# Sugar dust for mites and other questions



## MikeParks (Apr 2, 2006)

I was reading and watching a video sample of how to dust a hive with powdered sugar to reduce mites. The person suggests doing this for 6 weeks to get emerging mites (which makes a lot of sense), but I had some questions...

1) Won't giving the bees so much sugar reduce their desire to forage nector (and make honey)?

2) If you have an open bottom screen board (which I thought for summers would make a lot of sense) and you do this, the mites fall to the ground, but if you don't clean this up won't the bees just go down there to get the sugar and end up picking up the mites? (A closed screen board will allow mites to crawle back up, and some say use a sticky board of such, but won't the powdered sugar simply coat it and the mites will be able to walk on it?)

Now a question that is not related 

3) Winter in maine doesn't have 60 degree days (or at least I haven't seen one) so according to the idea you should never open a hive below 60 degrees means the hive won't be opened until mid May to late May in most years. So what would you do to keep track of their status? (I know you can lift the hive to get an idea of weight but a beginner won't really know what he should expect).

Thanks
Mike


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## Michael Bush (Oct 26, 2008)

>1) Won't giving the bees so much sugar reduce their desire to forage nector (and make honey)?

No. They will not harvest the sugar. They will groom it off.

>2) If you have an open bottom screen board (which I thought for summers would make a lot of sense) and you do this, the mites fall to the ground, but if you don't clean this up won't the bees just go down there to get the sugar and end up picking up the mites?

The mites will desiccate and die reasonably quickly.

> (A closed screen board will allow mites to crawle back up, and some say use a sticky board of such, but won't the powdered sugar simply coat it and the mites will be able to walk on it?)

Not really.

>3) Winter in maine doesn't have 60 degree days (or at least I haven't seen one) so according to the idea you should never open a hive below 60 degrees means the hive won't be opened until mid May to late May in most years.

Correct.

> So what would you do to keep track of their status? (I know you can lift the hive to get an idea of weight but a beginner won't really know what he should expect).

Listen. Watch on a warm day (40's to 50's) for bees flying.


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## MikeParks (Apr 2, 2006)

Michael Bush said:


> >1) Won't giving the bees so much sugar reduce their desire to forage nector (and make honey)?
> 
> No. They will not harvest the sugar. They will groom it off.


Thanks for the answers...
I still am wondering about #1 though, I thought some people said they fed the bees using newspaper and cane sugar. If this is so why wouldn't they eat the powdered sugar?

Thanks
Mike


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## Iddee (Sep 25, 2005)

They prefer nectar, and will only eat sugar when nectar is not available. They will pass it up when the flowers are blooming.


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## alleyyooper (Apr 22, 2005)

Get in the habit of lifting the hive thru the summer and make a mental note of how it feels. During the winter do those lifts and try to remember how the hive felt in the summer.

 Al


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## beehoppers (Jun 3, 2008)

>I still am wondering about #1 though, I thought some people said they fed the bees using newspaper and cane sugar. If this is so why wouldn't they eat the powdered sugar?<

They still eat a bit of the powdered sugar, but the dusting event is something they deal with as an intrusion, and invasion, a blizzard. They groom it off and fan it away, taking mites along. It also serves to cause the mites to loose their grip.

Keep this in mind. You can sugar dust a hive during honey production if you find a hive in trouble. Just dust under the supers.


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## Michael Bush (Oct 26, 2008)

>I still am wondering about #1 though, I thought some people said they fed the bees using newspaper and cane sugar. If this is so why wouldn't they eat the powdered sugar?

First, powdered sugar in no way resembles white sugar. It has a lot of corn starch in it. Second, the bees don't go that crazy over the white sugar either. They just eat it when they are hungry and make no real effort to store it like they do syrup or nectar.


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## Me Beekeeper (Jan 6, 2009)

In addition to using the powdered sugar, sumac also makes a difference when smoking. This past year when I ran out of sumac, which is what I've used for the past 4 years, I had a mite bloom that had to be dealt with like I'd never seen before. Sugar, sumac and screen bottom boards make a big difference. IPM = Intergrated Pest Management Keep'm Buzz'n :icecream:


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## MikeParks (Apr 2, 2006)

I have read that tobacco smoke will cause the mites to drop.
How would this effect the hive/honey? I would imagine it would not take much (probably soak the tobacco so it smolders instead of burning).

Mike


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## Me Beekeeper (Jan 6, 2009)

Well, what ever you use for smoker fuel is a smudge. It's not burning the way you would envision a fire. :flame: It's expected to be a cold smoke, more like fumes. I know tobacco has been used for many years. I'm not familiar with it causing mites to drop :lookout: as research has shown sumac and a few other fuels do. So, as fumes, the smoke doesn't bother the honey. You don't try to smoke the bees out, just a few light puffs will do it. It gets their attention then they stay occupied while you check the hive out.


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## reginabee (May 15, 2008)

Me Beekeeper said:


> In addition to using the powdered sugar, sumac also makes a difference when smoking. This past year when I ran out of sumac, which is what I've used for the past 4 years, I had a mite bloom that had to be dealt with like I'd never seen before. Sugar, sumac and screen bottom boards make a big difference. IPM = Intergrated Pest Management Keep'm Buzz'n :icecream:


where do you get sumac??.. I have never heard of sumac as smoker fuel and mite control...sounds good!


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## Durandal (Aug 19, 2007)

MikeParks said:


> 3) Winter in maine doesn't have 60 degree days (or at least I haven't seen one) so according to the idea you should never open a hive below 60 degrees means the hive won't be opened until mid May to late May in most years. So what would you do to keep track of their status? (I know you can lift the hive to get an idea of weight but a beginner won't really know what he should expect).


I've been meaning to come back to this topic and simply did not have the a chance to do so. I typed out a rather lengthy response, some of which duplicates others' responses on here so I'll tackle the last question.

As mentioned you can track by weight.

You can also look at debris on the Screened Bottom Board (SBB) inserts. This can be done without effecting the colony (or at least not in any way I have seen). I have found it gives you a great snapshot of the colony. 

A) You get to see where they are on the box in 2-dimensions (chances are they are working higher up into the box and I think this changes more than a lot of books lead on. Literally, you'll know which frames they are on the and the dimension of the cluster.

B) You can see if they are feeding or tossing sugar, opening honey cells, dropping mites, having bowel troubles, the list goes on.

C) You can gauge the amount of activity to more often you do it OR by the amount of debris.

I checked these on Thursday. I try to leave them on for seven days. The last time they were cleaned was the previous Friday (6 days, but who is counting ).




























Notice how each board has its own distinct fingerprint of the colony?

Sometimes they leave almost no debris because they are locked in so tight. I thought I had one of the six die off on me. Only to see it humming right along our last "warm" spike.

SBBs have lots of uses!

Hope that helps.










B) You can see


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