Nigel, it would be interesting for you to see the un-treated bees that Beeblebrox refers to - you obviously have your own locals which you have mentioned before which are not prime examples of 'local bees'.
An experiment of winter-treating a couple of Beeblebroxs' colonies to a) see the mite drop and b) see how they compare the following season to non-treated ones would be very interesting!
And as I mentioned in my earlier post, if non-treated bees could be selectively bred over time, their performance should slowly but surely increase. This is performance of mite resistance and also honey-gathering ability.
It would take a (long) while for them to improve to be close to that of a hybrid bee I suspect. However if below, they could improve to have the average yield as reported by the BBKA survey, I suspect. Say, in 6 - 10 years?
From what I remember, studies have shown that viruses associated with varroa can be transmitted from drone to queen and early queen failure is a result. For Ron Hoskins miticide use - I don't doubt his experience - however if he was using Apistan or Bayvarol as 'chemical' miticides as the only ones available in the early days I believe, before he went treatment free, they could well have harmed the queens or drones by a sub-lethal dose. They are insecticides after all.
I would also assume that if colonies are heavily infested with varroa, they would not be prosperous enough to swarm. But this very much depends on the swarming nature of the bee as I have had , in the past, colonies that would swarm on 5 frames of brood which means that you would be unlikely to get anything other than the odd jar of honey.
I would anticipate, say, an average 6 frames of brood at first inspection in a wooden hive - although when is first inspection? The date changes by the season. My (treated) colonies get to around 14 - 15 frames of brood as an average by the end of May and hopefully stay there for a couple of months and hopefully won't swarm. Overwintering with a small brood will conserve winter stores and is no bad thing in itself; Carniolans have a reputation for a rapid spring build up and then swarm. Ligusticas are renowned for a large winter and summer colony. AMM's are expected to have a small winter cluster and not get too big for a single national brood box. Buckfasts try to be the best of all. (And as you imply Nigel, there are potentially better and not so good breeders out there).
Nigel I have seen your buckets ! Impressive. It is impossible to compare one region with another however for what it's worth, I got 800kg from 11 production hives last year, without local comparisons, I can't say whether they are good or bad, however I got more honey than I need for one season. From those 11, one of those swarmed, one was artificially swarmed and one had brood stolen a few times which reduced its effectiveness. It was very noticeable that the new (2017) queens built up much better in 2018 than colonies with 2016 queens. I suspect the poor spring and a late start made the difference more noticeable than usual.
An experiment of winter-treating a couple of Beeblebroxs' colonies to a) see the mite drop and b) see how they compare the following season to non-treated ones would be very interesting!
And as I mentioned in my earlier post, if non-treated bees could be selectively bred over time, their performance should slowly but surely increase. This is performance of mite resistance and also honey-gathering ability.
It would take a (long) while for them to improve to be close to that of a hybrid bee I suspect. However if below, they could improve to have the average yield as reported by the BBKA survey, I suspect. Say, in 6 - 10 years?
From what I remember, studies have shown that viruses associated with varroa can be transmitted from drone to queen and early queen failure is a result. For Ron Hoskins miticide use - I don't doubt his experience - however if he was using Apistan or Bayvarol as 'chemical' miticides as the only ones available in the early days I believe, before he went treatment free, they could well have harmed the queens or drones by a sub-lethal dose. They are insecticides after all.
I would also assume that if colonies are heavily infested with varroa, they would not be prosperous enough to swarm. But this very much depends on the swarming nature of the bee as I have had , in the past, colonies that would swarm on 5 frames of brood which means that you would be unlikely to get anything other than the odd jar of honey.
I would anticipate, say, an average 6 frames of brood at first inspection in a wooden hive - although when is first inspection? The date changes by the season. My (treated) colonies get to around 14 - 15 frames of brood as an average by the end of May and hopefully stay there for a couple of months and hopefully won't swarm. Overwintering with a small brood will conserve winter stores and is no bad thing in itself; Carniolans have a reputation for a rapid spring build up and then swarm. Ligusticas are renowned for a large winter and summer colony. AMM's are expected to have a small winter cluster and not get too big for a single national brood box. Buckfasts try to be the best of all. (And as you imply Nigel, there are potentially better and not so good breeders out there).
Nigel I have seen your buckets ! Impressive. It is impossible to compare one region with another however for what it's worth, I got 800kg from 11 production hives last year, without local comparisons, I can't say whether they are good or bad, however I got more honey than I need for one season. From those 11, one of those swarmed, one was artificially swarmed and one had brood stolen a few times which reduced its effectiveness. It was very noticeable that the new (2017) queens built up much better in 2018 than colonies with 2016 queens. I suspect the poor spring and a late start made the difference more noticeable than usual.
May your bees read the same books as you do.