On 29-Oct-15, at 10:50 AM, randy oliver wrote: >> > >> Does this suggest that they gather in one area in order to reduce >> brother/sister > mating? > > Perhaps what you are suggesting is that females seek already > infested cells > in order to allow for cross fertilization of unrelated males and > females. > This is a reasonable hypothesis, as it would appear to be to the > evolutionary advantage to the mites. However, I haven't seen any > finding > suggesting that the presence of a foundress is either attractive or > repellent to subsequent mite invasion. > Hi All These last 2 paragraphs are new to me and make so much sense. I have always thought that it should be easy to find a treatment that works because the mating is always brother to sister. If several(more than one) foundress mites enter a cell the offspring have a good chance of being genetically different than their parents. Therefore the practice of drone brood removal using pierco drone frames may be far more important than I previously thought. Bob Darrell Caledon Ontario Canada 44N80W *********************************************** 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