>Randy, you have more "Cojones" than I. I admire your tenacity and hope you
will keep us posted.

I spoke with my sons a couple of weeks ago.  I congratulated us for finally
hitting our target number of hives, and for being caught up on feeding,
supering, etc. (for the first time ever).  And then I said that there was
only one thing keeping me awake at night.  Both sons in unison spoke, "Our
mite levels."

We've never had such a hard time in bringing mite levels down to what we're
comfortable with.  And up until recently, we only used thymol gel for
summer treatment.

We're not scrimping on investment--it costs us nearly $5 grand and a bunch
of labor to put two MAQS in all our hives.  However, a full dose of Apivar
would cost a great deal more, plus take more labor.  We are also dealing
with the constraint that due to an unusual season, we still have lots of
honey to pull, so can't apply treatments not approved for hives with honey.
  But we have no intention of doing something as dumb as letting our hives
go downhill due to mites.  There is nothing simple nor easy about this.  We
muddle along, learning just as everyone else does.

-- 
Randy Oliver
Grass Valley, CA
www.ScientificBeekeeping.com

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