Last work with the bees for this year - formic acid and oxalic acid treatment

Go Movember :)

At the end of the season the bees are treated with first formic acid in October and then with oxalic acid in November.

I performed the formic acid treatment start October this year. For 4 day in a row 30 ml of formic acid was distributed on a cloth and put on the bottom plate of the hive. This was a massacre of the family. Usually dead bees are carried away the the workers but this time several hundreds dead bees were scattered all around the entrance of the hive. I could only hope that the queen was still OK. 

Above: Evidence of massacre of formic acid treatment :(

I checked the tray 2 weeks after but I could only count about 160 mites.

Last weekend (16th November) it was time for the oxalic acid treatment. This is done by spraying an oxalic acid solution ON the bees. 35 ml of the solution was spread as evenly as possible on the bees between each honey board. 

Yesterday I went back to check on the bees and I must say that I expected the worst. But I was relieved to find that there was not many dead bees. When checking the tray I could count about 400 mites. This is not bad considering I have heard of hives with mite counts of 2000-4000. 

Above: Every black dot is a mite - and this is not that bad....

So now there should be no more work with the bees until the spring - besides an occasional check/cleaning of the tray once in a while.