> This is getting tedious!  I'm wasting a Sunday morning.  The two slides 
> that you showed do not have any neonics on them!

You did have to point that out.  Oh, well, he is prolly back in the lab 
right now doing just that or maybe he forgot to show that slide.

> Yes, that's what I thought at first, since this is a subject that I've 
> been
> following closely.  Unfortunately, the researcher used freshly-emerged 
> bees
> that had not ever received a probiotic inoculum from nurse bees, and that
> were inoculated with 200,000 spores!  So I'm not sure how applicable the
> results would be in the field.

That should not stop is from jumping to conclusions, though don't you think? 
Or extrapolating wildly?

> Allen, I thought that we were going to table the presentation until we had 
> all the data!

The truce was broken, and not by me.

It is really hard not to make fun of this particularly vulnerable study when 
some take it so seriously.  I can't help myself.

>  I'd hardly call the slide a *stopper*!  When you say "by October," you 
> imply that there was a trend.

Actually, I don't imply anything.  I just report what I see and where to go 
to form one's own conclusions.

I think I also mentioned the study was flawed and superficial IMO, so am no 
advocate of believing anything it shows?  I just pointed it out.  After all, 
we know that some of the slides are not even from this study.

 > The trend for most of the season was for the Movento hives to have 
*lower* nosema and varroa counts.

The data for "most of the season" was omitted.  For some reason the authors 
thought to show this particular set of bars.  I found it fascinating enough 
to share.

> The higher mite levels in Oct. could be easily explained by the higher
> amount of brood and bees in the Movento hives.  Bob Harrison has often
> explained how stronger colonies will have higher mite levels in fall. 
> Ditto
> with nosema--longer-lived foragers will have higher counts.

Or the lunar tides.  We  simply do not know.  What was reported was what was 
reported.

> Allen, there are confounding factors in this trial--such as the fact that
> the beekeeper was allowed to restock queenless colonies with fresh nucs, 
> and
> continued to run them in the trial.  As far as I'm concerned, any 
> subsequent
> data from those colonies should have been discarded.

I'd discard the whole thing, after the first week or so that proved the bees 
did not just march out and die or suffer a horrible death.

> Can we please wait until we have all the data before we discuss this 
> further?

Can you assure me of a date?

Also, Randy, I think you are taking this far too seriously.  This is no 
sacred cow -- or should not be IMO.

When a study is presented in public, the authors should know that it may be 
subject to intense scrutiny on the basis of what is presented, not what 
might have been presented or will later be presented.

If they are not prepared for that, they should not present. 

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