Here we go again!

[Jon]

Hi Eric
I think a red herring alert should be posted re. the entire business of guttation water.
It is highly unusual for bees to drink guttation water. Why would they do that when there is water in puddles? You only see guttation water early in the day when bees are not really up and about to forage, or after rain when the ground is covered in puddles anyway. There was an Italian researcher, Girolami, who fed bees imidacloprid tainted guttation water with a pipette and killed them. What that proved is anyones guess. At a minimum we now know that insecticide kills insects including bees especially if they are dehydrated and offered a source of water with poison in it.
Bonmatin's work, which is now quite dated, was not replicated by others who set the level of harm at a higher concentration. It mostly seemed to look at what dose of toxin was harmful to bees and he argued that lower levels than those recommended were actually harmful. I haven't read the Tennekes book so I don't know what he adds to the overall picture. I listened to Phil Chandler interviewing him in his podcast and Tennekes sounded as dull as ditchwater, but I guess that is not a crime. Phil made up for Tennekes' lethargy with his 500 word questions. Maybe that stupified him!!

[Eric McArthur]

Hi Eric
I think a red herring alert should be posted re. the entire business of guttation water.
It is highly unusual for bees to drink guttation water. Why would they do that when there is water in puddles? You only see guttation water early in the day when bees are not really up and about to forage, or after rain when the ground is covered in puddles anyway. There was an Italian researcher, Girolami, who fed bees imidacloprid tainted guttation water with a pipette and killed them. What that proved is anyones guess. At a minimum we now know that insecticide kills insects including bees especially if they are dehydrated and offered a source of water with poison in it.
Bonmatin's work, which is now quite dated, was not replicated by others who set the level of harm at a higher concentration. It mostly seemed to look at what dose of toxin was harmful to bees and he argued that lower levels than those recommended were actually harmful. I haven't read the Tennekes book so I don't know what he adds to the overall picture. I listened to Phil Chandler interviewing him in his podcast and Tennekes sounded as dull as ditchwater, but I guess that is not a crime. Phil made up for Tennekes' lethargy with his 500 word questions. Maybe that stupified him!!

Hi Jon
Using the old adage – “A picture is worth a thousand words! How many words do you reckon a video is worth? Follow the link and tell me again that bees do not visit grasses for water. Read the book! Dead bees and birds are also deadly dull!
Eric
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PZZ54VS8qMQ&NR=1

[Eric McArthur]

Hi Jon
Using the old adage – “A picture is worth a thousand words! How many words do you reckon a video is worth? Follow the link and tell me again that bees do not visit grasses for water. Read the book! Dead bees and birds are also deadly dull!
Eric
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PZZ54VS8qMQ&NR=1

If the link doesn't work - no worries Google - bees guttation corn grass

Eric

[Jon]

Eric you must have better eyesight than me.
All I can see is an out of focus bee moving around in out of focus grass in the lens of a shaky photographer.
How do you know it is not collecting pollen. That's what it appears to be doing.
Did Gavin not mention recently finding grass pollen in pollen samples he looked at?

How many times in your forty plus year beekeeping career have you seen bees collecting guttation water and how many times have you seen them collect from other sources such as puddles and pond edges.
I'm not suggesting that bees 'never' collect guttation water but in my experience it is not usual. If it isn't common, it's unlikely to be a cause of bee decline.
Oh yes, bee decline.
40,000 to 120,000 colonies in the UK over the past 30 months.
My own experience is an increase from 4 to 30 in that time, now back to 21 after combining some nucs and having a few dwindle away in the autumn. And I have sold about 8 nucs as well.
I will bet you that the main cause of bee loss in the uk is not pesticides. It is non treatment or inadequate treatment of varroa mites.
If you read biobees.com it seems to be a long list of 'natural beekeepers' aka, non varroa treaters, losing their bees and blaming Bayer.

Here is a better example although it looks more like raindrops or irrigation water on the leaves rather than guttation droplets. if you look at the second video you will see the guttation droplet is exuded from the tip of the maize seedling.
I have sown and cultivated acres of maize in Mexico and I still grow a couple of hundred plants on my allotment where I have most of my (thriving) bees. Actually on reflection, that is definitely not guttation water. Time for another red herring alert thanks to ProBeekepersGermany




This is a Girolami influenced chap feeding poison to bees and falling off his chair with surprise when they die.



None of this is new news Eric.

There was a thread on the bbka site about two years ago titled German researchers kills bees by hand - blame Bayer

[Eric McArthur]

Hi All
Varroa is a major problem, and so is the Beebase advice relative to keeping the mite population below a 1000 mite damage level. With this number of mites in a colony entering winter, the colony is doomed.
The legal”gray area” of the oxalic acid situation discourages many beekeepers from using this critically important treatment.
That formic acid is still illegal is a travesty. Beekeepers need the tools and the correct advice to weather Varroa. The pesticides problem does not help.
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Jon
It is highly unusual for bees to drink guttation water.
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This is a purely subjective opinion.
.................................................. .................................................. ...............Jon How many times in your forty plus year beekeeping career have you seen bees collecting guttation water?
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I know a number of beekeepers who are in denial that bees forage on hawthorn, despite the fact that in many seasons in Scotland it can produce a mono floral harvest. It’s results that count.
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Jon Are the neonicotinoids really worse than the ones they are replacing?
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Have a look at the fall in honey yields of French beekeepers during the years 1994 until imidacloprid was banned!
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.Jon 40,000 to 120,000 colonies in the UK over the past 30 months.
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When the Swedish government carried out the first population Census in the late 1900 it was assumed that the population numbered around 20 million. The Establishment went into shock when the true figure of 2 million emerged. Check it out!!
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Jon Might be difficult to separate the negative effects of monoculture from the negative effects of pesticides.
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Classic double negative!
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Hi Jon

Have your say. I’ll be back soon!

Eric

[Jon]

Have your say. I’ll be back soon!
Eric

Was that you in Terminator?

I know a number of beekeepers who are in denial that bees forage on hawthorn,

Mine forage on hawthorn, but not every year. I think they collect more pollen than nectar but you can get a crop from it so I am with you on that one.

The legal”gray area” of the oxalic acid situation discourages many beekeepers from using this critically important treatment.

I don't think to many worry about that. It is just a hive cleaning process after all and that is quite legal!!

I treated 21 colonies and nucs this week, total cost about 75p and most of that was for the 400g of sugar in the mix.
You can't beat a varroa treatment at a cost of under 4p per colony. I had a look today and very few mites have dropped so far. The strongest colony I have had dropped 25 so that is a result and it will probably drop some more. 25 mites could grow to 1600 between March and September and as you know, 1000 mites is in the problem area.
Eric, you are different from a lot of the pesticide headbangers in that you sensibly treat for varroa.
A lot of beekeepers are losing colonies to varroa and blaming Bayer.

When the Swedish government carried out the first population Census in the late 1900 it was assumed that the population numbered around 20 million. The Establishment went into shock when the true figure of 2 million emerged. Check it out!!

I doff my cap to you with regard to your knowledge of early 20th century Sweden. Remind me again what it has to do with bee decline.

So you reckon the british countryside is littered with empty bee boxes.

[Eric McArthur]

Hi Jon

Jon
I don't think to many worry about that. It is just a hive cleaning process after all and that is quite legal!!
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Interesting! When did you start using oxalic acid as a hive cleaner – powerful stuff if 50 mls cleans a hive, even an empty hive. Do you use a cloth soaked in the recommended 50ml, 3.5% solution on the interior walls?
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Jon
The strongest colony I have had dropped 25 so that is a result and it will probably drop some more. 25 mites could grow to 1600 between March and September and as you know, 1000 mites is in the problem area.
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Your 26 mite drop inferred as an overwintering mite population, implies for a perfect understanding of mite population dynamics! What is your mite drop per day to permit such a guesstimate? 1000 mites as a blanket recommendation with no qualifying reference to overwintering colonies as in Beebase – is not “ a problem area” it is a “disaster area”!
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Jon
Eric, you are different from a lot of the pesticide head bangers.....
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Todays head banger - tomorrows soothsayer!
History is punctuated with head bangers – like Galileo, Marco Polo, Dzierzon, Karl von Frisch; the list is actually endless. Sadly you do not seem to warrant a place! These people were just a bit more observant that their contemporaries!
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