Ted:
You think pretty well, too bad others don't.
However, what is the SHELF LIFE of your APISTAN as you keep it?  To make a
real scientific evaluation, you would have to use a separate previously
unopened box of Apistan for each treatment to really determine if your bees
had developed a resistance to Apistan.

Surely, you remember that wonderful miticide, Miticur, which would kill BOTH
tracheal and Varroa mites.  Those penny-pinching commercial operators in
Florida discovered that a veterinarian pesticide was 30% stronger and MUCH
cheaper, so they substituted that for Miticur and KILLED THEIR BEES.  Then,
they SUED Hoechst-Rouse
company for the value of their bees, so H.R. curtailed Miticur completely
stating that there was not enough profit in it for them to put up with all
that crap done by
unskilled, abusing beekeepers.
We have the same problem with Apistan today including the migratory folks.
They can't set colonies aside for 42 days between migratory stops, so they
are keeping strips in for long periods of time in winter quarters, or using
strips 5-6 days while in transit between stops and repeat, and repeat, and
repeat. The mites become RESISTANT to Apistan because of NOT FOLLOWING THE
LABEL.

Apistan is a fine miticide if PROPERLY USED; but it just takes 1-2 bad apples
to spoil a whole barrel, and you just can't convince some of these know-it-all
beeHAVERS to follow instructions developed by competent scientists.

Good to hear from you Ted
By the way, the MIDNITEBEE has had some severe medical problems and another
URL offered to publish my PINK PAGES and I said OK.  Now, the MIDNITEBEE has
dropped
my stuff.  The new URL is:
http://www.beekeeper.org/george_imirie/index.html


George