> I have observed what I feel in general is a smaller population... On the 
> other hand the amount of brood seems to be about the same.

It seems that the bees which tolerate varroa without help tend to have 
smaller clusters.  That is one reason that the Primorsky stock has not 
caught on as well as it might have with commercial beekeepers.  As Bob has 
repeated, given the choice, his cohorts prefer to have bees which 
demonstrate commercial qualities even if they have to use treatments.  Since 
those treatments are not cheap or convenient, they moist be seeing a huge 
difference in favour of the commercial stocks.  For pollination and honey 
production, beekeepers need to have a large field force.  Housekeeping and 
foundation drawing tend to be better in larger colonies, too.

It seems that outside that commercial group, there seem to be many 
beekeepers who manage bees which stay alive without treatments, but we 
wonder at a cost in terms of production and other commercially desirable 
qualities.  Just staying alive and looking good are a minimum standard.  I 
had some bees like that at one time and it took me several years to figure 
out that I was working for the bees and no the other way around.  These bees 
were selected for hardiness and wintering and other good things by an 
idealistic backwoods kind of guy, but not for production, apparently.  When 
I changed stock, suddenly our crops got larger and I started making money 
again.

>  I just dont see those huge ol bee beards in the summer like I used to 
> when I first started some 10 years back.

That brings us to the question: Are your bees as productive as the bees 
which you remember from ten years ago?

> . On the other hand the amount of brood seems to be about the same.

And, if there is a similar amount of brood, what is becoming of all those 
bees that are apparently being raised? 

             ***********************************************
The BEE-L mailing list is powered by L-Soft's renowned
LISTSERV(R) list management software.  For more information, go to:
http://www.lsoft.com/LISTSERV-powered.html

Guidelines for posting to BEE-L can be found at:
http://honeybeeworld.com/bee-l/guidelines.htm