Peter Borst quoted Eric Mussen: > Some colonies with high virus levels survive while others > don't. This suggests that selection and breeding programs could have > real value in this battle to protect bees from mites. We know that some colonies are susceptible to certain viruses and others are resistant, e.g. we can requeen a colony with sacbrood and the sacbrood disappears; TSBV wiped out 95% of cerana colonies in S India in the early 1990s, but they bred from the survivors and TSBV is now not a great problem. Same in the human population - some folks seem to have colds permanently, others never. So is it not logical that some colonies will have a natural resistance to viruses spread by varroa, such as DWV? When varroa first arrived in the UK there were considerable losses; but then things seemed to improve - and this was attributed to beekeepers learning how to cope with varroa. But is that correct? Perhaps it was because those colonies that were highly susceptible to DWV had died out. If this is correct then we need to expose colonies to varroa and select breeders from those that show the best survival rates. Best wishes Peter Edwards beekeepers at stratford-upon-avon.freeserve.co.uk www.stratford-upon-avon.freeserve.co.uk/ **************************************************** * General Information About BEE-L is available at: * * http://www.honeybeeworld.com/bee-l/default.htm * ****************************************************