>Have you purchased his nucs and followed his methods?<

No and only as far as making up new colonies with queen cells. It took me a few years to somewhat understand what I was see with out the treatments other than dying bees. Very conservative as to the number of new colonies per year. 

> all the proretic varroa do not pile into the first brood raised after a broodless 
period and kill themselves as Mel suggests.<

This is what I see also, nice solid brood patterns right from the start. Just guessing, but what I think could be happening is for the mites to reproduce efficiently they must enter a cell within a certain time frame during the active breeding season. If they don't some may lose their ability to reproduce. What I do know is the new nucs made up with queen cells winter quite well.

With one of my second year colonies I have tried something different as these are the ones that have the most trouble getting through to the next spring. Early July I pulled the queen to let the bees build emergency cells. For what ever reason the new queen did not make it back from a mating flight or something. So introduced more eggs and larva from the original queen, this new queen took.  So am looking forward as to how this colony winters. I did see a very substantial mite drop through the requeen period.

My goal at this stage is to have colonies consistently go through two winters and build up strong the third season but as it stands now to stay static I make up two nucs with queen cells from one hive to carry over to the next year using one for honey production the other to make new nucs to over winter. To increase I forgo the honey. Making the nucs up in late June early July work well to over winter. July being the best.

>His methods, if followed and if successful should have resulted in a far 
larger increase in your hive numbers, so I am curious which of his ideas you 
have followed and which proved out -- and how.  Perhaps increase was not 
your goal?<

It looks good on paper but I have no ideal if it can be done at that level.
My goal is to have x number of colonies year to year without buying new bees to fill the gaps with some honey production, but also working towards healthy colonies surviving several years sometime in the future.
Really just using queen cells to make up replacement colonies for the next season. A July split/nuc does work very well.

I think any one new to bees and wanting to go treatment free is taking on a tough job. You need a good plan in place when starting. There is such a large chance that their first package or nuc will not make it to the New Year without doing something to deal with the mites and then there are all the other issues. After three generations of queens I do notice an improvement in how my bees are handling the varroa. Not that I know why this is. On a small scale I do think treatment free is possible which really hinges on a persons expectations.
Another four years may tell me something new.

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