Kelley Rosenlund wrote:
 
\On the subject of mite control, I understand the drone cells attract the
\mites & I assume consequently the drones have a higher infestation of mites
\than the workers.
 
Yes, mites invade drone brood cells about twelve times more frequent than
worker brood cells. From the point of view of the mite, this is behaviour is
favoured by the higher reproductive success in drone brood cells. However,
mites seem to leave the bees with which they emerged from the brood cells,
maybe influenced by the sometimes deplorable condition of the parasitized
young bees. Also, drones can be the 'vehikle' to transport mites from one
colony to another. However, within the colony mites will experience the
largest probability to be brought to a suitable brood cell by a worker bee
rather than by a drone since drones dominantly dwell on the (broodless) edges
of the colony. So, I don't know if adult drones as a consequence of a higher
brood cell infection will really have a higher infestation rate than the
workers.(but this is hardly infestigated!)
 
\I was reading in The hive & the Honey bee of using
\synthetic queen phernomes to attract drones for research.
\Could phernomes be used to attract drones, destroy them and the mites?
 
I guess that this could work for mate-ready drones
 
\How effective would this be?
 
But I don't think that a significant part of the mites can be distroyed,
moreover, suppose that we were able to destroy all the drones we may get
other problems!
It is probably more convenient to kill the drones and the mites before they
emerge. Drone trapping combs are proven to be very effective varroacides,
provided that all the mites are on the bees (during periods with no brood
older than 7 days in your colonies). About 500 drone larvea in brood cells
per kg of bees will trap during capping more than 95% of the mites from the
bees. My private apiary (10-15 colonies, for the 4th year) as well as the
university apiary (about 50 colonies, for the second year) are maintained
healthy only using drone trapping combs.
 
yours,
 
Johan Calis
 
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Wageningen Agricultural University
The Netherlands