From: tip@lead.aichem.arizona.edu (Tom Perigrin)
Newsgroups: misc.rural
Subject: Re: dealing with "meat" bees
Date: 11 Sep 92 17:43:23 GMT
Distribution: usa, na
Organization: University of Arizona UNIX Users Group

In article <Sep.8.17.05.17.1992.6291@joes.garage.com> shibumi@joes.garage.com writes:
>The solution was a home-grown one, and was derived from some reading I 
>did on what would inadvertantly kill off bee colonies.
>
>3/5ths sugar water
>1/5th anise liquour
>1/5th malathion
>
>It works really well.  The idea is to make sure that the dose of 
>pesticide isn't so big that the bees die off right away, but rather
>go home to feed mom and the kids.

As a beekeeper I was saddened to read this note. But I'm a realist and
know that bees occasionally have to be exterminated.

However, another little dose of reality here.   The above idea probably 
works, but not as the poster suggests.   

Bees do not eat nectar or unripe honey.   They eat pollen moistened with
honey, and aged honey.  (except in certain rare cicumstances).

When a bee collects nectar they ingest it into a honey stomach.  This
stomach is lined with absorbtive membranes, to start reducing the
60 - 90% water content of the nectar.  By the time they reach the hive
the concentration is alredy down to 40%.  The bees then regurgitate the
thickened nectar, and start kneading it on their mandibles to increase
surface area.  When the water concentration is down to 17 - 20%, they put
it in uncapped cells, and allow it to stand.   The hive has a flow of air
through it... if there isn't a natural one, they fan thier wings.
When the water concentration is low enough, they cap the cell.

The honey stomach is also highly absorbtive of insecticides.   So you kill
off the workers,  probably on their way home.   In fact, hives post
guard bees , and if a worker actsa a little funny (signs of pesticide
ingestion) they refuse entry to the worker.  The worker never fights,
just hangs around outside of the hive until it either gets better or
dies.

You don't need to kill off the queen to kill a hive.  The social structure
is too rigid to enable them to adapt to a drastic change in propulation
distribution.  The oldeest bees (3 - 7 weeks) are the foragers.  The
younger bees (1-3 weeks) are the nurses.   The nurses will go out to forage,
but then the very youngest bees (0-1 week) are pressed into survice as
nurses.  It turns out that such young bees make very poor nurses.  Over half
of the larvae die from over or underfeeding.   The population takes a sudden
huge downturn, which further exacerbates the problem of nursing the eggs.

Bee hives have a crises point below which they are not self sustaining.
You can get below that crises population by just killing off all of the
workers who venture out of the hive over a couple of day period.
After that, the larvae start dying from poor nursing,  the youngest bees try
to forage too early (before thier wings are fully hardened) and die after a
few days, and nobody feeds mom.  She lays low quality eggs,  and eventually
starves to death.  Only bees of a certain age (2-3 weeks) are aloowed to feed
the queen.  She cannot eat honey by herself, even if it is put right in
front of her.  She only eats by mouth to mouth transfer of partly digested
food.    

The drones (male bees) will often just move to another hive, where 
pickings are better.  Those that remain behind bully the few
remaining nurse bees into feeding them, instead of tending to the larvae.
Only foragers and guard bees stand up to drones,  and they are generally
the first killed in a pesticide attack.

The hive may overheat or chill due to lack of fanning 
or heat clustering,  so the larvae and pupae die of cold or heat.
Those pupae who do hatch tend to be deformed due to temperature damage
during developmental stages.   Often they die in the hive, and start to 
rot, spreading contagion through the hive.

It's the bee equivalent of the black plague.

Fun, eh?

Better to just gas 'em or something.   Your solution takes about 2 or 3 weeks
to run it's full course.  You won't see most of the results,  but it's
social disruption and starvation,  not distribution of poison.   So,
as I said,  i imagine your method is effective,  but not as you thought.
Newsgroups: misc.rural,misc.kids