Jim said;
  One gentleman monitored his drops daily, followed product labels, sought
help from club members and still lost all three of his hives.

Monitoring drops has not worked this year. Commercial beekeepers in the U.S.
have seen hives crashing which were not even near the needing treatment
level as laid out by our researchers.

Samples sent to Rothamsted in the U.K. placed the blame on a combination of
viruses. Many commercial beekeepers are not willing to spend the money for
replacement bees until we get a handle on the problem for fear of a repeat
this fall.

Jim said:
While it is true that a few people had just been
blissfully unaware of what was happening, the balance of the people are
educated, informed and experienced.

Varroa is winning the battle! Commercial beekeepers around the world have
been lulled into thinking researchers are going to pull a rabbit out of a
hat and save the industry with a new chemical with a 98% efficacy. Not going
to happen!

As foretold by our best beekeeping minds years ago when beekeepers decided
to get on the chemical treadmill:

" when the varroa become resistant to the big three chemicals which show 98%
control in testing then varroa control will get harder and the virus issue
will raise its ugly head".

Over a hundred chemicals have shown some efficacy in control of varroa
(varroa Handbook 1988) but only three were what the industry saw as
effective for the commercial beekeeper.

I warned the list years ago the present situation was coming. Even myself or
those at Rothamsted could not have imagined the magnitude of the current
problem.

Jim's friend is worried about three hives. I have personally seen in my
travels deadouts in the tens of thousands. Parasitic mite syndrome (PMS) in
almost all deadouts . PMS is the term given to virus problems associated
with a varroa infestation by Dr. Shiminuki when head of the Beltsville Bee
lab.

My varroa tolerant bees (Bee Culture  Jan. 2005) , those of Purvis
Brothers( ABJ  Jan. 2005)  and Kirk Webster (ABJ March 2005)
so far are unaffected by the current virus problems.

Of the three above beekeepers I will most likely be the first to test the
Russian/Russian bee against the "super varroa" & current virus issue as I am
placing a line of Russian yards parallel to yards returning from California
with super mites & virus issues for miles. All within flying distance.

Will be a real test of the Russian bee. To be fair reports of losses of
Russian hives mixed in holding yards with crashing colonies of other races
are around as are reports from beekeepers of the Russian bee the only bee
left standing in such situations. I need to see for myself.

Wish I had better news for the list!

Sincerely,
Bob Harrison

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