> The numbers that I cited are without a sticky board! We have usualy only
>  a flat panel (the drawer) on wich the mites fall. Sticky boards or
> oiled paper are not used. I dought that the efficiency justifies the
> amount of work involved. Do you have any data about this?
 
Nope.  I wonder, though, where the other mites go?
 
> Compare this with  the ether roll that kills you some hundred bees or
> counting the mites in 100 drone cells, nasty and time consuming. Further
> it is the place were you can treat a colony without any contact to the
> bees.
 
Right I hate killing bees for no good reason, I'll give it some thought.
 
In the meantime, I realised that there is an ideal product for catching
mite drop samples without a screen: A sheet of Permadent, Plasticell or
Pierco cut in half and oiled lightly, with a half inch or so hole to hook
it by then pushed in with a wire poker or somesuchthing.  After two uses
(one on each side), a trip through the dishwasher would make it ready to
go again.
 
They are white and the deep depressions should make it hard for the bees
to get the mites out.
 
Comments anyone?
 
allen