There is certainly a lot of talk about formic acid against varroa mites. In Holland, as probably in many other countries the use of formic acid is officially not yet allowed, but still we want to give it a try. On a fair we found little containers that could be mounted inside a low frame and hung between other frames in the brood area. They will hold some 150 ml of fluid and are manufactured in Berlin. The principle is that of a bottle filled with water and put upside down in in a saucer to water the birds in your garden. In the cup you stick some kind of paper wick, so the fluid will evaporate slowly over a couple of weeks. Interesting, but where do you buy formic acid? Thirty years ago it could easily be bought in any drugstore for just about peanuts (as the dutch say for a fart and three marbles), but today it seems like it has disappeared from the face of the earth. Nobody wants to order it for you and nobody even knows where from. We went to the farmacy here and also in Belgium and it turned out they could order it, but the price would be about $100 for a gallon! Then all of a sudden an agricultural advisor turned up and got me ten gallons for about $75. That's better! The datasheet that comes with the formic acid applicator references an paper by a German entomologist on the results. Anybody tried it and can tell us if FA is any good? It is a nasty skin etching stuff that ants use for chemical warfare, but it still seems a lot more natural than Apistan to me. 73's Richard -- Richard C. van Ouwerkerk, arts email [log in to unmask] anesthesioloog PE1KFM Geerdinkhof 529 telephone & fax +31 20 6953246 1103 RH AMSTERDAM ZUIDOOST The Netherlands "Das ist wirklich groszartig, Herr Kollege, was sie da geleistet haben" Einstein