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Subject:
From:
Bob Harrison <[log in to unmask]>
Reply To:
Informed Discussion of Beekeeping Issues and Bee Biology <[log in to unmask]>
Date:
Tue, 28 Oct 2008 09:56:25 -0500
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 PMS > looked like the simultaneous occurence of every bee disease known, 
and
> then some, all in the brood combs at the same time.

Over the years I have looked at a bunch of PMS comb.Most likely a 20 year 
anniversary of the first PMS comb this year. I have went through thousands 
of boxes with many frames with PMS displayed.

After awhile a pattern emerges. At times there are several commercial beeks 
each looking and holding up frames for me to look at.

from my experience:
yes you can see signs of most disease in PMS comb at first look but at a 
closer look you see *my opinion* much PMS caused by brood nest effected by a 
loss of healthy bees which leads to poorly fed larva and unable at times to 
control brood nest temperature. If you look closely in the field many times 
you will spot the robber bees helping their selves . Moral is poor. Virus 
issues take hold when nurse bee and larva immune systems break down. Dr. 
Shiminuki told us 20 years ago that the hive at this stage is hard to save 
or simply in his opinion not worth the effort. Always  varroa is found in 
many cells.

I learned the most about PMS by field observations as the hive crashes . The 
least looking at the deadouts.

A common PMS (maybe the first sign when you look at the PMS frame) sign in 
the Midwest when dealing with dark brood comb is the elongated older larva 
poking heads from the dark comb. Looks kind of like maybe the larva tried to 
crawl out or perhaps a nurse bee tried to pull and remove and then stopped. 
Usually these larvae are scattered over the brood area. Then you see larva 
with different colorations which can resemble EFB but the larva color is not 
uniform off colored (like usually in EFB) and not somewhat watery like EFB.

The perforated capping which appear like AFB are caused many times by bees 
either checking the pupa or thinking of removing. Although these cells 
appear AFB ( and at times are!) usually the content do not rope.

On severe PMS frames the frame can look like both AFB & EFB were present, 
chilled brood, stone brood,sac brood, chalkbrood  and you will find mature 
varroa in large numbers in sealed brood when uncapped.

Dr. Shiminuki and I discussed *if* the virus found in samples was the cause 
of PMS or the result following the crash from high varroa infestatation as 
we both agreed:

The same virus was present in most those hives before the crash.  A point 
which I always make and seems to  go over the CCD teams heads  when we talk.

The CCD deadout samples had virus in samples as did the strong healthy hives 
3 miles down the road which had the same virus in samples.

Is virus the cause or simply the result. Humans are exposed to virus all the 
time but usually only have problems when our immune systems break down.

I agree I tend to oversimplify things but in my opinion many researchers 
tend to over complicate many things.

bob

 

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