tomas mozer wrote:
>
 in my opinion,  the situation should stabilize within a decade or so
and a re-normalized
> apiculture will be the result, avoiding bee-products' chemical contamination
> and perpetual pharmaceutical dependency...
>Hello Mr. Mozer,
Although we have never met or talked I have long admired you from a
distance. Although i now live in Missouri i grew up in DeLand,Florida
with the late B. Green and Horace Bell.
If we are to solve the Varroa problem as you believe can be done what
steps would you recommend.
1. get all our bees on 4.9mm foundation?
2. quit medicating for varroa and raise queens from survivors?
3. perfect the line by breeding from the best of the best survivior
queens.
With all do respect Mr. Mozer i believe step 2&3 have been tried with
some success but not total success by E.H. Erickson,A.H. Atmowidjojo and
L.H. Hines.
Being a retired bee inspector from Florida, a state which has had mite
problems from the start, I respect your opinion. Its your opinion then
that the missing link we are all looking for might be the small cell
size?
A friend of mine tried steps 2 & 3 with a operation around two thousand
colonies. When his numbers dropped below 200 and he was almost bankrupt
he bought 850 packages from the south,bought honey to keep from losing
honey accounts and went to medicating. He was from a three generation
beekeeping family and Grandpa had advised son and grandson to do steps
2&3.
What you propose for a large beekeeper is expensive. Wouldn't a start be
replacing all foundation with the smaller size for you area and then
buying survivor queens from the many people raising those? In my opinion
i don't believe steps 2&3 will solve the problem by itself. You really
believe the small feral colony cell size 4.8mm to 5.0mm might be the
missing link we have been looking for? So simple and right before us all
the time. If you are right this could be the most important beekeeping
discovery of this decade!
Bob Harrison U.S.A.