>whole frames of comb containing mainly  drone cells, they never do so
naturally,

Dave, the trap frames that I use have no foundation, and close to 99 out of
a hundred are drawn out in early spring as solid drone comb.

>
> >They are not going to politely wait for the drone
> frame to be drawn out again, now are they?


This is a great image, but not what I see in my colonies.  When I reinsert
the empty drone trap frame after cutting out the drone comb, the bees build
fresh drone comb immediately, and by two days later there is already a palm
to hand-sized patch of comb with eggs.

This is one of the points that I make in my article on the method--that it
spreads out the time interval that there are drone larvae being capped, so
that the frame traps mites for more days.


> > Also, as one gets further
> into summer, I'd expect less and less interest in
> re-drawing the cut-out drone frame, and more re-use
> of wax to rework existing worker cells into drone cells.


What I actually see is that later in the season the bees may build worker
brood if the trap comb is near the center of the cluster.  Otherwise, most
fill it with honey.  But a percentage of colonies maintain a mix of drone
larvae/pupae and honey scattered in the frames.

>
>
> > Seeley, in the study that you cited, found the  same to be true.
> >No, Seeley never removed any drone comb at all.


What I said, Jim, was "I find that by giving them a place to do so, they
don't build it elsewhere.  Seeley, in the study that you cited, found the
same to be true."  I didn't say anything about removing it.

>
> > There is ample evidence that the presence of
> > varroa at any level will suppress honey production.
>
> >The classic case of the best honey-producing
> colonies being the ones that crash on Labor Day
> tends to refute that correlation, so I'm not so
> sure that varroa can be blamed for poor crops.


This is an interesting point, Jim.  Currie has a graph of total honey
production for the season vs. mite infestation level in May.  It's a
negative linear correlation.

However, Schmidt-Hemple points out that in general, larger colonies tend to
have more parasites.  The sheer size and degree of brood production allow
them to outbreed the parasite.  Unfortunately for bees, the mite catches up
about Sept 1.

>I've found that Nosema was a

> bigger issue for "poor crops" than any other
> disease/pest issue.


I don't doubt, since nosema infection shortens forager lifespan.

>
> > An ancillary question that I have is just how
> > critical is it to remove every round of drone
> > brood produced.
>
> I call drone frames "varroa hand grenades".
> Hold on to them too long, and they go boom.  :)


I  too was of that opinion until I obtained empirical data from field
observations.  It may be a bit more complicated.  For example, if the first
few drone cells to be sealed are multiply infested by mites, the drones and
mites may never emerge.  Or it could be that the occasional removal of a
drone comb is enough to disrupt the mite reproductive cycle enough to be of
benefit.

>
>
> > I found several colonies in my operation last summer that
> > I had inadvertently left drone trap frames in through the
> > season, without removal, other than twice in the spring.
> > Those colonies did not exhibit higher mite levels than
> > "control" colonies side by side.  Indeed, some of them had
> > extremely low mite levels, despite the presence of a drone frame!
>
> >This is another very unusual report.


Unusual as compared to other data, or unusual compared to what you would
expect?
It was not what I expected, either.

>
> >How dry was the weather?
> I might understand if all colonies had low mite levels
> and the air humidity had been really dry.

Drier than what you are used to on the East Coast.  But not any different
than our normal summer, with bees next to irrigation ditches.  I wish that
all colonies had low mite levels, but since I don't use synthetic miticides,
and had only spot treated with Apiguard, there was ample exposure to mites.
Plus I was surrounded by yards of bees from other commercial beeks easily
within flight range.

>
> >(I'm assuming here that the drone frame was being used for
> drone brood rather than for stores

Correct.  But in the scattered way that I mentioned above--not solid frames
of brood.
I've observed this phenomenon in several colonies, for two seasons now.

Again, we need much more field data.  I have completely given up on common
sense, and now only trust actual field data.

Re Allen's leaving the bees alone, I'm with you on that one.  We split all
to make equal nucs in early spring, then leave dang near alone for the rest
of the year.

Randy Oliver

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