I get notes from list members. and recently I received this from a friend I
respect:

> You certainly have succeeded in turning the bee list into a
> Dee Lusby Booster Club.   I understand taking the side of
> the underdog, but I thought the list was supposed to be
> Informed.  Anyone who cannot get it into their head that there
> were NO native honey bees in America, has got a credibility
> problem, in my opinion...

Well, turning the bee list into a Dee Lusby Booster Club is not the intent,
nor are we not going to turn the list into BioBee or any such thing.  BEE-L
is not a one-topic list and we solicit posts that cover a wide range of
topics and opinion.  I suspect this topic will fade a bit, but not go
completely away.  I notice Jim has just submitted a very good article on
varroa in Brazil.  Keep 'em coming, folks!

Anyone can vote for new topics by picking one and by writing and submitting
a good article on that topic that either asks an intelligent and novel
question, asks an old question a new way.  Or anyone can submit an
information or opinion piece.  Humour too (about bees or beekeepers) is
acceptable, but I have learned that not everyone has a sense of humour,
especially a sense of dry humour, so if you try humour, shields up!

For the record, we *are* going to accept *any* posts that conform to our
guidelines as long as things don't get too repetitive or wildly and
tediously imaginative, and we will accept truth or reasonable and useful
speculation from *anyone* who submits it.  We'll even accept posts on the
rampant evils of GMOs and the cabals that promote them, if the posts are
predominantly about bees and reasonably civil.  We *will* reject -- or post
strong caveats -- about any topics that are politically contentious and
hot -- or potentially libellous.

I repeat the ad hominem part above quote, because I think it is important
to point out that any person can be very right about one thing and very
wrong about another.  Besides, we can never be entirely sure which is
which.  I imagine it must have been a huge shock for many to learn that the
world is not, in fact flat, but rather that it is pretzel shaped.  (Please
pardon my little joke).

FWIW, The native bee idea seems to have no legs in the history as we are
able to understand it, but in the last decade a lot of what we thought we
knew absolutely has been proven incomplete or wrong.  I expect this trend
to continue.  The idea is interesting, harmless, fun, and not politically
hot -- AFAIK -- and led to some interesting discussion from which everyone
learned something.

Leaving aside the question of native bees, you may recall that I have been
a sceptic on 4.9 and remain so.  Consult the longest running thread on
BEE-L only a year back if you doubt that.  Nonetheless, I maintain and open
mind, and when Joe and I went south this winter, I posted that we were
passing thru AZ and CA and that anyone who would like us to come by for a
visit should drop us a line.  Dee was the only person to respond, in spite
of our rather cool relationship to that point.

When Joe and I went to visit we expected just to say hello and keep going,
but they put us up and fed us and showed us anything we wanted to see.  I
happened to take a lot of pictures, intended for my diary at
http://www.internode.net/honeybee/diary/, but wound up writing a Bee
Culture article that turned into two. I might mention here that Kim is no
fool and he features Dee and Ed on the cover this month. He has also
visited them and has written about their ideas himself in the past.

Whatever the historical truth is -- and I have real problems following or
confirming any of the arguments -- I am writing today to say that Joe did
in fact finally shake some bees onto 4.9 wax foundation and some of the
(unwaxed and unwashed) plastic prototype 4.9 a few days ago.  He used a big
nucs and put them in the dark for three days.  He called yesterday to say
that the nucs had each drawn several sheets of the 4.9 wax quite well and
that the queens were laying in it nicely.  Where the wax was embedded (a
bad job) the cells are not perfect, but otherwise they were fine.  So far
the bees have not touched the unwaxed plastic foundation, but he did not
expect them to chose it first, given a choice.

The bees he chose for this informal test were picked at random from one of
his commercial yards.  they were just normal Hawaiian or Buckfast that were
living on normal commercial combs until the moment he shook them.

Back to the question of 'Informed Discussion':  A number of people seem to
have problems understanding why we tolerate some seemingly crazy ideas
here.  I think this demonstrates why.  A year ago or two ago most of us
thought the idea of bees happily drawing out 4.9 foundation was cuckoo.

Thanks to someone who thinks there were native honey bees in North America,
we now are finding that bees *can*  draw 4.9.  I wonder what else we may
learn if we keep our minds open?

allen
http://www.internode.net/honeybee/diary/