American foulbrood
American foulbrood is a burn rule here
American foulbrood is not a bottle job in Florida. The bacterium forms spores. UF already said that. The state already wrote the clock. This page is those papers and that rule, not a drug list.
European foulbrood can be treated, but American foulbrood cannot.
What the papers actually name
Identification and Treatment of European Foulbrood is an EFB paper that still has to name AFB, because the two look alike until you test. European foulbrood is Melissococcus plutonius. It does not form spores. American foulbrood is Paenibacillus larvae. It does. That is why UF puts burn on the AFB side of Table 1 and treatment on the EFB side. Smell is not a lab. Some keepers call AFB sulfurous and EFB sour. The same paper says the smell can be ambiguous and can vary with how far the infection has gone. A rope test, a matchstick drawn slowly from a dead cell, is a field hint when the contents strand an inch or more. It is not a substitute for the inspector.
Keeping Bees in Florida is the Florida husbandry paper. Florida has a mandatory registration law. Each keeper with colonies in the state registers with FDACS. The firm number goes on the hive bodies. Registration renews every year. Registered keepers undergo routine inspection for symptoms of American foulbrood by an FDACS apiary inspector. Bees and equipment found with AFB, or with African honey bees, will need to be treated or destroyed if treatment is not possible. That sentence is on Keeping Bees in Florida. The destruction clock is not. The clock is in the rule.
Seven days, then the yard is on hold
Florida Administrative Code 5B-54.017, effective 27 March 2018, names AFB as a bacterial spore-forming disease of honey bee larvae. Colonies found infected or infested with AFB shall be destroyed by burning or treated using irradiation as prescribed in 5B-54.0175(2). That work must be done within seven days of a positive diagnosis. Colonies and equipment stay stored so other bees cannot reach them. Every colony in that apiary is quarantined for a minimum of 30 days after the destruction or treatment, on a Notice of Quarantine, Stop-Sale And Hold Order For American Foulbrood Disease, FDACS-08063. Sale, barter, and movement off that yard are stopped while the hold is on, except under Department authority.
Compensation, if the state has money for it, is a different rule. 5B-54.018 pays registered keepers $25 per colony destroyed for AFB when funding is available. This page does not promise a check. Open the live rule.
A field kit samples a suspect cell the way Identification and Treatment of European Foulbrood describes for the sister disease. Buy the AFB kit. The EFB kit answers a different bacterium. Get this. Open the box with a hive tool the inspector can actually see brood through. This is not a shopping trip for a bottle. Get this. the Florida Beekeeping Management Calendar names prevention products that need a prescription or a veterinary feed directive. This page does not pick a bottle. A positive AFB diagnosis in Florida is still the burn or irradiate clock.
Inspection is not a flashlight guess
You register first. The FDACS Beekeeper Registration page is the live form. Then you keep the box open enough that an inspector can see brood. Sunken, perforated cappings and a hard scale that will not peel are the AFB signs Identification and Treatment of European Foulbrood lists on Table 1. EFB kills uncapped larvae that look melted or rubbery. Do not treat those two as one smell. If you think you have either, stop moving frames between yards. Call the inspector. Mites still get a number on Varroa. Beetles still get August on Beetles. Neither of those jobs is AFB.
Can I treat AFB with the same antibiotic as EFB?
Identification and Treatment of European Foulbrood says EFB can be treated and AFB cannot. Table 1 puts burning on the AFB treatment row. Florida rule 5B-54.017 requires burning or irradiation after a positive diagnosis. This page does not pick a bottle.
Does a rope test close the case?
Identification and Treatment of European Foulbrood calls the rope test useful in the field when coupled with other signs. It is not the diagnosis the seven-day clock starts on. That diagnosis is the inspector's.
Sources
- Identification and Treatment of European Foulbrood. AFB cannot be treated. Table 1: destroy the colony by burning.
- Keeping Bees in Florida. Mandatory registration. Routine FDACS inspection for AFB.
- Florida Administrative Code 5B-54.017. Burn or irradiate within seven days. Apiary hold at least 30 days.
- Florida Administrative Code 5B-54.018. Compensation $25 per colony if funding is available.
- FDACS Beekeeper Registration. The live registration page Keeping Bees in Florida points at.