thanks again for the great replies.
donna, sounds like you are doing a great job with your bees, and congratulations for being successful off treatments. i meant to put (optional) after the powdered sugar step but i forgot to. i was thinking about using formic acid for this step, but after considering the information dean presented, and realizing that it would be faster, less expensive, and less traumatic to the bees, i decided powdered sugar made more sense. it may not be necessary, and it's a little more effort, but i would probably do it to give the weakened bees the best chance for recovery.
letmbee, you present the other case, letting m bee and having them make it through tough times might result in some good traits coming through, and that would be a plus. as far as exposure to diseases and pests, your right, you can't totally prevent it. on the other hand you can limit it be not letting any of your other hives become a source for it. i wonder when i read about treatment free yards having big losses, whether or not it may have started with one hive, and then spread to the other hives like a domino effect. i don't believe there will ever be a 'superbee' that is so resistant to diseases and pests that it is immune to collapse from same. it seems a waste of good bees and good genetics to test them beyond their limit, when exposing them unecessarily by not cleaning up the sick hives, before they collapse, and then get robbed out by the good ones. (not to mention putting the nearby ferals at risk as well) jmho.
mark, as far as combining goes, i would personally not introduce bees from a weak hive into a strong one unless i first tried to figure out why the weak one was weak. if it was mites, i think i would want to remove the mites from the weak bees first, and avoid introducing a sudden load into the strong one.
oldtimer, you and i can recall when it wasn't possible to carry on a discussion like this on the treatment free forum. thankfully, that has changed. i know that i have raised some of these questions on the main bee forum, but i really wanted to get feed back here in the tfb forum from folks like donna, who might be willing to share their actual experiences.
rusty hills, i share your view about being responsible for the bees that we adopt, corral up, manipulate, and take away from. i don't think it's fair to the bees to put them into this artificial situation, and not take action when it is needed.
the one thing that is not considered in my working plan above, is what to do with a hive that is failing later in the season, after the fall harvest say, and after there are no longer any drones or replacement queens available.
any thoughts?