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Date: | Fri, 17 Jun 2011 22:10:40 -0700 |
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A few weeks ago on this list I described symptoms that I thought might
be a strange looking American foulbrood. Larvae dying extended in
capped cells, melting down and forming scales that look just like
American foulbrood scale. In the mean time, USDA lab confirmed that my
samples are of European foulbrood.
A month ago, I had 8 hives with symptoms and all other hives looked
great. Thinking it could be AFB I removed them before they died and was
careful about sterilizing my hive tool etc. Now a month later I am
finding EFB in pretty much all of my hives, some with classic symptoms
(larvae yellow or dying in coiled stage) and some with the larvae dying
under the cappings. Some hives have cleared it up on their own and most
have become worse. The only hives being killed by it right now are
splits with new queens.
Since it must be extremely contagious to go from 8 hives to 350 in a
month I am wondering if anyone else has had an outbreak like this and
how long EFB typically persists on used comb. I read somewhere on the
internet that it can survive for 3 years on brood comb, but I haven't
found a scientific study. Right now I am medicating the worst hives
with OTC and making honey with most of the decent hives. I am trying to
avoid medicating all of them since we are going to be making honey
constantly until October with all the rain this year. As they all
appear to have it I am no longer concerned about mixing frames from
infected hives.
--Jeremy Rose
San Luis Obispo, CA
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