Referencing an article in the Danish Beekeeper magazine!

Anderson & Truemann

a lot is pointing at, that 5-6 sorts of Varroa is present in the World. All which is harming the bees differently.

Varroa Jacobsoni Oud, that was first described in 1904 is apparently not that Mite, that is spread in the most of the world. The suspect about this was raised in New Guinea, where it was found, that some mites were very dangerous to European bees while other didn't harm the families. An examination of mites from 32 different places in the world shows that there exists 5-6 different Varroamites. They are of clearly different size, character of reproduction and in mihochondie DNA composition. It obviously shows that Varroa Jacobini keeps to its original host the Asiatic honey bee Apis cerana. Obviously it is only this sort that can harm beefamilies. Special the so known  Korean type is found in Europe and USA, while the Japanese type is found in South America and in a few places in USA. It is only those two strains that have been able to infest the European bee, while the other lives on the Asiatic bee Apis cerana. This could explain that the South American bees are tolerant to the mites. Maybe the Japanese type is not that aggressive as the Korean type that we find on our (Danish) bees.

best regards
Jorn Johanesson

EDBi = multilingual Beekeeping software since 1987
http://apimo.dk (USA)
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Read the article about use of oxalic and formic acid in the fight of the Varroa at the above URL
now also as Adobe PDF format!