It would be nice to never have to feed, but the necessity can be as much a function of weather, local climate, and carrying capacity for the area as it strain of bees (not saying it has no effect). Not to mention as has been written here ad nauseum before there are often a lot of economic reasons to feed, it just depends on your philosophy and goals. I seldom feed syrup anymore but then again I extract early and usually only pull enough honey to keep myself and my wife supplied with beer and mead and pay for expenditures. I do toss bricks on when the winter runs long as a precaution though. Jeremy West Michigan *********************************************** The BEE-L mailing list is powered by L-Soft's renowned LISTSERV(R) list management software. For more information, go to: http://www.lsoft.com/LISTSERV-powered.html