Natural spruce extract is an effective remedy to fight against varroatosis in organic beekeeping

L.D Romanchuk,S.V Furman,O.V Lisohurska

doi:10.15421/2020_254

Abstract

Varoatosis is the most dangerous disease of bees. A number of synthetic preparations are used for its treatment. In organic beekeeping they are forbidden; and the search for new effective acaricides, which are not toxic to bees and do not contaminate bee products, is highly relevant. Therefore, our purpose was to investigate the effectiveness of using natural spruce extract to fight against varroatosis at an organic apiary. In this study, we compared the effectiveness of using natural spruce extract and formic acid extract to combat varroatosis in 24 bee families (12 each the group). The preparations were administered according to the guidelines once in the spring and once in the autumn. In the course of the study, a number of indicators were evaluated such as spring and autumn mite infestation, the strengthening and weakening of families, honey and wax productivity, the percentage of families that died (lost their queen bee) during the winter. The results of our investigation show that natural spruce extract effectively controls the varroa mite. This is confirmed by the significant difference in mite infestation between the groups treated with formic acid and spruce extract. This indicator was lower in bee families treated with spruce extract. After the spring treatment, the difference was 3 times (p=0.05), before autumn and spring next year it was 1.2 (p=0.01). When spruce extract was applied, the bee families had by 1.2 times higher honey productivity and by 1.4 higher wax productivity. Therefore, it is advisable to use this anti-varroatosis preparation in organic beekeeping. We recommend administering preparations in the spring after the first flying rout and at the end of August, adding 15 ml per 1 liter of sugar syrup (90 ml/family).

Highlights

According to the report from the Research Institute of Organic Agriculture (Willer & Lernoud, 2019), global organic farming is developing rapidly
After the spring anti-varroatosis treatment, the mite infestation of families treated with spruce extract was 0.25%, which is by 3 times less significant than the control one (t22=2.128, P
This difference is explained by the fact that during the treatment the air temperature dropped below +14°C at night, which led to a decrease in the effectiveness of formic acid

Summary

Introduction

According to the report from the Research Institute of Organic Agriculture (Willer & Lernoud, 2019), global organic farming is developing rapidly. In 1999, there were 200,000 organic producers; in 2017 their number was 2.9 million. There are 112.3 million hectares of organic land in the world, of which 70 (1.4%) are agricultural. In 2017, organic farms had more than 3.2 million bee families, accounting for almost 3.5%. They are mainly concentrated in Latin America (45%) and Europe (30%)

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