>From:    allen <[log in to unmask]>
>> Consider a million AFB spores will fit on a pin. Also researchers have 
>> said bees can not clean up all the spores from a heavy AFB infection.

>Absolutely true, but irrelevant,  Cleaning up all the spores is not at all 
necessary.  Simply reducing them to the level where the bees are seldom 
challenged is all that it takes -- if you have good bees.

> A waste of researcher time in my opinion. Burn or treat I say.

>In the past, I *intentionally* bought scaly AFB contaminated equipment
(dirt  cheap) and cleaned it up with OTC (sulfa before that) in accordance
with Phillips` advice.

>No bonfires, and day after day of heavy extracting. 

Spores, eh? Let's look at routine treatment of some other spores,
common button mushrooms, as well as others... Though they work in a
sort of clean room when beginning a culture strain, these are applied
not to a sterile environment, but to a merely disinfected one. The
technique and intent is to "overwhelm" the competition.

Burning won't eradicate the spore. Some will travel in lift-off
when the fire is close... et al. It may not be a commercial approach,
but I have always considered that a hot oven could take a single
hive body for a minute and disinfect it to a depth of perhaps 0.1 mm.

Passing single hive bodies over a fire for 10 seconds might do as
well for field use.. And some traditional Warre' users intentionally
char hive bodies for longevity against inclement precipitation, if
not fungi as well. They are the wood composters. What works against
one spore often works against others.

Yeast is closely related and tends to die, past 115F in a minute;
faster at 140F... (restaurant and 'high temp-type. Sewage digester*
temps. In the case of the latter, the pathogens are merely disfavored
agasint beneficial organisms, as in mushroom copmpost "fast-composting.")

A water-mist-spray dampened body would be known to hit 212F when
steam begins, some seconds into a fire's flames.  The addition of
moisture also is used to carry and distribute heat in soil
solarizartion.

BillSF9c




 


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