HELP! Shiveled wings, varroa

[Brent Bean]

Check Mite with formic acid? How do the bees handle such and onslaught? The cure might be as bad as the disease.
First I quit using hard chemicals like Check Mite for the obvious reason, they don’t work like they once did because of resistance and long term contamination of comb. The best defense against varroa is not to let them build up to economic threshold which usually will cause the hive to crash no matter what you do, like declare total war by bombarding them with multiple chemicals none of which is consequence free, there is a trade off.
Many successful beekeepers don’t us any hard chemicals or soft chemicals like formic acid, read some of the articles in American Bee Journal from guys like Randy Oliver. If you wait until there is heavy mite load before you do mite treatment you are setting yourself up for failure more than success.

[Bee_Sweet]

I offer my suggestions because I went through this already this year and this worked. Also, I do believe that aircooled wants to use nonchemical if possible "I've been trying to keep things chemical free".

To go along with my other suggestions; to treat for tracheal mites I added in 10 drops of winter green oil to 8 cups of sugar (in your 2:1 sugar water. I say 8 cups because that is how I make mine, in batches). You can get the oil in the baking section of your grocery store. Make sure you put it on the sugar first before the water so that it soaks in good. Feed to your bees as I mentioned in the other post (remember do not feed too much.... maybe about 1/2 to 3/4 of a gallon).
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[MIKI]

What were the mite counts for this hive for the last couple of months?