Trish, you've discovered some of the problems with volunteer, self-reported
survey data.

I've watched Dennis vanEngelsdorp's presentations at national conventions
each year.  Overall, those treating have substantially lower losses.  I
can't remember about monitoring.

Re years of beekeeping--many pre varroa beekeepers are still having trouble
adjusting to varroa.  I see a sea change difference between them and their
children who are taking over.  Mike's recent post describes it well : )

A question--did you tease out apiary size?  I'm curious as to whether large
apiaries had more problems (something that I often hear).

What I would find to be far more valuable than self-reported surveys, would
be reporting on demo apiaries using best management practices, set up all
over the U.S. (managed by local clubs, but following strict protocols).
The hard data from those apiaries would likely give us usable information.

I talk with other professional beekeepers.  This season, a number have
already experienced high losses, and expect it to get worse over the
winter.  Some are predicting a train wreck for almond pollination.  But
here's the point--they know what they did wrong,  Most of the time it's
screwing up on varroa management for one reason or another.  Coupled with
this are the poor honey crops this season in some areas, indicating poor
nutrition.  How, or if, this info will show up in the BIP survey is an open
question.

There is, however, a wealth of information from the BIP Tech Team info on
mite counts, etc gathered for commercial operations all over the country.
I can't see that that info (anonymously for the paying beekeepers) is
available at the BIP website--have you found it?

-- 
Randy Oliver
Grass Valley, CA
www.ScientificBeekeeping.com

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