Hello Chris. Murray & All,

>People have the impression that UK EFB levels have greatly increased
since the burning policy was ended.    Chris

 I had a few discussions with my long time friend Murray off list at the
start of the problem. I gave my input which was most likely quite different
than other input he received. Murray is by far the largest beekeeper in
Scotland . Not a place I would want to be in as the commercial view point is
very different than *most* hobby and sideline view points. I suspect Gavin
has heard my input. As I write this post I have no idea what course of
action was taken.

If happened in the U.S.:

In the U,S, there are basically 3 types of beekeepers. Hobby, sideline and
commercial. The fewest number by far are the commercial beekeepers in
numbers but own I would guess 90% of the hives.Very different than in
Scotland.

Checking *each* hive in a 10,000 hive operation ( as Murray said was going
on in Scotland) for EFB would be a huge undertaking. Checking for EFB
involves a complete hive look and shaking bees off frames which does not
make the bees happy.  Back breaking work and can involve human error. In
other words some EFB missed which is a basis for the problem to start again.

If one used the figure of ten minutes a hive for a search and you used the
figure of 10,000 hives then you would end up with 100,000 minutes which
would figure to 1667 hours. My example is too simply show the amount of time
and expense involved if each hive was checked. Also because of human error a
percentage of EFB most likely would be missed.

When looking at a serious EFB problem in a large operation you need to
consider all options. I have seen and heard of EFB raising its ugly head in
the U.S. since many beekeepers dropped terramycin in favor of tylosin for
AFB. Tylosin has no effect on EFB. In my opinion the only beekeepers seeing
EFB problems in the U.S. are beekeepers which have dropped all use of
terramycin ( mainly based on remote finds in certain areas of AFB resistant
to AFB).
In my opinion and experience AFB resistant to terramycin is rare.

I have seen operations with EFB and the beekeepers thought they were seeing
PMS ( parasitic mite syndrome). To the trained eye it would be hard to
confuse the two but remember EFB has only raised its ugly head for the most
part since the use of terramycin has been dropped. ( 5 years in U.S.?) This 
is a serious problem
but to my knowledge has not been given a lot of discussion at national
meetings.

Despite the opinion of the powers that be in Scotland myself and my
associates *do not* see EFB as a reason to burn bee hives. We see EFB
responds quickly to treatment. We treat *all* hives in the yard or holding
area. In my opinion trying to dig through all hives and try to leave some
untreated as no detectable signs of EFB are seen is a method doomed to
failure.

In the case of AFB burning is an option we often use but only the frames. We
scorch the woodenware. Then we treat all the hives in the yard with
teramycin (tylosin the next option) . In my experiments since the
researchers have said there was AFB in the U.S. resistant to terramycin I
have seen none I could not cure with terramycin. I am not saying AFB
resistant to terramycin does not exist but only I prefer terramycin over
tylosin for a number of reasons.

to also answer Dick M. I would say letting EFB go and assume the problem 
will clear up is not the best solution. Again I go back to some commercial 
beekeepers not looking for EFB as they treated regularly with terramycin and 
the product controls EFB. No resistant EFB reported to date to terramycin. 
EFB does look at times like PMS. Most commercial beekeepers do not cull PMS 
combs and depend on the bees for cleanup.( which can be a mistake with EFB) 
EFB can (as in Scotland) move through the entire operation. In the fifties 
and sixties we saw quite a bit of EFB in the U.S. .

bob 

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