Randy's post in the synergy thread was excellent.

We have never had "treatment free bees". What we had were "reasonable"
losses.

Humans are not treatment free. All you need do is review, from birth, all
the medications we pour into our bodies and we still succumb to viruses,
bacteria, dna faults, cancers, and many other problems. Our losses are not
acceptable to us, just as our colony losses are not acceptable.

The problem we are currently involved in is caused by globalization. Pests
from one place are now able to be transported by us to anywhere on the
globe. The globe is slowly becoming more uniform.

As beekeepers, the problem we face is is the same as we face with our own
health. Natural selection is more of an option with our bees than
ourselves, but do we really want to go down that path? There is no
guarantee that all will come out well through natural selection since
extinction is always a natural option.

IMO, our current problem with Varroa  is like our human problem with
Malaria. Kill the mosquito and you control Malaria. In the meantime we
develop treatments for Malaria.

We know how to control Varroa, but it requires treatments. We are not very
far along in treating the bees so they can withstand the attendant
diseases.

Where there are no disease carrying mosquitoes, we partially tolerate them.
If there were no disease vectoring Varroa, they also would be partially
tolerable.

But there are not, so our only option, unless we do not care about major
losses, it to treat for Varroa. The other part of the equation has always
been a part of good beekeeping which is, to the best of our ability, keep
our bees healthy.

We live in interesting times.

Bill Truesdell
Bath, Maine

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