> Similarly, the question of whether varroa gets hammered by sugar
> rolls, jelly rolls, oil foggers, vinegar foggers, a suspiciously
> low-volatility organic acid, even less volatile salts, fluorinated
> synthetic pesticides, or other treatment, is a question for empirical
> testing, quite aside from whether any mechanism has been proposed.

That's quite a list!  And it doesn't include any of the SANCTIONED
treatments
(two in my country, more in others).  Seems the only thing missing is the
kitchen sink!  Sobering when presented so succinctly.  Thanks Robert!

> People should stop saying 'you dunno how it works so you
> can't claim that it does work'.

In most cases the call for proof has been for empirical evidence
that a treatment (regardless of its mechanism) is effective.  AND
that the empirical evidence be gathered against experimental
controls and the data collection be consistently repeatable.
Admittedly the requests for that proof have been cloaked in a lot
of emotive authoring and response.  Would there were more of the
former (empirical evidence) and less of the latter (emotion), but
we're only human.

> While I'm holding forth on scientific method, let me add that the
> functions of the drones in the hive are so very little known that drastic
> interference with their numbers is in my opinion unjustified.
Sacrificing
> any large minority of drones as a kind of varroa sink looks to me dubious.

I heard Thomas Seeley speak in March of this year, the title of
his presentation was "Drones, Good for the bees or good for the
beekeeper?"  The answer to his question was, "Yes".

During drone season (the time of year when virgin queens are in
want of nuptual flights), bees want to be raising drones.  This
"want" is based on experiments done in summertime (drone season)
where hives were continuously denied drone brood (any and all drone
brood was removed from the hive).  Hives thus denied shifted into a
drone production mode, the more they were denied the more they attempted
to thwart the denial.  The less drones they had, the more they tried
to raise more drones!  Complete drone denial demoralized the hive
(an anthropomorphic interpretation of the behavior the bees
displayed).

The conclusion was that drones were good for the bees, but not
without a price.  Hives that were seeded with drones (using drone
foundation) produced significantly less honey than control hives
(hives neither denied drone production OR seeded with drone foundation).
The price the "drone empowered" hives paid was the price of rearing and
fueling all those stud muffins.  It takes a lot of pollen to raise 'em
and a lot of honey to keep 'em flyin'.  The price the hive pay fors
morale is balanced by the resources it takes for the morale boosters.

Enter drone trapping.  Studies yet unpublished (at least the ones I'm
thinking of) will show that drone trapping is an effective means to keep
Varroa populations in check.  When trapping drones, not all of the
developing drones are removed from the hive, some remain.  It appears
(and is speculated) that drone trapping gives the best of both worlds.
Hives aren't totally denied their drones (hence bees get what they want),
Varroa populations are kept in check (hence the beekeeper gets what (s)he
wants, and the bees expend some resources raising the drones but don't
expend as many resources keeping the drones flying (a good compromise).
These speculative conclusions have yet to be verified empirically, but
expectations are that drones can be good both for the bees and the
beekeepers!

Aaron Morris - thinking you CAN have it both ways!