Hi Mike,
what a "successful" treatment free beekeeper is, has been discussed before. And the discussion showed, that it is not easy to define.
Personally I don't think an apiary with untreated hives which "has bees", is successful. Because if you replace losses year after year with swarms, cutouts, splits and packages - that is not sustainable and never enhances the local stock.
The oldtimers here say, if you loose more than 3 % of your hives during winter, you do a poor job as a beekeeper. That was pre-varroa, though. Today up to 10 % loss every winter is considered normal. Most beekeepers here have much less losses each year. 0-5 %.
Also a bunch of hives that are in a poor state, fleshless, starving and generally weak, can't be seriously called a success. See the other thread thriving vs. treatment free. If I look into nature I see strong creatures with a good health. What have been showed me by some treatment free beekeepers was far away from it. I see the videos an Dee's hives and they do seem to be fairly strong. But where are the videos of your hives? And I would also be interested in videos and pictures of Michael Bush's hives. Just to get a feeling how hives do in other treatment free projects.
I also asked Michael, how many hives in total were killed in his project so far, excuse: let die.
It would be nice to get an answer.
It also would be good to compare the number of hives available and those habitated. If you have 1,000 hives and just about 200 are habitated each year, that won't be a success in my eyes. Far from it.
I want people going treatment free successfully, meaning: do the transition more slowly. Take more time. Have much less or zero losses. Have strong and healthy colonies. In my experience the sturdiest colonies are very strong colonies.
From what I distilled from successful full-stop treatment free beekeepers, is, that they usually start with a high number of hives. Minimum 100, mostly 500-1,000 colonies. This is another start going treatment free, because the probability that there is a colony that adapts, is much higher than starting with one or two hives. Numbers do matter. Also most of them are experienced beekeepers, very experienced beekeepers. Bees don't die from beekeeper faults in their hands.
Bottom line. For beginners with a couple of hives it is more difficult if not impossible to go treatment free from now to tomorrow. Full stop. It is advisable for them to use slow approach. No haste, take your time. Beekeeping itself is difficult, learn bees first. Than go treatment free, slowly. It may need 50-100 years to get there, so there is no reason to run.
It would be good, if the big names in the treatment free world also would advise beginners to take the slow route. Full stop is not the only way, it is one way. And there are prerequisites to it: experience in beekeeping, high number of hives.
Not every beekeeper wants to keep 100 and more hives. But those beekeepers could found a local treatment free beekeeping association. 5 beekeepers with 10 hives, properly cared for, make 100 hives, too. Also (practical) experience is gained much better through local sharing.