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Date: | Wed, 10 Jun 2020 03:01:22 -0400 |
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I think we discussed this at length last year so the listers will have to forgive me for repetition.
In response to Alexander Jackson, OTC (oxytetracycline) alone does not offer a cure, it only suppresses symptoms of EFB (and AFB for that matter). Once the course is over, your rebloom rate will be high as the bacterium remains infective in stores. EFB has been found to be infective in honey for up to two years. AFB as we know can remain infective on old equipment for decades.
To clear the apiary, it is more effective to do shook swarms onto clean equipment than it is to use OTC alone.
**The best chance you have of remediation/cure is to use OTC and shook swarming in concert. Note you can save the woodenware by scraping and disinfection (either by irradiation...no longer available to small holding beekeepers in my area...or soaking equipment in a bath of 1:5 bleach to water for 20 minutes). Comb, stores and brood cannot be disinfected and must be trashed/burned. Honey can be taken off infected hives but is for human consumption only.
Strains of EFB vary in their virulence and in their resistance to OTC, which is now a prescription only medication. Alas no good mechanism for speedy access to OTC when needed was set up at the time the OTC was removed from bee supply/ag supply store shelves.
Use of the Vita-Life test kits is very helpful in confirming the diagnosis, and gives confidence in deciding on a course of remediation.
Just as an aside on hygienic colonies...I visited a beekeeper recently who was having brood issues that turned out to be EFB. I remarked on the poor brood pattern and he said that pattern was typical of his colonies from advertised high hygienic lines. They don't just clear out sick or dead brood, they clear out half the healthy brood. As a result the colonies, even when healthy and treated for mites, are often very slow to build, and never reach the size or vigour of the non-hygienic colonies...not a trade-off I would be happy with.
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