I have two apologies to make.

The first is for posting a reply to the list that includes the entire quotes of a previous posting.  I was distracted and hit "send" before completely editing it.

Normally, messages go to moderation before going to the list and are intercepted.  I guess at the moment I sent it, Aaron was tweaking the list settings and it went straight through, as did another, without being examined.

Sorry, folks.  Reducing quoting to the minimum necessary for understanding is rule of BEE-L and it applies to everyone.

I apologize. 

The second apology is to anyone who may feel slighted or frightened off by Bill's comments and any that follow.  

I am happy to see some members posting to the list who may have been reluctant to do so in the past.  We do not want to discourage new faces.  Keep posting and understand that polite disagreement and occaasional critical comments are just part of life on BEE-L.  

If everyone agrees, no one is thinking.

FWIW, I reviewed the entire conversation and did not see anything which appeared to me to be particularly uninformed, but as I mentioned eariler, I lent my copy of the "Hive and the Honey Bee" some time back and have not seen it since.  I now regret not having replaced it last week and shall order a new copy forthwith.

I did question one or two of the remarks, and they made me think and wonder if they are outside the range of possibilty.  Is that a bad thing?

There may, also, these days, be new information on proplis since the last publication as well.  The fact that Marla and Gary are working on propolis - http://www.extension.umn.edu/honeybees/components/meetteam.htm - seems to indicate that the topic may be important and that there is still more to know.

I have noticed, too, that when a questionable "fact" is presented here, that members quickly step in with material to centre the discussion.  Peter is particularly to be thanked in that regard.

I do strongly agree that if we start to veer into speculation, claims of magic, or riding hobby horses, that it will be time to lower the hammer on the topic, but so far I don't see a problem other than some admit not having mastered the archives.  

Maybe someone will post an article on that which goes beyond the fairly extensive "help" available on the search itself?

I do know that searching takes a few minutes of experimentation and some patience, but getting lost for an hour or two in thew archives is one of the great pleasures of BEE-L.

Again, apologies, and please keep posting folks.  Just consider looking some of the topics up first, for background, in the archives or in books, if you know nothing about it and have the time.

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