I like your attitude about the basis for comparison and the needs for control of material used and the need to replicate an experiment. The problems in conducting such an experiment is controlling the environmentduring the experiment. I am not sure that one can really replicate such an experiment because of the changes in environment. Let us say that in 1996 we have lower than average daytime temperatures, more fog than usual and heavy rains. These conditions may be more favorable to the flowers in the area, provide more natural pollen and richer nectar.So the colony of bees grows well. What about the mites or the mold oriented diseases? They may also thrive, but how do we know.? Next season we try to replicate the size of colony, the treatments used, but there is nothing we can do to replicate the weather we can only record the differences and make an intelligent guess of the effect of the differences. Can you describe or direct me to literature on measuring the effect of trachael mites and the devices needed to observe them.