>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 *********************************************** The BEE-L mailing list is powered by L-Soft's renowned LISTSERV(R) list management software. For more information, go to: http://www.lsoft.com/LISTSERV-powered.html