> Am I right in interpreting that the total number of mites per colony was about the same for SC and the controls? In that case, the number of mites per 100 bees was smaller in SC since there were more bees.

No, that's not right. What they are saying is that the colonies
reached the economic threshold at about the same time. This means
small cell failed to prevent the mites from building up and the hives
reached the critical point just as the regular cell hives did and were
not protected from the devastating effects of varroa mite *at all*.
These figures are not absolute values but reflect averages and ranges.
What is important is the overall effect in preventing colony collapse.

As I quoted, they is what they said:

> To summarize our results, we found that the use of small cell foundation did not significantly affect cm2 total brood, total mites per colony, mites per brood cell, or mites per adult bee, but did affect adult bee population for two sampling months. Varroa levels were similar in all colonies throughout the study. We found no evidence that small cell foundation was beneficial with regard to varroa control under the tested conditions in Florida.

In other words, it did not work, it did not help, it provided no
significant effect in delaying the mite development nor the ultimate
explosion of mites which leads to colony collapse due to varroa
infestation.


-- 
Peter L Borst

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