So I pulled the inspection boards on the bottom of my hives this past weekend. I apologize, no photos (impossible to use phone w gauntlets on) I found larvae some about 1” long ,3-4mm wide and some about 1/2 in long and about 1mm wide. Couple hives had adult moths crawling on the inspection boards. I pulled a few frames and saw no beetles or larvae in the hive. And saw none of the filmy webbing or slimy honey cells.
I scraped all the inspection boards clean, and some webby stuff was there and some trails in it, but again saw nothing in the hive.
It sounds to me like you saw wax moth activity. Keep up the inspections & keep everything neat & tidy, with minimal bee deaths & damaged comb… By doing that, you’ll make your own good luck.
Well I went down this morning to inspect and to do mite counts. I only got through 9 of the 15 hives, the heat ran me off. Also the bees were pretty testy. I’ll finish up tomorrow. Good news is, I only found a few moths/larvae on the inspection boards this time, and saw no moth/beetle activity in the hives themselves. Bad news is, I saw 2 hives with mite counts of about 6-8%
Did the rest of the hives this morning, looks like 5 out of 15 have mite levels that warrant treatment. More good news … none of the hives have moth or beetle evidence in the hive itself. Just one had another larva since yesterday.
So … I nee d to treat 5 of the fifteen hives. I was considering treatment with Apiguard this first time around, since it’s screamingly hot in Texas right now.
The documentation suggests using 2 25g packs one week apart during very hot weather, rather than 2 50g packs two weeks apart. Sounds like a dumb question, but would it be the same to just use one 50g pack one week apart? I cannot seem to find the 25g packs
I had a hive that just didn’t make it. Comb was ok but it was time to cut losses. Pulled out frames and let bees clean it away from apiary. After they finished I saw tiny wax moths and a few hive beetles. Wrapped up and stuck in the freezer. Eventually will pull out of freezer and store with paramoth somewhere dry.