BobHarrison wrote: There has been research but for the most part our U.S.
queen producers have ignored the research. Our commercial beekeepers also. 

Hi Bob,
It is fairly typical of industry not to incorporate current research--there
is often a 20- to 30-year lag time between research and application in
technology fields, medicine, and agriculture.

One personal observation is that I started and ran the insectary at Univ of
Calif, Irvine in 1972.  I mass produced insects in order to extract their
developmental hormones--juvenile hormone and ecdysone--in order to develop
environmentally-friendly insecticides.  These insecticides didn't reach the
market until the last few years--after the previous generations of
insecticides were phased out due to regulation, inefficiency due to
resistance, or politically due to consumer demand.

Beekeepers usually won't change their ways until they are forced to by the
fact that their established methods no longer work.  Then they MUST change
if they want to stay in business.  There are a some, such as yourself, who
are a few years ahead of the curve, and are able to experiment and set an
example for the others.  I commend you for that.

Randy Oliver
California

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