only assume that they have the traits or genetics the others
didn't have. Any advice or suggestions would be appreciated.
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