Hi PB and Everyone,

>it has nothing to do with cell size and everything to do with not
treating for mites....

Sure could be. It was over a decade ago that I starting looking for a way to
run bees without the pesticides. At that time almost all the research, with
two exceptions, was focused on finding more powerful mite pesticides. And
the constant cry from the government, universities, etc. was
treat...treat....treat. Anyone not treating was perceived as a public
nuisance or worse by the beekeeping community.

Today, those same people are promoting a non-treatment approach. There's
only one little problem. There are few to none who have successfully done it
on large cell. So far, they bounced a few times. Pulled the throttle, hit
the brakes and are still on the ground. Their bees required treatment to
survive. They IPMed them.

And I sure don't see any stampede to be the first test pilot. I don't think
most beekeepers think it will fly.

Treating no longer assures a beekeeper productive, healthy hives, if it ever
did. Treated hives still die off by the tens of thousands from PMS. They
overwinter poorly and require constant requeening.

The only non-treatment alternative back then, was small cell. Those of us,
with few exceptions, who tried it, found that we could run productive,
healthy hives without treating for mites. Along the way, certain behaviors.
like the bees ability to detect and remove mite infected pupa when on small
cell, were hashed out. That was years before it was officially discovered
and called VHS. Makes me wonder what else is going to be discovered :>)))

And once we were past the take off, flying was easy. It gave us lots of time
to speculate as to the whys and even tweak some of the hows.

Regardless of the reasons why, it looks like it still requires 3000' to get
off the ground, even in SA. And if you chop the throttle at 900', you've
learned something about the ground roll, you've made some noise and traveled
aways. But you're along ways from experiencing flight, let alone
understanding it.

So, I ask the question, Do you need to treat your hives? How is it working
for you? If you're happy with it, don't waste a second looking for any other
alternatives. Not everyone would enjoy the flight. Some are scared to death
of it. And that's OK.

Regards
Dennis

****************************************************
* General Information About BEE-L is available at: *
* http://www.honeybeeworld.com/bee-l/default.htm   *
****************************************************