Two questions in response to my good friend Bill Miller's suggestion to NOT treat feral swarms for varroa. 1. How do know the swarm is a feral one and not from a kept colony? 2. How do you prevent any varroa from that swarm from serving as a close and perhaps potent source of infection for your own colonies. I remain to be convinced that not treating feral swarms is generally a good practice for most beekeepers. A final comment. There is lots of discussion on selective breeding of queens to come up with a resistant strain of bees. I am sure there must be considerable variation in the genetics of the mites - ie some less and some more virulent. Is this an area that is receiving any attention? Could a more innocuous mite be produced that our bees could better tolerate? Its not obvious how this would work, given the life style of the mite, but it may be an aspect that could help. Wayne Esaias