Sorry Aaron about the excessive quotes.  I hope this is ok.
Janaet

 I did not get when you apply the powder sugar.  One limitation or possible
> misinterpretation stems from the fact that most mites will be [capped?] in
> brood cells during the brood-rearing season.  As I understand it, sugar
> dislodges only mites on the adult bees on the frames which is still
> beneficial.
>
> Waldemar

Absolutely.  Each time we do a treatment, we apply the powdered sugar 3
times, 7 to 10 days apart, like Sucrocide.  That's the timing to capture
mites as cap brood hatches.  I've done it so far when there were no honey
supers.
  We just did our 2nd out of 3 treatments and we have one more to go.  I've
done two other series, one in April and one in mid-July after we pulled our
berry honey.  On the two more infested (out of 8) hives, we did a 4th
treatment, 7 days after the 3rd both times.
   Dr. Eric Mussen, our California State Apiarist says the powdered sugar
does not actually kill the mites, although it seems to me they are
suffocated.  It just dislodges them.  The sugar does harden after 24 hours
and I've seen mites walk across the top. I encourage removing the sugar
right away, in case there are living mites and you are having a dearth where
the bees would be attracted back to the sugar, allowing the mites to hitch a
ride.  The other thing Eric said, mites can live a week without a host.
Scary.
   We have pictures and more detailed instructions posted on the Instruction
page of www.countryrubes.com
Thanks,
   Janet

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