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Subject:
From:
Bob Harrison <[log in to unmask]>
Reply To:
Informed Discussion of Beekeeping Issues and Bee Biology <[log in to unmask]>
Date:
Thu, 16 Mar 2006 11:24:51 -0600
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Hello Rod &  All,
Dr. Ostiguy said the same thing at our  Missouri/Kansas meeting.

 I did not question her on her findings at the meeting but not what we have
seen dealing with large numbers of PMS deadouts and talks with researchers
in the U.K. (Ball).

The bottom line has been so far that if you control the varroa load the
virus issues are not a problem.

You control the varroa and comb from deadouts with PMS are not a problem.

Not to disrespect what Dr. Ostiguy is saying but what you observe in a
microscope/ small group of hives in the lab setting *can* vary considerably
from what the commercial beekeepers see in the field.


> They determined that, at a critical point, killing the varroa
> did not stop the virus levels from rising.

 I am really glad our research proved the above as a non issue. We worried
the above *would* be true. Dr. Ostiguy might indeed find in her test hives
some rise in virus levels ( after varroa treatrment) but the bottom line
from Brenda Ball and our
research is that if you can *control* the varroa levels virus issues are
minor in commercial beekeeping.

I also do not agree with Dr. Ostiguys views on "organic Honey" but another
issue. I did voice my opinions at the meeting on the subject.
We are in a serious fight with packers over label violations on the use of
the words "local" "raw honey" " country of origin" & "blended".  We have got
proof the packers are cheating but unable to stop the label abuse. Next will
be misuse of the "organic honey" label by packers. In my opinion wide spread
misuse will be done by packers and organic beekeepers will not be able to
stop the misuse.

Back to virus:
 They also found
> that transferring the honey from such a hive that died from
> high virus levels would cause similarly high virus levels in
> the hive that received it.

As long as the virus does not cause problems who really cares?  The U.K. has
volumes on the subject. Why waste precious research dollars on research
already available?


> So if you feed that honey to another hive, you may kill that hive too.

I don't think that's *exactly* what she said Rod. Possibly if the hive has a
very high varroa load the virus (PMS) will rise but not what we saw when we
put new packages on 1200 boxes of PMS deadout comb. The real test of an
hypothesis is in the field with large numbers of hives and not a few hives
in a lab setting.

How many times have the labs gave us a product/ hypothesis  which worked in
the lab to only see the product/ hypothesis  fail in the field?

What Dr. Ostiguy *seems* to be saying is send research dollars so we can
research an unstoppable problem????? In my mind I believe if you control the
varroa the virus problems will go away. Virus can be found in about every
hive. A non issue until varroa loads rise to high levels.

Researchers need to be working on ways to improve the bees immune system
(nutrition?)so the bees can resist virus infection while still having a high
varroa load in the hive.

Bob

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