Here are the last results. This is going to be long winded so I apologize in advance.

Pretreat  On removal day 8-9   Day 16-17  Day 28-32
23          no test                       22             21 
32          9                                9               7      Queen loss post treat, no brood, colony dwindling 5-6 frames
10          20                              14             10
12          4                                19             8
6            4                                5               9
19         16                               14             21     New Pads

I finally searched the archives and realize that I am late to the conversation. If I had any brains I would have started there. (If I had any brains I wouldn't be a beekeeper) 

This trial was late July, early Aug. in Eastern WA. Daytime temps. high 90-98 low 45-50 humidity 20%+/-. All double deeps with 1 or 2 western supers on above an excluder. 3/4" full entrance on solid bottoms, no box set-back.  MAQS were hold over from 2012 except as noted. Standard application of 2 strips carefully separated to keep the paper in tact (maddeningly difficult). The application was on 55 colonies with mite counts on the 6 noted. All were checked and I had no queen loss. All had brood kill/disruption varying from moderate to heavy but normal laying resumed by day 8/9. 

My results closely mirror Jeremy's poor results of 8/9/11. Last year I used MAQS and when removing the pads all looked good visually so like a dope I assumed all was well. I had higher mite load than I like this spring so decided to test post application this year. I sample via a 300 bee sugar shake that for me is easy in the field (I will give details if anyone is interested). I know that it is not as accurate as an alcohol wash but I believe that as long as I repeat the test protocol exactly each time that the relative result will be informative. As you can see I had very poor efficacy. Day 30 very similar to pre-treat. I can see no indication that significant mites (Male or Female) were killed in surviving brood. My assumption was that the threat of too high temperature was to the queen and adult bees. I did exceed the recommended highs but all queens survived, maybe it caused too fast a vaporization. A 3/4 day knock down of phoretic mites is not worth the heavy colony stress involved and can be achieved much more benignly via Hop Guard, oxalic acid dribble or 40ml 65% formic on a Dri-Loc pads. In addition to the sugar shakes in the coarse of normal post treatment inspection on day 20-25 I plucked some drone brood when I ran across it and found  heavy mite infestation, many with 2/3 mites that I assume were fertile. Most colonies "appear good", no DWV,  no brood problems and good populations. So for those that look and say "they're great" I suggest doing some sampling. 

I read with interest Allan's posts of the Canadian trials. You guys know formic, eh? I am intrigued by Randy's good result of Nov, 2010 (very high efficacy) and by his ABJ article of a single strip getting 50/60% efficacy. I very much look forward to hearing of Randy's current application, please don't make us wait. It is hard to judge others stated results without numbers.

As the acknowledged "Guru of Literature Research" I would love to here from Pete about any studies of mite kill in capped brood using MAQS. Have the claims of male kill with brood survival ever been substantiated? 

Finally I would very much like to hear from those who have had success (verified by test) with MAQS. What were the weather, hive conditions, and timing?

Paul Hosticka
Dayton WA

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