> I recently read about a beekeeper who had made up his own
> three year cyclic varroa treatment method: In addition to
> removing drone brood in the spring, he alternates with formic
> acid one year, lactic acid the next year and a one week
> treament with Apistan strips in the fall the third year.

Perhaps the combination of the drone trapping and other 3 methods (formic in
year 1, lactic acid in year 2, and 1 week of Apistan in year 3) will keep
this beekeeper's V.d. at bay in his part of the world.  However, the
concerns you have about the shortened Apistan treatment in year 3 may be
valid.  A 1-week treatment period will only get the phoretic mites.  V.d.
spends the majority of its life cycle in capped cells.  Cells are capped for
15 days (workers), drones are capped for 18 days.  Obviously a 10-day
treatment will miss a lot of mites, assuming there are a lot of mites to be
missed in the first place.  That is one flaw in this man's treatment
strategy; no testing to determine mite levels.  Second problem: 10 days
misses the developing mites in capped cells.  This may be a lesser concern
in the fall as the number of capped cells is dropping, but it is still a
concern.  Developing fluvalinate resistance is probably of little concern in
this method.  Fluvalinate exposure is only 1 year in 3.  Resistance is
fostered by a regular exposure.  It is unclear in your post if the beekeeper
is reusing the strips (is his figuring that assuming the label stays 6 to 8
weeks, since he is only using the strip for one week he can use the same
stip 5 to 8 times?)  Or is he using one strip one time?  Exposure to
low/sub-lethal doses may become more of a concern if he uses that same strip
6 to 8 times, if/when he uses the same strip  on the forth, fifth, sixth ...
time.  And that number is a guess.  All in all, the resistance issue should
be of minimal concern, I'd be more concerned about the numbers of mites that
may be hiding out in capped cells.  And again, depending on the time in the
fall (early fall, late fall, how much capped brood is left in the hive?),
the mites that may be hiding in capped cells may be of minimal concern.

When I first read your description of the treatment routine I thought, "Bad
idea".  But as I think this through I think it is not nearly as bad an idea
as others I've heard.  I think the weakest link in the strategt is it
contains no evaluations of mite loads in the first place.  Perhaps the 3rd
year Apistan treatment is not needed, who can tell id no one looks?

> and now there's an article written about this in the beekeepers
> magazine over here. Anything written in that magazine tends
> to be looked upon as the truth.
Kind of like BEE-L, eh?

Aaron Morris - I think, therefore I bee!

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