Interesting that this topic brings out differing viewpoints.

Those with susceptible bees see one thing and the  rest of us see something 
else.

> 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.

> Rothenbuler said a bee could be bred to survive AFB and clean up AFB and 
> started the issue.
> A waste of researcher time in my opinion. Burn or treat I say.

Many would differ, including some of the best and brightest.  That solution 
is maybe the best for those who can't or won't take the easy way out, 
though, and get with the hygienic bee program.

 Hygienic stock is here, it costs no more than susceptible stock, and it is 
powerful.

I have a confession here, folks.  I have confessed before but maybe nobody 
was listening.

Here goes:

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.  I simply bent down the scale cells a bit to detach the 
scale so the bees could it out (scale is hard to remove otherwise) and let 
them go at it.

After a few years without breakdown, my incidence of AFB was very low, even 
with the susceptible stock of that time.  Of course, I was treating 
prophylacticly as documented in my diary back as far as 2000.  At that time, 
after cleaning up the scale, any scale I found was removed and stored for 
melting (never happened - I still have that stack somewhere) but I have to 
admit was not particularly kept out of the reach of my bees (I have no 
beekeeping neighbours).  For all I know there is some scale and honey with 
AFB spores stacked somewhere within reach of my bees now.

Here is the interesting part.

I entirely quit medicating a few years back, and the last AFB I saw was in 
some Australian packages a few years ago.  The Kona stock in the same yards 
was clean other than the occasional suspicious cell or two.  Most people 
would not notice.  I ignored the AFB and the Australians, along with some 
various other hives died of neglect, but not of AFB.  If nothing else, that 
loss proved that all the work I had put into my bees over the years had not 
been a waste, since many hives died within a year after I stopped giving 
them my normal attention.  Previously my losses were small.

At any rate, Some of the hives did not die and I finally got around to 
caring for the bees again.  I started socking the pollen patties to them and 
checked for varroa.  I even gave them one dose of oxalic syrup last fall.  I 
hadn't seen many mites, but figured at that late date, simply running some 
oxalic syrup on them was easier and more likely to get done than mite drops 
and shakes, etc.  (I travel a lot).  FWIW, I really did not enjoy drizzling 
the syrup.  It seemed unnatural, somehow.  Maybe it did some good.  Who 
knows.

As for tracheal and nosema, I never seem to have a problem, but then again, 
I don't manipulate or move hives much and I do feed protein, even now. My 
hives -- all except two -- ate two pounds of Global 15% patties since the 
last time I looked about two weeks ago, before EAS.  My hives are also kept 
very heavy all the time.  I don`t extract.  I just keep splitting.

(Another confession: I have had to give up splitting as planned, and start 
supering.  I had hoped to make one more split this year, but after listening 
to Larry Connor, and calculating, I realize that the first emerging brood 
would now be in mid-September (42 days). I think that is too late for good 
wintering.

With three brood chambers on the splits, I was planning to add more deadout 
broods to get them cleaned up for next year, but the bees are making so much 
honey that I am afraid there would be no room for bees in the broods and I 
have had to stack on supers with a few frames of foundation interspersed to 
keep the bees busy.  Amazingly, these bees are drawing sheets of 
ten-year-old unwaxed plastic foundation quite well!   Of course sometimes 
they get the wrong notion and make a mess, but nine out of ten are worker 
comb, built properly.  I see they are borrowing wax, since the new cells are 
sometimes a bit brown.  Any that are messy, I just scrape off and put back 
in somewhere else.

Just now, I went through 21 hives, looking at brood, since we have been 
discussing AFB, and I am curious to see if I am just blowing smoke. 
Apparently not.  I see no AFB, and I cannot remember when I last added an 
antibiotic.  It has been years.

Don`t forget that some of these frames had been riddled with AFB at some 
time in the past, and never burned, melted or irradiated -- merely cleaned 
up by the bees.  The hives were never scorched or boiled in lye.  Most have 
not even been properly scraped.  (I am a slob). I did see one hive with a 
spotty pattern, but no signs of any disease.  You never know.  Hygienic 
queens can have spotty patterns when challenged, and new queens sometime 
inherit a bad pattern from their predecessor for a while.

Anyhow, if what Bob and many many others say is true, and if anyone should 
get AFB from stopping treatment, it should be me.  Why am I not, I can only 
assume that it is the bees I have.  I get my stock from my friends and they 
are smart beekeepers with a European background.  They use Buckfast, Kona, 
Saskatraz, Russian, and other bees with  a good reputation for hygiene.

There are lots of hygienic bees for sale these days.

Get some and you`ll miss all the fun.

No bonfires, and day after day of heavy extracting. 

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