>Peter wrote "My reading is that they are positing bee behavior as the main factor; mite behavior is not implicated in this work."

That's how I read it, and they specifically call out frequency of swarming, which has been mentioned a lot in posts here as a way to break the mite reproductive cycle.  I was curious how often African bees actually swarm in their native environment.  I found specific numbers in: Behavior Characteristics of the Africanized Bees, Apis mellifera scutellata, by Elizabeth L. Sears:

"Africanized honey bees swarm at a rate far greater than European honey bees. Unlike the European bees who construct large nests for winter protection and storage of food resources, seldom abandoning them, Africanized honey bees, not needing winter storage, construct smaller nests. Most of their resources go toward reproduction and the rearing of young. Africanized bees are smaller than European honey bees and swarm at a younger age. 100% of bees as young as eight days old will swarm in Africanized colonies, as contrasted to only 70% swarming of bees at the same age in European Colonies (Winston, 1992). Their numbers increase very rapidly and they soon outgrow the small nests. They typically produce six to twelve swarms per year (Camazine and Morse, 1988; Benson, 1985). The record number of swarms in one year for European bees during one particularly favorable growing season was 3.6 swarms with an average of 1.0 to 2.6 swarms annually (Winston, 1992). "

Six to 12 per year, and I'm guessing that, given the tropical/subtropical climate and the fact that they are active year round, means that the swarms happen more or less regularly throughout the year, as soon as the colony outgrows the hive (assumption on my part).  I would think that that behavior alone would go a long way towards providing a high degree of resistance to varroa.

So, all we have to do is split our colonies every month throughout the growing season and we're done, problem solved.  <--- joke.....or is it?


Bill
Claremont, NH, US

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