Questions About The "Small Cell Studies"

[Michael Palmer]

Originally Posted by DRUR

I am also wondering how helpful it is to remove those mites which are more inclined to attack drone brood as opposed to those more inclined to attacking worker brood?

I don't think there are varroa that specifically target drones or workers. It seems that varroa target the drones first, until there is a large enough population of varroa or until the drone population starts to decrease, and then they target worker brood. The idea of drone trapping is to remove a large % of the varroa population early, before they target worker.

[JBJ]

RIKI, that was 2007. According to her recent (Nov 2009 Bee Culture)article, multiple recent studies show much less favorable results for SC. This illustrates the evolving nature of science. What is perceived at one point in time often gives way over time as we begin to more thoroughly understand the biology of these critters. Who knows what we will know next year?

[Michael Bush]

>How about an alternative hypothesis, just for comparison, it would be interesting to take SC bees that are doing well on their own, and see how they do on regular cell? I would wager there is a good chance they would still thrive.

Yes, as Barry says, Dennis did this and they did not do well back on large cell.

>Who knows what we will know next year?

What we "know" vacillates and changes constantly. Why do we think we "know" anything?

"The bulk of the world’s knowledge is an imaginary construction."--Helen Keller

[BWrangler]

Hi Guys,

You can read about my un-regressed bees here:

http://bwrangler.wordpress.com/small...egressed-bees/

Like Barry and Michael, mites are no longer an issue for me. I stopped treating, counting, reading about, thinking about or dealing with mites a long time ago. I see one occasionally, but they are a none issue for me.

And they remain that way, even after I retrieved my hives from a commercial beekeeper's care after two seasons. You can read about that here:

http://bwrangler.wordpress.com/small.../end-in-sight/

For me, putting bees on small cell was a great step forward. And I too am indebted to Ed and Dee. I visited the Lusbys after my second season on small cell. I thought, at that time I needed some 'survivor' stock. Ed convinced me to return to Wyoming and persevere with what I had left which wasn't much!

And he was right. The bees rebounded. I bred from them. Unfortunately, most of the resulting bees were susceptible to para foulbrood. So, I treated them and recommended others do the same which got me tossed off the organic list. And then requeened everything with commercially available stock Miska's, Harbo's, NWC, Koehnen, Glenn Russians, Bolling Green Caucasians, and my own mutts. And bred from the best of the lot.

Since then, no problems with mites, disease, overwintering or anything else. The only problem I've had are winter queen failures, as some of my experiments stretched well beyond the useful life of a queen. And heaven forbid, I replace a queen and mess up the test results :>)

Getting bees on small cell sized comb is one thing. The results are amazing. But it's costly in both bees and money. It's time consuming and at times very frustrating.

And then there's small cell organic beekeeping which is another thing altogether. It involves regressing bees, isolated/off season mating, much comb culling and lots of other stuff. A small cell beekeeper can stress over his bees as much as a conventional beekeeper stresses over varroa!

For me, small cell issues have gone the way of varroa. I no longer think about them. Read about them. And I promised myself, not to write about them ;>) A natural beekeeping approach is just so much easier. And it's much simpler.

Small cell and especially natural cell beekeepers are living the treatment-free dream that's only a distant vision for most other beekeepers desiring the same. Surprising enough, not all beekeepers have that vision! But that's another story I might share sometime.

Regards
Dennis

[JBJ]

"What we "know" vacillates and changes constantly. Why do we think we "know" anything?" MB

Considering we do not even know what we don't know, it would be unreasonable to expect otherwise. At least scientific principals we know like the gravitational constant do not fluctuate too wildly. Scientific method still seems pretty useful and relevant to me despite inherit limitations. Somebody some day may look back at our current understanding of the universe and feel very thankful to not be livinging the "dark ages". Dark matter anyone?

Since it is possible to be "treatment free" without fussing about with this 4.9 regression stuff, why bother? This seems expensive, arduous, and unnecessary, especially in light of the three recent studies cited in J Berry's recent BC article.

[Michael Bush]

>Since it is possible to be "treatment free" without fussing about with this 4.9 regression stuff, why bother?

What kind of losses do you get from Varroa being treatment free without small cell or natural cell? I bothered because I never succeeded being treatment free without it and since doing it have had no Varroa issues or losses at all. That is a huge weight off my shoulders.

[JBJ]

"What kind of losses do you get from Varroa being treatment free without small cell or natural cell? " MB

I would say usually on average about 20% plus or minus 10%. In other words in some years one out of ten, and in others 3 out of ten. However I would be very reluctant to attribute all losses to Varroa. I feel that viral, Nosema, and nutritional issues are as, or more, important than Varroa. The rigors of commercial pollination can place heavy demands on bees and if there are any underlying stresses or issues they will be revealed.

[Riki]

Originally Posted by JBJ

RIKI, that was 2007. According to her recent (Nov 2009 Bee Culture)article, multiple recent studies show much less favorable results for SC. This illustrates the evolving nature of science. What is perceived at one point in time often gives way over time as we begin to more thoroughly understand the biology of these critters. Who knows what we will know next year?

Sorry, I've been away from this forum for a while and didn't know of that. Thanks for keeping me updated.

[kennedy]

I dont know about studies.sc is working for me also im saving on foundation and miteaway 2. much regard to other peoples knowledge ken

[fat/beeman]

I been on small cell yrs now. if it wasn't working I would have less and less bees. or do think I wasted my money on a mill to keep out all chem's. say what you like or believe what you like come look around my bee yard tell me its not working===lol
Don