> ...The important point in my original post was regarding the
> purchase of SMR selected bees from elsewhere, however excellent the work
> done in developing a proven strain. It would, IMHO be a sad day if we
> suddenly went over to one strain from another continent, especially when
> it has been argued that there is a poor gene pool there, when we could
> select out our own SMR bees from a proven good gene pool...

It seems to me that it is possible for operators or regions with hundreds of
hives to select for bees that exhibit resistance to varroa mites in any
population while continuing to treat the hives routinely for varroa.  The cost
and effort need not be great, and the local genetics would be largely preserved.

It also seems to me that this selection can be accomplished by merely placing a
sticky board under every hive at time of treatment and looking for hives that
have fewer mites falling compared to equivalent hives nearby.  The range of mite
loads should be obvious from a quick glance at the sticky boards. Typically,
some boards are black with mites and some have many fewer mites, while most are
average in density.  There may be more reasons for the variation than simply the
nature of the bees in the hive, but I should think that any tendency for mite
resistance would be captured by noting the best ten percent (along with some
other, hopefully irrelevant, effects).

After eliminating hives that obviously had an unusual history like a broodless
period or other anomalies and those which did not produce well, ten percent or
so of the total hives could be removed to breeding yards for further
consideration.  Conversely, perhaps the hives which show the highest mite levels
should be eliminated from the breeding pool by requeening or making treated
nucs.  This should reduce, over time, a potential mite reservoir in the locale
and also reduce the number of local drones carrying the undesirable trait.

We had amazing results in breeding out chalkbrood using a similar
quick-and-dirty selection --  as have others who have tried it.

This is a quick-and-dirty method, but IMO should give some obvious and useful
improvement in mite tolerance and reduce need for treatment.  The improvement
may be quite quick at first while the variation in the characteristic is high in
the population, however any initial high rate of improvement may slacken over
years, unless this method is augmented or replaced by more careful and focused
selection techniques.

allen