From: "Allen Dick" <allend@internode.net>
Date: Tue, 1 Jan 2002 14:35:34 -0700
To: <BiologicalBeekeeping@yahoogroups.com>
Subject: Re: Brood diseases

>You may well be right regarding the USA, but the picture in the UK isn't
> so clear.

Nor in America, really. Modernization spread unevenly and with it,
previously minor annoyances developed into scourges.

Before moveable frames and extracting, comb was not kept and re-used for
long. Honey harvesting involved cutting out the combs and destroying them
and the bees, along with any diseases they might harbour. Heavy hives and
light hives were harvested (comb cut out) and medium weight hives kept for
the next year. This eliminated the poorest -- perhaps diseased -- ones and
the mature hives that might have been out robbing.

Bee strains were heavily selected by these management techniques which
eliminated extremes, but rewarded consistent success.

In addition to the selection pressure from the harvesting methods, frequent
swarming was encouraged. Bees were continually re-establishing on new comb.
Bees had to be able to thrive or die.

The invention of extraction and introduction of moveable comb allowed
increasing honey production at the expense of wax production, but at the
expense of dumping all previous selection criteria and relying solely on
human intervention to control diseases and pests.

allen