Deformed Wing Virus (DWV) and its spread around the globe is the focus of a recent publication by Professor Robert Paxton and colleagues from the Martin Luther University of Halle-Wittenberg in Germany.
The effective recognized monitoring methods, alcohol washes and powdered sugar rolls, utilize a sample of approximately one-half cup of honey bees by volume. The purpose of both of these methods is to separate the mites from the bees in the sample, enabling the tester to count them and estimate the infestation rate in the colony.
Varroa EasyCheck was developed by Véto-pharma in 2016 to provide an accurate estimation of the mite infestation levels in a hive with the alcohol wash method. Recent investigations in our apiary showed that the Varroa EasyCheck can be used equally with the sugar roll and CO2 injection methods as well.
Varroa monitoring before the end of summer treatment is probably the most overlooked task performed by a beekeeper. Knowing pre-treatment mite loads will provide you with information as to what to expect from your mite treatment.
