J. Waggle wrote:

>Also, as mentioned earlier by a poster, a brood break after swarming,
>potentially 3 to 4 weeks can perhaps contribute to mite reduction.
>But in my observations, most varroa invasion of cells during swarming
>season is concentrated very heavily in drone cells which take about 24
>days to hatch, basically carrying most mites through most of the broodless
>period.

At issue is not whether the mites will survive a broodless period such as
exists in both a swarm and the parent colony that swarmed. It is the long
break in varroa reproduction that prevents the varroa population from
getting too large. They are unable to reproduce in broodless colonies. As I
pointed out: In the study of shook swarms, the unsplit control colonies had
twice as many bees at the end of the season but FIVE TIMES as many varroa
mites. I think that natural swarming is an ideal mechanism for ridding a
colony of bees of many pests, and the parent gets a new queen out of the
deal. I discussed the idea of splitting colonies annually (thereby
simulating this process) in my July article in the American Bee Journal.

-- 
Peter L. Borst
Danby, NY  USA
42.35, -76.50

picasaweb.google.com/peterlborst

******************************************************
* Full guidelines for BEE-L posting are at:          *
* http://www.honeybeeworld.com/bee-l/guidelines.htm  *
******************************************************