Ok so I might be shooting in the dark here, but I was trying to catch up on
emails over Spring break.  (incedently whoever posted about pollen and
Spring peepers, I heard the first of them two days ago before it got cold
and the maples are "blooming" here today, should be warm enough for
foraging).  We've been talking about feeding macerated bees to colonies and
killing them.  I wonder if there is any link to VSH, might be a double
edged sword there.  Bees are chewing up the pupae that are parasitized by
varroa, which theoretically seem to be the most likely to be affected
viruses in particular.  I seem to recall that pure VSH lines did horribly
bad and it was put forth that the metabolic cost of VSH might be too high
(well that and the cost of lost brood/population, which is metabolic
indirectly).  Seems transmission of viruses could be a compounding factor.
If the control of varroa leads to the spread of viruses what's the point
right?

Has anyone had any good luck with the VSH line?  At what level of
expression?  Just curiosity striking me today, I better get back to
building that deck before I get caught spending all day in front of the
computer.

Jeremy
West Michigan

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