No other interference is allowed, no smoke, no bayvarol, no honey, no end of interest. If the weekly varroa drop of dead mites exceed the MAFF requirement for treatment destroy colony. The experiment has failed. The graph underneath may be useful to plot weekly progress Copy of Patent specification as applied for in the United Kingdom Bee Hive This invention relates to a Bee Hive Bee hives in Great Britain have been infested with the varroa mite since 1992. Unless treated, the bee colony dies due to this infestation.
Bees have an inherent ability to groom themselves free of the varroa mite.
In a conventional bee hive this is not apparent due to the hive entrance being at floor level which allows groomed varroa mites to regain the colony by attaching themselves to incoming bees. A wild bee colony would construct a nest where the comb would be circular the size of a dinner plate, and a series of these would be constructed, as placed in a plate rack. The honey stores would be in the top portion, the worker brood in the centre, with the drone brood underneath. Varroa mites prefer to undertake their breeding cycle in drone brood when available. The frames in the brood box of a conventional bee hive are much longer than they are deep which flattens the nest shape into an ellipse with the major axis being horizontal.