Even Bumblebees Get Mites, (Lots of Them)

February 13, 2014 by solarbeez

February 13, 2014…This bumble bee (bombus Melanopygus, I believe) was sipping honey when we noticed all the mites on her back. We would like to try to remove them…Does anyone have any ideas of how to accomplish that?

Posted in Bumblebees, Music video, Natural Beekeeping, Videos | Tagged bees on Oregon Coast, bombus melanopygus, bumblebees, macro nature video, mites on a bumblebee, nature photography, pollinators, Wild pollinators | 15 Comments

15 Responses

on February 14, 2014 at 12:16 am | Reply thomas73640

Wow, it looks shocking and have never seen anything like it before. The only information I could find about it is from the Bumblebee Conservation Trust and its not all bad thankfully.
http://bumblebeeconservation.org/about-bees/faqs/bumblebee-mites/
- on February 14, 2014 at 7:39 pm | Reply solarbeez
  
  Thanks for that link. I looked it up and was happily surprised that those mites might not be too harmful. Might just be hitching a ride.
  Footnote…they might not even BE mites. I aim to get a better close up if I can roll some of them onto a q-tip.
on February 14, 2014 at 6:14 am | Reply afrenchgarden

The Bumblebee Conservation Trust (UK) advises brushing them off with a child’s paintbrush. I would think you would have to put it into the fridge for 15 minutes which will make it very languid for long enough for you to wipe them off. On the plus side they say they usually do not feed on the bees but the pollen and waste materials of the nest so are just hitching a lift to spread. They sometimes drop off on flowers to pick up a new host. However, if the bee is heavily infested, the mites are heavy and will impede the flight of the bee. I have seen bumble bees with mites but only one or two and I have never personally tried this.
on February 14, 2014 at 6:19 am | Reply ...a Beehive here Inside My Heart

aghhh that is so sad! i’ve never seen any bee with so many mites D:
on February 14, 2014 at 12:15 pm | Reply Bill Catherall

I think, maybe, those are bee louse (louses?), not mites. http://entnemdept.ufl.edu/creatures/misc/bees/bee_louse.htm

Whatever they are, they don’t look like Varroa.
- on February 14, 2014 at 1:04 pm | Reply solarbeez
  
  Looking closer at them, you might be right. I’m going to try to ‘roll’ some up on a Q-tip and get an even closer look at them.
- on February 15, 2014 at 12:56 pm | Reply Emily Heath
  
  They’re not varroa, but not braula coeca either – both are honey bee parasites, and also much darker brown than those in the picture.
on February 14, 2014 at 8:26 pm | Reply dirtywordsgarden

I think they are commensal mites and have a symbiotic relationship with the bumblebee.
- on February 25, 2014 at 6:14 am | Reply Andrew Millar
  
  So which are you suggesting a commensalist or symbiotic relationship?
  - on February 27, 2014 at 7:29 pm dirtywordsgarden
    
    Commensalism is a type of symbiosis. The mites live with the bumblebee and eat discarded food, wax and garbage, etc in the hive. When the time is right in their cycle then they hitch rides on the back of a bumblebees to flowers, etc to find other bumblebees and new hives. The mites benefit from, but don’t hurt, their hosts.
  - on February 28, 2014 at 12:49 am Andrew Millar
    
    In symbiosis both animals benefit from the relationship, in commensalism only one member of the relationship benefits but doesn’t influence the other negatively which would be parasitism….they are distinct.
on February 25, 2014 at 6:08 am | Reply Andrew Millar

I went looking and found a suggestion that these mites are from the genus Parasitellus. I also found a link documenting a method of getting rid of the mites. Although I think this is interfering in a natural process, the mites might serve some beneficial purpose we do not know of.
http://www.uksafari.com/bumblebees3.htm
on March 1, 2014 at 1:16 am | Reply lindaswildlifegarden

Reblogged this on Linda's wildlife garden and commented:
lovely post
on July 15, 2015 at 2:33 pm | Reply Ann

I first learned mites could infest a bee on the Houzz.com website of all places. I was dismayed to learn that the mites were sucking the vital juices out of the bee and would eventually kill it. There were other photos of another bee with mites coming out of its abdomen. Horrible way to die, I think. If I saw a bee infested, I would try to hold it down in some fashion and pick off the mites with tweezers or just squeeze them with tweezers. In one video, the bee, fully aware of the dozens of mites on its back, was using a back leg to swipe at them, but because of physical limitations, he never even came close. Must have been so frustrating for him.
on February 7, 2017 at 9:30 pm | Reply Robin Lloyd

February 2017.I picked up a bumble bee a few days ago which seemed slow & unable or unwilling to fly& after leaving it inside the house for a few hours to warm up a bit ,I noticed there were tiny whiteish/light brown mites between its head & body which when disturbed by end of tweezers would scurry around the bee; with great difficulty & patience, I was able to disturb all the mites & remove each one individually with tweezers & then swiftly squash them with the tweezers; whether this bee survived or not I will never know but in future I will try to get hold of some powder to assist in this bee recovery exercise ! Any suggestions as to what might be available by way of a spray or powder ?