several Travis Owen snips followed by > my comments..

>First off good comments...
 
It seems to me that in most cases "darwinian beekeeping" or perhaps even any "treatment free" approach would only work in isolation or when *all* the beekeepers within a hives maximum flight radius agree to manage their hives sans acaricides.

>If you followed the history of commercial beekeeping in the US there are only a small number of these and most are unlikely to set down hives where MOST hobby beekeeper reside.  I will add that no one should think that they can add one or two 'resistant' stock to their apiary and overcome all the problems with varroa.  In addition anyone that buys resistant stock should look at this as 'hedging your bet' and not as some kind of miracle cure. The path from treatment to no treatment is slow and does require perseverance.

>Other consideration where by 'resistant stock' will also NOT have a good chance of working are.. 1) a local environment where chemical contamination is in air, water or soil and 2) any equipment that is contaminated by emergency and off label chemicals used to combat varroa.   

I would suggest to any beekeeper with an apiary in an area with a high density of other beekeepers to A.) monitor for varroa, and B.) have a plan (treatment) for *when* mite levels rise above a 2-3% threshold. Of course use resistant stock (does that even exist?), local if possible.

>Most folks will have no idea if their hives are or are not in a high density area.  Threshold can be very arbitrary number, but you larger message to 'any beekeeper' is exactly the advice I give to ALL new beekeepers here plus any more advanced beekeeper (typically a younger crowd) who want to go commercial and move into the pollination business.

>I am not exactly certain of the exact number but there are about half a dozen well know 'commercial size' beekeeping operation that are rearing resistant stock.

>Lucky for me (largely due to location) a lot of the local stock is from a well known and local (always a good consideration) resistant stock.

>I do suspect the context of the local environment does play into my own efforts to rear 'no treatment' stock.

Gene in Central Texas...

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