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Natural Cell Size Experiment

12K views 53 replies 14 participants last post by  Oldtimer 
#1 ·
#3 ·
How many would I have to measure?

I guess for me, the average doesn't really mean all that much. I now know for a fact that there is a range between 4.9 and 5.2. An average is in reality a number which may or may not even exist within the sample.

I have 4.9mm foundation and 4.95mm plastic frames. Both those are shown conclusively to be within my range of values. That's all I need to know. If the bees need anything else, they have foundationless frames.
 
#4 ·
Good experiment Sol. I'm actually going to do something like that once I've had bees on small cell for 2 years, let them build natural comb and see what they do.

However, your experiment lacks one thing. To truly let your bees "regress" back to the cell size they would prefer, you would need to do the exact opposite of what people do when regressing down. You would need to remove all sc foundation, let the bees breed in the larger cells they have built, and then see what sized cells the next generation build. As when bees regress down, they need several cell size stages to do it, it is likely the same, if letting them regress up.

The the next phase, once the bees have established a permanent cell size that may be larger than your sc foundation, would be to see how that affects varroa resistance, ie, are they as resistant as the others.

I'm planning on doing all these experiments myself, so I'll be following yours with interest, if you take it all the way.
 
#6 ·
However, your experiment lacks one thing ... You would need to ... if you take it all the way.
This stuff has been done to death, and I don't plan to continue beating a dead horse. The results are going to be the same as they have always been. The bees build a range of cell sizes that are typically smaller than the standard foundations available to us. There is no need for further testing. There is no need to find some 'average'. It is irrelevant. It's a range, and it's smaller. That really is all there is to it.

I trust Dee Lusby, I trust Michael Bush, I trust my own results. I'd like to get on with my beekeeping experience without getting mired in nit-picking issues that really don't matter. The more foundationless frames I pull, the more I expect them to cover a range of cell sizes that is slightly smaller than the standard foundation available. That's all I've ever seen, that's all I've ever heard of. This is not new technology, not to me, and not to others. It is what it is and looking at it for more decades than it has already been looked at will not change the results. Furthermore, cell size is only part of the puzzle, and I postulate that it is part of the puzzle that has already been solved. Not all agree, but I can't change that. It's literally arguing over tenths of millimeters. It's not worth it.
 
#8 ·
I apologize if my tone was offensive, it was not intended to be so.

I really have seen all this before. It really has all been done before. Eight years ago, it was Michael Bush and Dennis What's-his-name and Dee Lusby and Barry Birkey.

My experiment was to see if using foundationless frames was a viable option. It appears to be. I have purchased some Kelley foundationless mediums which I plan to test next year.

Sorry if I misunderstood the interest in your post, I have a younger brother whose mouth often produces the words "you should..."
 
#10 ·
I started out foundationless and that's all I've ever used. I have 10 frames of drawn comb in an empty deep that I was going to use in swarm traps in the spring. Whenever I get out to the apiary I'll measure a few samples of them for giggles. I only have an english units caliper so i'll have to do a conversion but it should still be accurate into the 10ths of a mm. We are going to get 4 inches of snow today so my trip won't be for another few days or so but I'll check it then if my memory doesn't fail me. Don't know if it matters that I have carnis (that have been making russian daughters for a while now) but they've always been foundationless from day 1. I doubt the results will be miraculous but now I'm interested to see the my own results :D
 
#14 ·
Thanks. I'll basically be doing the same as I did with that other natural cell hive, but starting from sc bees. But this year is just about increasing my numbers of sc bees, I won't do the nc thing till next year.

Once it's under way I'll post pics and stuff.

From a comb foundation only person, I'm now doing some nc in most hives, just to get more drones out there. Anyhow back to Sol, don't want to hijack his thread.
 
#15 ·
Sorry guys, my days with experimenting with cell size are over. I don't wanna be pulling perfectly good comb anymore. It's taken me eight years to get a goodly number of hives full of well drawn comb and now I wanna start breeding and producing nucs and honey.

If I had posted these pics back in 2002, I would have been very popular. Alas, I was uncool before uncool was cool. I'm hoping for a mass exodus from packages to nucs. Then I can handle some business.
 
#16 ·
Sol, yes it's been done to death. Still, it's amazing how many people still don't quite believe it. I make a habit of taking measurements on cut-outs and the like. 5.1 is about the upper end around here, with the lower end being 4.7. Interestingly enough, I did some measurements in Hawaii this year on some top-bar hives and they ranged between 5.1 and 5.4. I thought this was pretty interesting, but didn't really know the history of the hives. So, it could be an issue of regression. It makes sense that size might be climate dependent though.

Food for thought.

Edit: Ok I just found a reference to Lusby's chart. Why have I never seen that before? Makes perfect sense.
(http://www.beesource.com/point-of-v...ta-on-the-influence-of-cell-size/climate-map/)
 
#17 ·
You've just answered your own question and explained why some people don't believe it.

In my own case, when I started reading beesource I saw posts from gurus, saying that the natural size for a cell is 4.9 mm. From my own experience in my own country, I knew this not to be true. So of course I was cautious about everything else the guru said too. If that happened to me, it must also have happened to others. That's why there are non believers. ;)

The first person on beesource to tell me that small cell and natural cell are not the same thing, was Barry. I already knew that, but had got the idea that everybody on beesource thought otherwise.

It's probably about providing full information.
 
#18 ·
I realize people in the know are bored with this information. But I am not in the know.
Has anyone noticed a benefit to natural cell size? I do realize that it seems most people are going back to a 4.9mm cell but that could be influenced by being the most convenient while still being beneficial. Is natural comb worth it basically?
 
#20 ·
No, it is just the majority of comments I read here. Seems to me that there was a trend toward larger cells that resulted in problems with Varrao mites. I have seen a lot of comments that people have large cell foundation setting on shelves and they no longer want to use it in favor of 4.9mm.
 
#22 ·
Barry, You may very well be right. I realize that forums such as this tend to draw attention to only certain things. complaints about suppliers for example. 99 customers can be perfectly happy and never post a word. but the one unhappy one can cause a 15 page thread.
 
#24 ·
"I realize that forums such as this tend to draw attention to only certain things. complaints about suppliers for example."

Or brand new beekeepers trying to tell experienced ones how to do things. Yep, it's all covered in forums like this. ;)
 
#25 ·
I've come to the conclusion that the cell size issue has come to be such a point of contention because of our scientifically minded culture. It's the same with some religious, political, and social issues. Scientific study is very very often simplified by making assumptions and removing variables so that the study can be based on just one or a couple variables and not all of them. It's those simplifying assumptions that really lead the science based in the natural world to useful conclusions and productive innovations.

I am intimately familiar with these constructs as a civil engineer. I just finished a five page spreadsheet for the design of an aeration basin for a waste water treatment plant, and I'd dare to say 3-4 pages of that was based on assumptions made because actually testing for those parameters would be prohibitively expensive. In this type of engineering and especially with foundation engineering, factors of safety can be applied which smooths out the problems that may exist in the design due to simplifying assumptions.

As far as I know, there are no factors of safety in beekeeping (except maybe in the amount of honey one leaves for winter). I submit that in scientifically based beekeeping studies, the simplifying assumptions are what causes much of the strife between the treating and not-treating crowds. Yes, the studies show that small cell doesn't help, but again it comes to the simplifying assumptions. None of the studies tested under real world conditions, over the space of years like actual beekeepers keep bees. I hope Michael Bush will explain it because he can do it better than me.

One of the simplifying assumptions is that the number 4.9 means anything. It doesn't. It's just a number. It's an average. Averages are mathematical constructs, just like wind chill. They don't actually exist. They are a fabrication of mankind to make another simplifying assumption. 4.9 is useful for understanding the issue, to achieve a sense of perspective, but beyond that, it's useless. We all know for a fact naturally, bees build a range of cell sizes. So the idea of having a magic 4.9 number has very limited application. We choose not to make foundation rollers with a range of cell sizes, another simplifying assumption. I'm sure it's possible, but it would be a pain.

It's like when Oldtimer was doing his experiment and he found out that his foundation was 5.0mm and not 4.9mm. He was concerned because he seemed to feel that he wasn't reaching his goal of real small cell beekeeping. It was my position that it wasn't that big of a deal.

But here are the realities. Cell size isn't the only variable. Having exactly 4.9mm cells isn't the only answer. Dee said it was a combination of cell size, genetics, and management. Kirk Webster says that a collapse and recovery is necessary. http://www.kirkwebster.com/index.php/collapse-and-recovery-the-gateway-to-treatment-free-beekeeping A big part of it is raising your own queens. I have always said that you had to lose a bunch of bees and expand up from the survivors. I only wish I had more time to be intense about it. One of the overriding problems in my view is that most people don't seem willing to lose a hive if they can at all help it. They always want to help. They always want a simple solution.

But as has been proven, there are no simple answers. Treatment-free beekeeping is simple in concept (don't treat, expand from survivors) but truly understanding and implementing it is complex and difficult. Thus far, there are relatively few willing to do it. It's like I tell my tutoring students: "They don't pay you good money to do easy stuff."
 
#26 ·
I submit that in scientifically based beekeeping studies, the simplifying assumptions are what causes much of the strife between the treating and not-treating crowds.
I think you are oversimplifying it :)
Much of the strife, as you refer to it, is a result of personal experience, in my opinion.
Many folks, in my opinion, advise beginning beekeepers to go untreated without adding the following caveat:
Kirk Webster says that a collapse and recovery is necessary.
Dennis (Bwrangler?) said much the same.
This is my biggest concern. I get calls each season from new beekeepers whose hives have collapsed. I ask how they treated for mites. Sometimes I get a long silence. Sometimes I hear something to the effect 'I don't have mites, I'm using small cell'. And the next season, when I pass by their houses, I usually see empty hives or no hives at all.
I believe there is a place for untreated hives. I've supported Dann Purvis and his queen breeding philosophy. I believe that, as Tom Seeley has suggested, untreated mites may become less virulent. But...from my experience, getting to a place that one can successfully keep bees without any treatments can be a painful trip.
And I only hope to warn those inexperienced beekeepers to be prepared for that pain, if they choose this path.
 
#27 ·
You make some good points. For a number of years now, I have suggested two primary things to new beekeepers trying out Treatment-Free.

First, don't get bees in the same year you decide to become a beekeeper. Stew in it over a winter and see if you're still interested. It gives you time to plan and accumulate equipment.

Secondly, don't start with one hive. Start with no less than five.

This advice, if taken, does three things, it makes a larger investment and longer time to think about it, weeding out those who aren't serious and it gives a greater chance of at least one hive surviving the first winter.

Furthermore, from what I'm hearing from Michael Palmer and others there is a very high failure rate among packages and purchased queens. Newbees should invest in nucs alone. This seems quite a bit worse then when I started when I purchased 20 packages and after five years and no splitting, there were still five of them. From what I'm hearing, that can't be done now.

I started a thread a while back for newbees and quickly got chastised for being a downer because everyone was sharing their cautions. But it's the truth. You can't just 'not treat' and expect everything to come out okay. It is far more complex than that. Some failures are due to simple chance, but many are due to not being properly prepared, informed, and educated. I'd submit that success in beekeeping is never due to chance.
 
#29 ·
I dont have any dog in the fight on cell size so it is interesting to sit back and watch the discussions and see what kind of evidence is collected and if there is obvious effort to avoid assumptions or arriving at preconceived conclusions.

I dont think that eliminating a big bunch of potential variables from your input is a scientific method of problem solving. It might get you quick answers and it could very conceivably beget the desired answer but that is not scientific method. I think it is the introduction as fact, matters which are accepted merely on faith or incomplete observations that make decisions drawn out. Failing to identify all contributing factors or jumping to conclusions about the significance of results makes for delays in solid answers.

People have come to faulty conclusions and state them very solemnly and defend vehemently some that are simply incorrect, though they still be a matter of common discussion. I could state that from long personal observation of their concurrence and unfailing predictability, it is definitely a fact that the waving of the tree branches causes the wind to blow.

Repeatability in other locations, accounting for all controlling influences, impartial observation, complete documentation of every move; 100% record keeping. When that is the process I think a workable answer comes fairly quickly unless there are forces at play on the problem that are beyond our understanding.
 
#30 ·
I think the bottom line is that having smaller cells in the center of the brood nest where most of the bees are raised helps. If for no other reason than that the bees hatch out a little faster and 1 or more cycles of varroa breeding doesn't happen. I don't use foundation of any kind because I'm cheap. I don't see the need to invest about $1 more per frame when the bees are capable of doing it themselves. If this was the only benefit to being foundationless (natural cell) I'd do it.

Rod
 
#31 ·
I don't use foundation of any kind because I'm cheap. I don't see the need to invest about $1 more per frame when the bees are capable of doing it themselves. If this was the only benefit to being foundationless (natural cell) I'd do it.
Rod
I couldn't agree more. When I started out I read all of the factors that have been discussed here also and (my wife wanting me to use "coupons" as she was / is into using) wanting to get more bang for my buck I also went for the more "natural" foundationless. Especially when MB said that in his experience the bees draw it faster than foundation. I do find it fascinating how the sizes of the bees vary so much in a single hive. Last night there were some bees (about 30 or so) that got stuck outside of the hive when it got dark / cold and they didn't make it back in. Well I went and got them and sought to warm them up and get them back in. It was very cool to see how they were all different sizes. From the same hive there were some that were very small almost to the point that I would have thought that they weren't HB's if I would have seen them on a flower or something. (not that bad, I'm exaggerating a bit) I'm not sure how things will end up, but It is a fun ride for sure!!! My wife is even getting into it a little which is a great blessing. The kids have been into it for a while. My wife laughs when we play / rough house and I'm a SHB and my daughter is a bee and son is a beekeeper. :lpf:
 
#32 ·
What happens when you use both? I use foundation because it was convenient and worked well on my second hive. After my first extraction using a gravity drain and heater fan I got it too hot and lost several frames to a collapse. Putting these frames between drawn frames worked perfectly. I don't see where foundation forces the bees to make cells large or small unless they want to. From what I see foundation is just more of a suggestion to the bees. They decide what to do with it.
 
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