From: "Dave Cushman" <dave.cushman@lineone.net>
Date: Thu, 11 Jan 2001 12:27:31 -0000
To: <BiologicalBeekeeping@egroups.com>
Subject: Re: cell size in supers

Hi All

----- Original Message -----
From: Joel Govostes <jwg6@cornell.edu>

In the 1880s through to 1930s Samuel Simmins made much of starting comb
drawing underneath the brood nest. He was able to do this as he used his own
design of hive known as a "Conquerer".

In essence the "Conquerer" hive was a cupboard with horizontal runners set
on the inside every 75 mm up oposing sides. His brood boxes and supers were
216 mm and 141 mm in height and had cleats on the sides so that they would
slide into any pair of runners. A 9 mm beespace existed between installed
boxes. His frames were also 216 mm & 141 mm in height respectively.

With this arrangement he could put brood boxes or supers in any position or
vertical order within the hive.

> So then, does a colony (left to its own
> devices) indeed abandon old, dark, cocoon-laden combs, over time, and
shift
> their brood nest onto newer ones?

I have observed a "wild" colony in a belfry that shifted the focus of its
brood nest so that exposed combs were attacked by waxmoth, then the bees
finished the destruction in a vigorous almost frenzied fashion before
constructing new comb in the same places.

This nest was horizontally disposed owing to local conditions.

> Could this be a behavior that would
> prevent reduction in workers' body size over time?

I have seen much old comb that shows renewel and re-fashioning.
I believe that after a few seasons the comb is chewed to pieces and rebuilt
so that the effect of cocoons only occurs for a short time then the original
cellsize (and bee size) is automatically restored.
This process is always on going in some part of the nest of a long
established colony, thus giving an overall stability in cellsize and
beesize. The cocoon load increases initially then stabilises.

I also think that old comb often has an appearance of having smaller cells
when in fact it is only the rim that is thickened. the volume of the cell
acually remaining reasonably constant. (work is in progress on this at
present).

Best Regards Dave Cushman