>Numbers would be interesting.  

Numbers, I never seem to get 100 bees so I hope I am not screwing up the testing by having lower amounts bees. The reasons I am not getting 100 bees is I am not brushing them from the frames into a box to scoop them up. I am using a jar over the vent hole on the top brood box to catch them, getting the guard bees I guess.

So far what we call the greenhouse hives I have yet to shake a mite off any bees from hive #4.
0 mites / 54 bees tested two different jars of them because I could not believe it and I am going to do a different hive from that area next time because hive #4 seems mite-less.

The blueberry yard tested one hive #26, will test more.
6 mites / 58 bees

The rest I have written down in notes I have at the shop but it has not been as bad as the 17 mites on 63 bees that started this whole affair. It is more like hive #26.

>Also, is it possible that a hive or yard were missed in the previous treatment?  
> Another possibility is that the strips were placed at locations in the hives or time of year when the bees were not in contact with them?  

This could be true things where not to great last year for the humans so it would affect the care of the hives.

For the strip placement.

Which brood box is the best place to put the strips? Top or bottom? I have placed the strips I have in now between frames 3 and 4 and 7 and 8 in the top box and put entrance reducers in. Do you think it will contaminate the foundation of a super by putting a wet super on top of the top hive body? I want to get the bees to go up and clean the wet super this will get them to crawl over the strips. Then I pull the super off when I take out the strips. I hope not because I have done this with some hives to see if it works out. I have been thinking of ways to make the bees crawl over the strips and they are always crazy over wet supers so I thought I could lure them up over the strips. Or should I just put them all in the bottom box? I would hate to have to pull them out of the bottom in 30 days because it is going to be really cold here.

On to my test:

My resistance test is taking a while I have had some complications. I put the bees in the jar with my piece of Apistan strip stapled to a card, it was late in the afternoon though the instructions said 6 hours I thought well... I think I will check them in the morning. That morning every bee was dead in that jar. I thought/hoped they starved to death or something since we had already put strips on about 10 hives. I go get more bees from a different hive that I have not done anything with as far as checking for mites, it happened to be close by. I get some in the jar and look an hour later and almost all are dead. Now I am really worried, I am wondering if it is the plastic lid, I have been cutting screen circles and using wide mouth canning jars with the canning rings holding on the screen for my bee jars but happened to grab a plastic screened lid for my Apistan test jar which is made for sprouting edible sprouts. Also I just had taken a wide mouth canning jar off the shelf in the back room of the shop that was up side down, because it was up side down it was clean and did not wash it. So I am thinking it was the jar? Or the lid? I am really hoping the strips are not that toxic. I have had a jar of pet bees that live inside a toilet paper roll and I feed them cappings once in a while. I have had them for a long time. I felt bad having to sacrifice them for science but I put the strip in with them and brought them home and put them on the kitchen table to keep a close eye on them. Not one died, I left the piece of strip in for over 24 hours since I have been worried about what the heck was going on. They are healthy and happy so I know there had to have been something in the jar I picked up in the shop or on the plastic lid I used that was toxic to bees. So I am back to starting again. I will use a jar just out of the dishwasher, rinsed well, and a newly cut screen circle and a new canning jar rim. Tomorrow I will go to hive #10, it has the most mites because I took samples there the other day from all the hives and that hive is loaded. Those hives are the hives that the window bees came from that started this whole thing. I will get as many bees as I can, by putting the jar over the vent hole on the top hive body and jiggle it. Then I may finally have some results on the resistance test.

So I am starting from scratch again and will report in soon. Long story I know… my days are longer than this story believe me. 

Karen

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