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Small Hive Beetle Infestation

Thread - Hive and to Hold,  Bees and Beetles Again

On 12/11/2002, Toby Fiander wrote:

Is there any hope of eradicating the small hive beetle from beehives?

Below my signature thingummy is am article which appears in today's SMH about whether it is feasible to rid the Sydney area of bees, and then to restock.  The problem seems to be that there are more feral bees than the other kind and almost all of them have infected hives.  At least one school of thought is that eradicating feral bees is likely to cost tens of millions and may prove impossible in any case.

Is there a pest of small hive beetles that might be introduced or are we really stuck with yet another introduced pest for good and all?

I suppose this is once again a demonstration that quarantine has been and continues to be so under-resourced.

SMH Article (12/11/02) The mission: eradicate every bee colony in the Sydney basin and beyond.

And whose idea is it? Sections of the honey industry.

Bee breeders, fearing for their export market, say the drastic action is needed to wipe out the small hive beetle, which came to Sydney undetected from South Africa about a year ago.

The beetle has caused very little trouble since. It is not a predator or competitor of the bee. However, the selling of live bees to northern hemisphere nations is a small but growing industry, and it will grind to a halt once these nations refuse to import potentially infected hives.

For two hours yesterday, the consultative committee on emergency animal diseases - which will advise the federal and state governments on what action to take - considered the proposal. No-one has identified how the eradication might be carried out. Some suggest chemicals, petrol fumes and even deep-freezing techniques.

 Regardless of the method adopted, the entire Sydney basin would have to be kept bee-free for three to six months to ensure the beetles had nothing to live on. Then the area could be repopulated with bees from uninfected hives elsewhere.

A specialist in honey bees at Sydney University and a senior lecturer in the school of biological sciences, Dr Ben Oldroyd, has some simple advice: forget about it.

In a recent study, Dr Oldroyd established that between 50 and 150 feral bee colonies exist per square kilometre.

"Every feral colony anyone has looked at has been infested," he said. "Eradication is impossible, it's crazy, it can't be done. It's preposterous. If they were serious about eradicating every feral bee in the Sydney basin it would cost tens of millions and I don't think there's a hope in Hades of it working."

The committee failed to come to any conclusion yesterday, but it will reconvene next week to again consider the problem.

The plan could also cover other parts of NSW and Queensland where infected hives have been found. The committee estimates the cost would be more than $6 million in NSW alone, and tax-payers would be asked to pay half.

[ends]

Podargus responded:

Toby asked:

> Is there any hope of eradicating the small hive beetle from beehives?

Although I am a member of the grandly named Response Team I have avoided mentioning it on the list to date, mostly owing to the large number of rumours circulating.

As the beetle has been here for over a year there is in my opinion no chance of eradication.  I'd like to think there was, but as it has already been moved to QLD. this seems impossible.

> Below my signature thingummy is am article which appears in today's SMH
> about whether it is feasible to rid the Sydney area of bees, and then to
> restock.  The problem seems to be that there are more feral bees than the
> other kind and almost all of them have infected hives.  At least one school
> of thought is that eradicating feral bees is likely to cost tens of millions
> and may prove impossible in any case.

The cost would be worth it if it were possible.  The export value of bees is around two million per year and growing.  This will stop it dead as the only places that have the beetle are Africa and USA.

> Is there a pest of small hive beetles that might be introduced or are we
> really stuck with yet another introduced pest for good and all?

There is not a lot known about the beetle's natural enemies in Africa where it is not regarded as a problem to the bees that they have there (a subspecies).  In the few years it has been in the states it has caused some havoc although doesn't appear to have moved very far.

There is a hope here that it may not prove to be a huge problem owing to the large number of ants in Australia.  The hope is that during the beetles pupa stage in the ground ants may act as a control.  That and our almost total reliance on migratory beekeeping in the commercial sector MAY help.

> I suppose this is once again a demonstration that quarantine has been and
> continues to be so under-resourced.

I agree with the sentiments, but because it was seen, but incompetently handled a year or so ago, we have as far as I know, little idea of where and how it got here.

The SMH is not a report full of accurate information so I will comment on it.

> SMH Article (12/11/02)
> The mission: eradicate every bee colony in the Sydney basin and beyond.
> And whose idea is it? Sections of the honey industry.
> Bee breeders, fearing for their export market, say the drastic action is
> needed to wipe out the small hive beetle, which came to Sydney undetected
> from South Africa about a year ago.

We do not know, at least no one has suggested to me, that SA is the source, it could equally be USA.  It was seen about a year ago by at least two people, including Ben Oldroyd, but the appropriate people approached did not follow up.

It is interesting that the 'sentinel hives' set up by industry and AQIS at points of entry do not have the beetle.  So how it got to the Hawksbury is a mystery.  It is reported to also be able to live/survive on soft fruits. There are therefore a few possibilities that come to mind, but libel laws prevent me from mentioning them except in the pub.

> The beetle has caused very little trouble since. It is not a predator or
> competitor of the bee. However, the selling of live bees to northern
> hemisphere nations is a small but growing industry, and it will grind to a
> halt once these nations refuse to import potentially infected hives.

It is true that only small numbers are being found in hives now.  Whether this is going to stay that way is a moot point.  Maybe the conditions in the Hawksbury area are not to its liking.  The Beerwah lot though may be more of a problem as the climate there is more like the areas of USA where it has been disastrous.

It IS a predator of the hive.  It eats eggs and larvae, as well as stored pollen.  In heavy infestations it also ruins the stored honey making it unsaleable.  In heavy infestations bees will abscond.

> For two hours yesterday, the consultative committee on emergency animal
> diseases - which will advise the federal and state governments on what
> action to take - considered the proposal. No-one has identified how the
> eradication might be carried out. Some suggest chemicals, petrol fumes and 
> even deep-freezing techniques.

The real problem is the beetles habit of pupating in the soil.  Also if the work that suggests it can live on some soft fruits, then it may well be impossible.

> Regardless of the method adopted, the entire Sydney basin would have to be
> kept bee-free for three to six months to ensure the beetles had nothing to
> live on. Then the area could be repopulated with bees from uninfected hives elsewhere.

See comments on soft fruits above.  The rest of the genus are sap suckers and there is also some thought that this species might get some succour that way.

> A specialist in honey bees at Sydney University and a senior lecturer in the
> school of biological sciences, Dr Ben Oldroyd, has some simple advice:  forget about it.

Ben has some self interest here.  He is three years into a study and would lose all that work if eradication were to be attempted.

Bill (WM) added:

>From an American perspective...

Strong hives are probably the best protection, and weak hives should be combined or requeened, but care should be taken against using infested equipment on non-infested hives. Protection of stored equipment is recommended and supers with honey should not be left standing for any length of time. PDB (paradichlorobenzene) has been used for protecting empty stored combs. Coumaphos bee strips (Bayer Corporation) have been approved for use in hives for the control of small hive beetles in some states under an emergency registration. Check with your State Apiary Inspector about whether coumaphos strips can be used legally.

Podargus responded:

Whatever may happen in the future it will cost.  It will mean a change in some of the 'normal' management practices we now use.  The industry in Australia has been making strenuous efforts to avoid using chemicals.  At
this time there is nothing registered for use in this country that could be used for the Small Hive Beetle.  Emergency use can be granted for an eradication program, but whether a company would feel that the market here is big enough to justify the costs of registration is open.  Coumaphos is used in the States for varroa mite control.  Something that thankfully we do not have.  At the moment.

Freezing is a possibility.  There has been a move over recent years to use cool rooms for the control of wax moth, a natural pest of bees.  Still they don't come cheap and the cost of getting 3 phase power is prohibitive in
many areas.

And in a later post :

The info below has just come in.

' Preliminary DNA analysis suggests the Small Hive beetles are not closely related to American beetles, but share much greater similarity with beetles from South Africa.  Further work will continue to further refine this information.'

Also

www.agric.nsw.gov.au/smallhivebeetle

Peter Macinnis added:

I have a bit of a conspiracy mind-set sometimes.  While simple stuff-ups may be to blame, it could also be small-scale agricultural bioterrorism.  And not necessarily from "foreigners" -- can anybody tell me what happened in the case of the Kiwi accused of introducing an apple pest into Adelaide?  I think it was called fire-something -- if anybody can give me even that name, it would help.

Meanwhile, the US has brought out a report on ag bioterrorism, and suppressed all the case studies in case bad people get ideas -- one that has leaked out is a scenario where BSE is spread in the US, but no mention is made of the cervid prionic disease, chronic wasting disease or CWD -- which may, or may not, transfer to humans and/or cattle, and which is being spread by conservationists as they move captive-breeding stock into new areas.

Some days, you just can't win.

> ... I think it was called fire-something --
> if anybody can give me even that name, it would help.

> Meanwhile, the US has brought out a report on ag bioterrorism, and
> suppressed all the case studies in case bad people get ideas -- one
> that has leaked out is a scenario where BSE is spread in the US, but
> no mention is made of the cervid prionic disease, chronic wasting
> disease or CWD -- which may, or may not, transfer to humans and/or
> cattle, and which is being spread by conservationists as they move
> captive-breeding stock into new areas.

Peter responded:

I did a filler piece last month -- I am flat out, so here it is in raw form.

Is chronic wasting disease BSE in deer?

A relative (at least) of bovine spongiform encephalopathy, also called BSE or mad cow disease, appears to be spreading among deer populations in the USA, and some of this spread may have been caused by attempts to repopulate areas where deer species have died out. Chronic wasting
disease or CWD was recorded in the Rocky Mountains in the 1960s, but now has spread across the midwest.

Like BSE and the human equivalent, Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (CJD), CWD appears to be a prionic disease, caused by misshapen proteins that cause other similar proteins also to collapse into a new and useless shape. An estimated 60% of people in the affected region eat venison
or elk, and while there is no evidence of transmission so far, British cases of 'variant CJD' or vCJD, are thought to have come from people eating cattle with BSE, while BSE is thought to have arisen from cattle being fed on protein derived from sheep suffering from scrapie.

Some American venison eaters are said to have died of neurological conditions that might be a human form of CWD, but as yet, there is no clear evidence of humans being infected. A greater worry would arise if CWD had transferred on the range from cattle to deer, and given that the disease is one of the candidates for use in bioterrorism (even if it is less likely than most), a significant research budget has been set aside to look into the problem. Much of the effort will
go into ways of identifying infection before symptoms appear.

**********

I will do more on this later -- I picked up some good stuff in the US in June last, on this.

MORE BEE STUFF
The Queensland Bee Keepers Association says a decision on eradicating an exotic pest that has infiltrated apiaries in Queensland and New South Wales will be made next week.

The small hive beetle has been discovered in several areas of New South Wales and on Queensland's Sunshine Coast.

Quarantine zones have been established to reduce the risk of beetles spreading to other hives.

Bee Keepers Association vice-president Trevor Weatherhead says a meeting next Monday will decide on an eradication program.

"If there was an eradication program undertaken, what would happen is the hives found with the beetles would be destroyed and compensation paid to the bee keepers," he said.

"The boxes and that would be saved, they would just be frozen to make sure nothing would survive in them and then they could use them at a later stage and that's the way we'd sort of go about it."

[ends]

Toby replied:

It would be a shame not to try to eradicate the SHB.  It would not be possible to know that everything had been done that could reasonably bee with out trying... [oops]....

Does this mean we can expect tree feeling to control the feral bees or some other strategy?

and in a follow-up message:

I seek the indulgence of the list, as I momentarily confused tree feeling with tree felling.  Perhaps one might be more appropriate in the circumstances than the other.

Toby Fiander replied:

It occurred to me that local naturalists may have varying views about killing all the bees in an area.  One I know and with whom I work too infrequently reads this list, I think, although he has never admitted to it.  I have mentioned my eminent colleague obliquely in previous posts.  His specialty is the Cumberland Plain Woodland and he has considerable knowledge of its fauna from interest and PhD studies.

I would be interesting to know what he thinks of removing all feral bee hives from the Cumberland Plain and beyond.  Assuming Danny does not instantly delurk at the mention of his name, I will ask what he thinks when
we speak at his Christmas bash in the coming week.  A number of other ecologists of local and regional significance are likely to be in attendance - conversation will be most interesting.

Toby wrote:

This week I attended the Christmas party of an ecologist whose PhD is in progress and deals with the Cumberland Plain Woodland.  Danny, who is about my age and once taught science at high school, happens to know most about lizards, but his knowledge of almost anything to do with area is good - almost encyclopedic (sic).

There was not a lot of time to talk.  We arrived late and left early due to a certain teenage person residing with us being in fairly serious trouble at school - something to do with notes and some of the worst attempts at forgery I have ever seen, but I digress.

It was not clear to me whether native bees are affected by the Small Hive Beetle, so I have assumed for this discussion that they are not.

However, the long and short of it is that he thinks:

• the effect of removing European bees from the area would be highly desirable for the native species - indeed most native species,
• finding feral beehives is not really that difficult, but the resources required to do all the necessary work in a season would be formidable,
• assembly and training of the required people would probably take 12 months and would cost a lot,
• one of the risks is that the weather would intervene causing the project to be incomplete, which is likely to mean that the work has to be undertaken the following season, as if nothing had occurred the previous season.

It may now be entirely academic, but he said he would like to be part of it, if it happens.  Given his knowledge, background and organisational skills, there does not seem to be much doubt about that anyway.

All quarantine and movement restrictions placed on NSW beekeepers in areas where the exotic bee pest Small Hive Beetle has been found will be lifted today.

NSW Chief Veterinary Officer (CVO) Dr Bruce Christie said movement restrictions on bees and bee products are being lifted in the wake of the National Emergency Animal Disease Management Group's (NMG) decision that eradication of the beetle is not feasible.

The NMG, which consists of the heads of Australia's agricultural departments and CEO's of affected peak industry bodies, considered advice from the Consultative Committee on Emergency Animal Diseases (CCEAD) on whether the beetle could be eradicated from Australia, as well as evidence of its further spread.

Dr Christie said the NMG decided at a meeting last night to develop a national strategy to assist beekeepers to manage the exotic pest.

"We will be encouraging members of the bee industry to adopt management strategies for Small Hive Beetle which will be outlined in an AgNote being prepared by NSW Agriculture staff," he said.

"This information will be distributed to all registered beekeepers and beekeeping associations in NSW."

Dr Christie said the industry has worked closely with NSW Agriculture during tracing and surveillance and played a key role in identifying the spread of the pest.

"We want to thank the state's beekeepers and their member associations for their proactive and cooperative approach to working with us in dealing with the outbreak of Small Hive Beetle," he said.

Beekeepers are being urged to carefully examine their hives and are required to report any suspicious findings to NSW Agriculture on 02 6391 3675.

Podargus responded:

> It was not clear to me whether native bees are affected by the Small Hive
> Beetle, so I have assumed for this discussion that they are not.

The consensus is that they are not.  It is unlikely that the native solitary bees would be, but to me it would seem not be so certain about the social and semi social ones.  Time will tell.

> However, the long and short of it is that he thinks:
>
> ... the effect of removing European bees from the area would be highly
> desirable for the native species - indeed most native species,

I am unclear as to which native species he is referring-everything or native bees?

> ... finding feral beehives is not really that difficult, but the resources
> required to do all the necessary work in a season would be formidable,
> ... assembly and training of the required people would probably take 12
> months and would cost a lot,

Other than direct observation, there are two methods of removing the feral hives that have been trialed.  One is remote poisoning, easier in a dearth time, and beelining.  In beelining bees are trained to a food source and then are followed back to their nest.  A large number of people (beekeepers) have already been trained in this technique and this training is continuing.

> ... one of the risks is that the weather would intervene causing the project
> to be incomplete, which is likely to mean that the work has to be undertaken
> the following season, as if nothing had occurred the previous season.

I'm not sure I follow this argument.  What effect does he think the weather would have?

> It may now be entirely academic, but he said he would like to be part of it,
> if it happens.  Given his knowledge, background and organisational skills,
> there does not seem to be much doubt about that anyway.

You apparently missed my post of the 26th when I said it was not going to happen.  Whether or not he would have been employed is now academic, however I suggest that there was a major role for weekend naturalists, many of whom know their areas extremely well.

> I see from the press release from Wednesday that eradication is off,
> principally because the beetle pest is now at Cowra and Stroud as well.The
> text of it is shown below.

> What management strategies are there to which they refer?

Zero Sum added:

On Saturday 30 November 2002 10:10, Podargus wrote:

> I'm not sure I follow this argument.  What effect does he think the
> weather would have?

You can't follow bees that are not flying.

Zero Sum replied:

On Saturday 30 November 2002 14:04, Podargus wrote:

> Whilst bees are not very active during rain, this is because,
> especially with eucalypts the nectar is washed from the flowers.  If
> the flower is of such a shape that this does not happen they will
> continue working.  More importantly they will sure as hell 'rob' in
> the rain.  As this is the principle behind 'beelineing' wet weather
> would be an advantage.

Hmmm... Maybe it was the bees I was keeping but mine always avoided the wet weather.

Mind you some of mine were definately a bit odd.  One hive I had I picked up from a swarm at the end of winter so I illegally kept them in my units 'backyard' over winter and fed them.  Not enough (any) supplies to last the winter.

When I used to come home from work (in a dark suit) and got to feed them propolis and honey/sugar water (yes I know it was naughty), they used to be waiting for me outside the hive and all lift off together and rush at me.  It was quite frightening the frst few time to have them bouncing off my face (thinking I was probably getting stung) but the always avoided my eyes and any orifice.

Next summer when I dissasembled the hive I found huntsman in the top guarding an egg sack - and the bees were guarding the huntsman.  I never had any problems with any infestations of that hive and nowadays it lives (or rather its descendants) as a feral hive in the top of a hollow gum.  It always seems very strong and healthy during summer but it is at an unreachable height (maybe 20 metres).  I wonder if they still 'keep' huntsmen.  And if so what impact this behaviour might have in the future.

> Hmmm... Maybe it was the bees I was keeping but mine always avoided
> the wet weather.

> When I used to come home from work (in a dark suit) and got to feed
> them propolis and honey/sugar water (yes I know it was naughty), they
> used to be waiting for me outside the hive and all lift off together
> and rush at me.  It was quite frightening the frst few time to have
> them bouncing off my face (thinking I was probably getting stung) but
> the always avoided my eyes and any orifice.

> Next summer when I dissasembled the hive I found huntsman in the top
> guarding an egg sack - and the bees were guarding the huntsman.

> I  never had any problems with any infestations of that hive and
> nowadays it lives (or rather ts descendants) as a feral hive in the
> top of a hollow gum.  It always seems very strong and healthy during
> summer but it is at an unreachable height (maybe 20 metres).  I
> wonder if they still 'keep' huntsmen.  And if so what impact this
> behaviour might have in the future.

> ... the effect of removing European bees from the area would be highly
> desirable for the native species - indeed most native species,