-- James Fischer <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
"No Bee Is An Island" 
also implies that "No Beehive Lives In A Vacuum".  :)

hi jim,

your reasoning is sound, and i appreciate the comments.

i will say, however, that formic acid (and other treatments) are left in the hive for an extended period of time.  it is not a case of fogging the inside of the hive and letting it air out...the formic acid fumes are constantly evaporating out of the pad (or, in the case of a formic acid drip, the drip is "dripping" constantly)....and yes, in the case of evaporation, the amount varies with the amount of ventilation as well as the temperature.

the facts that you outline seem to me to imply that there is one application of formic acid vapor that starts to dissipate immediately.  this isn't my understanding of how formic acid is used by anyone.

to me, it seems that the amount of formic acid in the hive waxes and wanes with the temperature and wind/ventilation, and doesn't simply start at a high concentration and then gradually taper off (although this is what happens over a long period of time, this isn't what happens during most of the treatment time).

i don't think that adding more yeast to any of the formic acid jars in our experiment would increase the amount of fermentation unless the formic acid were first removed.

certainly, after the treatment period, levels of formic acid move towards zero...but the damage might already be done by that point.  winter bees may simply not get enough nutrition from beebread, or from royal jelly to overwinter properly.  also, the long term composition of the "culture" that the bees keep may well be affected.  i don't know enough about the specific microorganisms involved (i don't think anyone does), but i can imagine that the bees may well keep "spring occurring microorganisms" not only throughout the season, but from year to year.  formic acid (and other contaminants) may well require the bees to re-inoculate the hive from scratch (or nearly so), and this may impact the overall health of the hive.

deknow

****************************************************
* General Information About BEE-L is available at: *
* http://www.honeybeeworld.com/bee-l/default.htm   *
****************************************************