Bob, I always appreciate your posts.

Across the board, new beekeepers lack experience (by definition)...those wanting to be "treatment-free" don't make any more or any stupider mistakes than any other group of beekeepers...feed until they swarm (after cutting out all the queen cells), don't inspect the hives (too scared), overfeed, underfeed, leave mite strips in over the winter, reverse boxes too early or too late, spread the brood too thin, leave too little honey on for the winter,leave too much...introduce a queen to a laying worker hive, treat with honey supers on, extract from treated brood frames, extract (and sell as honey) feed stored in the comb, put banannas and candy canes in the hives for "treatments", use fipronol in homemade SHB traps, various homemade treatments, etc....the list could go on.

I don't think it's particularly useful to single out "treatment-free" as an approach where people make mistakes that sometimes kill their bees.

I'll agree to be "the guy" responsible for all the bad treatment free advice that is given out on the internet (and there is a lot of it)...but only if someone takes the job to be responsible for all the bad treatment advice.

deknow

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