Varroa tester

Original Swienty Varroa tester

If you are in doubt if your bees have many varroa mites, then this easy to use Varroa tester is the solution for you.

This is how it works:

You catch 200 bees from the broodframe (avoid catching the queen). Then you anesthetize them with CO2 gas. After 10-20 seconds, shake the varroa counter for 10 seconds.

The varroa mites are also affected by the anesthetic and will fall off the bees.
So they are easy to count and it's easy to evaluate the number of mites in your hive.

The anesthetized bees will wake up after a short while and can be returned into the hive.

Easy, simple and gentle on the bees. 

Incl. CO2 dosing arrangement with 2 x 16 gram CO2 bottles (enough for up to 12 tests). New CO2 bottles can be ordered at us! TIP: use the CO2 dispenser gently in the beginning, since the bottle is under high pressure.

The following video shows the method (remark, CO2 dispenser is slightly different in the video than actually supplied - the supplied dispenser is easier to use)



Testimonial from clients:
With the varroatester we really had a new experience this season - we had almost no detection of mites in the varroa tray but after we checked with the tester, we observed nevertheless that there were beehives that required treatment. The tester will have saved us many hives this year! German beekeepers, august 2015