Not an image you wish to see first thing in the morning, afternoon or late evening, or whenever you’re reading this for that matter, but there it is the Varroa Destructor; the bane of a beekeepers life. Sound a bit too dramatic? Well, actually no. The definition of destructor according to Collins Dictionary is:

noun

1. A furnace or incinerator for the disposal of refuse

2. A device used to blow up a dangerously defective missile

And there you have it. Such is the impact of the Varroa mite on a colony of honeybees it has had the noun destructor added to its name.

Why do I write about this little, and it is little, mite? Because, dear readers, much to my chagrin one of my hives has had a rather worryingly high varroa count.

At this point I have to tell you that, shocking as it may sound, every colony in the UK has Varroa and it has become the most serious pest of European honeybees across the globe.

Unhappy looking brood frame. © MERIET DUNCAN

I noticed that, in one of my hives, the brood looked odd, in a way I’d never seen before. Some of the brood looked as if they had caved in and some of it had little openings in them. I googled various diseases and the one that looked the most similar was European Foul Brood, (EFB). Well, let that be a lesson to me. I went into a decline as this was serious stuff. I emailed a member of the Ludlow And District Beekeepers’ Association, which I belong to, Hamish Barbour, and he advised me to get in touch with The National Bee Unit. Ok, so I’d made the classic mistake. It turned out to be the equivalent of googling a headache and coming to the conclusion I had a brain tumour. Enter The National Bee Unit (https://nationalbeeunit.com/home-2 and a wonderful gentleman called Jack, who, having looked at the photograph and video I sent him, got back to me immediately and said he thought it was Varroa and said he would guide me through the steps to take in order to confirm his thoughts. It turned out he was right.

So…

What is Varroa and where has it come from?

It’s a parasitic mite of honey bee brood which, if it manages to overwhelm a colony, leads to a disease called parasitic mite syndrome and if left untreated can kill an entire colony. Varroa Jacobson was first discovered in Asia in 1904 on the Asian honeybee, Apis Cerana. Then, as a result of the movement of the western Honeybee, Apis mellifera, in and out of Asia, the Varroa mite became established first in Africa and then in Europe. It quickly spread around the world. By 1987 it was found in the US and on the 4th April 1992 it was found in the UK. Australia is now the only continent in the world not to have the Varroa mite. An Australian researcher, Dr. Denis Anderson, renamed it the Varroa destructor because of it’s wordwide damaging effect on honeybees.

How does it spread?

Varroa mites don’t have wings, they attach themselves to the backs of both worker and drone bees, (although they do have a preference for the drone brood), and manage to get into other hives via various acts of the bees like drifting, robbing, absconding, swarming and human interference.

Drifting • Mostly it’s the drone bees who drift into other hives as they have no loyalty to their queen and colony and they are accepted by colonies other than those in which they were raised.

Robbing • Worker bees will go into weak and failing colonies to steal their honey and pollen. They can either enter with a mite and that mite will slip unnoticed into an uncapped cell, (* see below), or they can pick up a mite while inside and take it back to their colony.

Absconding • Irritation caused by a high mite infestation in a colony can cause the bees to abscond. The varroa mite will travel with them and this makes them an infestation risk to other colonies.

Human interferance • Sometimes beekeepers can swap frames from one hive to another and if that frame has Varroa on it then it moves from one colony to another.

Swarming • When a colony splits and swarms, approximately 25% of all the Varroa mites travel with the swarm to its new site. As with the absconding bees, the swarm becomes a danger to existing colonies in the area.

*Once inside the hive the mite slips, unnoticed into vulnerable uncapped brood cells where they lie in wait until the bees cap the brood. Once a cell is capped the mother mite, climbs onto the cocoon of the developing bee and begins to feed off its blood. Within three days, she lays the first egg which always develops into a male and then she lays one female egg every 30 hours over the next week or so. As each female mite matures she mates with her brother. By the time the young bee develops and emerges from its mite infested cell, as many as three fertilised mites will come with the worker bee and 5 with the drone and so the cycle continues.

What can we do?

We can tackle it in several ways and do! As the mite has a preference for drone brood, one method is to place a super frame with fresh worker foundation in to the middle of a colony. (The Varroa mite prefers being in the centre of a colony). The workers will pull out the come to provide worker cells for the queen to lay in and, underneath the super frame, (which is half the size of a brood frame - see below), they will always build drone comb. Once the drone brood is sealed, the super frame is removed and the drone brood is sliced off from the bottom of the frame. However, you must keep an eye on it as if you leave it there for longer than 23 days the drones will hatch and you will have increased the number of Varroa in your colony. You can then replace the super frame and do the same again until the end of the mating season when the worker bees will start to build worker foundation…. ahhhh the wonders of nature.

Drone comb built and the brood covered underneath the worker brood in the super frame. ©MERIET DUNCAN

Varroacides are the most popular method of control as they are effective at killing the varroa mites. Below is a table showing the various methods of Varroa control according to the time of year and how to apply them.

So… having told you all about the Varroa Destructor and the fact that I discovered one of my hives had a worrying amount in it… the following 3 videos show, in as much detail as I have been able to video myself, my journey so far with my unhappy hive.

All of this has been done with the help of Jack Silberrad who comes with these impressive qualifications…BSc Hons Ind. Dip. BeeFarming | Regional Bee Inspector, Western Region |National Bee Unit |

I’m not there yet. Having just treated them, well, about 3 days ago, I have to wait another 3 days, see how many have fallen. Clean the board and replace it for four days and do the count again. Fingers crossed for this hive as, inspite of the Varroa, they appear to be strong and they have never been angsty when I’ve been in there to help them!

All of this has been done with the help of a gentleman by the name of Jack Silberrad who comes with these impressive qualifications…BSc Hons Ind. Dip. BeeFarming | Regional Bee Inspector, Western Region |National Bee Unit | https://nationalbeeunit.com/home-2

I’m not there yet. Having just treated them about 3 days ago, I have to wait another 3 days, see how many have fallen. Clean the board and replace it for four days and do the count again. Fingers crossed for this hive as, in spite of the Varroa, they appear to be strong and have never been angsty when I’ve been in there to help them!

If you check out my You Tube Channel then you will be able to see the final outcome, hopefully next week. If not, I’m sure I will manage to fit in the results in the next blog!

With all that doom and gloom I thought I’d add something I just found to be very amusing during the writing of this blog.

If I can’t find images among my own photographs to use for my blog, I will google them and always credit whosoever’s image I use. I was being lazy, as I thought I’d have to go through nye on 18 years of pictures to find the one that came to mind so I just googled super frame with drone brood and this great picture came up. I thought ‘that’s perfect… who do I credit?’ It was mine!!!!

And so it is, yet another blog completed. Another reason, as I always say, you just can’t ‘keep bees’ you have to look after them. And the way to do this is to join a club. Have support and learn about the care of them. Honeybees and humans now have a symbiotic relationship… we need them and they need us. Hopefully, one day we will find a cure for all the ills that domesticating them over the centuries have caused, but until them… don’t just keep bees…. look after them.

Talking of lovely pictures, and you know how I love to end a blog with a lovely image and saying… I love this… a heart shaped swarm and it sits rather nicely with something I heard while listening to a talk by the wonderful late Richard Rohr - an American Franciscan priest.

“The origin, the engine and the goal of life is love...”

Surely that is the very essence of the honeybees existence. which is why they are so successful.

VARROA DESTRUCTOR