Well, those who look closely see that the world is neither round nor flat...it's squished at the poles, and fat at the equator.  Only in superficial terms is the earth "round".

I think this is an excellent opportunity for an exercise in critical thinking.  Peter began touting this study over a year ago here on Bee-l, long before it was published:

http://community.lsoft.com/scripts/wa-LSOFTDONATIONS.exe?A2=BEE-L;fc9ffee8.1011

I got to read the study in August, and recently became aware that it is available for free download:

http://www.springerlink.com/content/8g697443p6274022/fulltext.pdf

Ideally, folks would read the study before continuing to read this post…mostly so you can see what you pick up and what you don’t.

I have a huge amount of respect for Tom Seeley.  I’ve heard him speak and met him a couple of times, his work on swarming is unparalleled…it is a model of how research should be conducted…long term and with expertise and perspective that can only be gained through long term work.  I do think that there are serious errors with this particular study, and I think that the peer review process failed in this case.  Mostly, I think it highlights the importance of reading things for yourself, and not trusting that the combination of reputation and peer review is always enough to ensure validity.

What follows are non-exhaustive observations (and explanations of the observations) that I made while reading through the paper.  Some of these problems are more serious and/or more easily avoided than others…I invite the reader to consider them all individually and in aggregate….even if in your best judgment one, two, or three of these observations seem frivolous, I ask that you toss them all out as a result…I ask that you also consider the remaining objections that do not seem so frivolous.

1.  The background/motivation for the study only includes the 1990 work by Erikson, and a 1995 article in Bee Culture from Hans-Otto Johnson. 

Obviously, these studies were not the motivation for this study, it is the current claims by the current, visible SC beekeepers.  I would suggest that if this had been acknowledged in the study, then many of the problems with this study could have been avoided by simply consulting with those that do claim success.  I’m constantly reminded of all the subtle details that go into the most routine tasks…especially when we are talking about beekeeping.
 
For instance, Mike Palmer’s recent posts about his overwintering of nucs technique…in some ways it seems obvious, but I know how many years he has been working on and refining this.  It would be a mistake to take the headline from his posts and talks and say simply that “the key to beekeeping success is overwintering nucs”.  Yes, that is true, but the obvious way of nucing strong hives is exactly what he is not doing…and the nucs are not 4 or 5 frame boxes….but double 4’s…with 4 frame supers.  Anyone (beekeeper or researcher) that is interested in “overwintering nucs” as a way to improve their operation would be well advised to consult, or at least watch an online video of Mike Palmer.  If I ignorantly went out and split all my hives into nucs in September with purchased southern queens, and put them all into 4 frame boxes….I would not be doing what Mike is talking about when he says “overwintering nucs”.  Such a test wouldn’t be a fair evaluation of his methods, even if it did test “overwintering nucs”.

2.  There is only one mechanism for SC effectiveness mentioned in the study….in fact, the study reads much more like a test of “mite crowding” than as a test of small cell.  No small cell beekeeper that I know thinks of mite crowding as the primary mechanism at work.  There are so many more possibilities that are not even alluded to.

3.  Comb:  Would any beekeeper consider a comb made of wax (wax that cannot be reworked by the bees), with flat bottom cells (that do not overlap in the midrib), with cells that are tapered towards the bottom of the cell, with cell walls that are close to 0.02”(cell walls are typically less than 0.004” thick) to be equivalent to regular comb built on foundation?

Do beekeepers consider plastic comb (fully drawn plastic comb, not plastic foundation or foundation/frame) to be equivalent to wax comb?  Both thermodynamic properties and any off gassing, as well as the “fixed” nature of the plastic (ironically, as far as the bees are concerned, this plastic lacks plasticity) are all obvious differences.

In this study, the control group was on wax comb (already drawn from foundation, free of any drone cells), while the SC bees were on Honey Super Cell…fully drawn injection molded polypropylene comb, with flat bottom cells that don’t overlap in the midrib, with tapered cells, and thick cell walls….thick enough that the center to center cell spacing is just about the same as for 5.4 comb.  I suppose one could intentionally want to separate the variables of cell density and cell size, but until this is stated overtly, I think it’s safe to classify cell density (and therefore brood density) as a function of cell size rather than a separate variable...unless you have really thick cell walls.

4. The bees used for both the control and experimental colonies were packages that were shaken by the researchers.  First, they identified the available colonies with the highest mite loads (probably the highest virus load as well, I would imagine), waited 6 weeks, then shook the packages.  I’m not sure that starting with the sickest bees possible is the best test of anything.

I don’t have a good feel for mite counts, but I hope someone else will look at the numbers in the study (before the packages were shaken, after they were shaken, and during the experiment) and comment on the level of infestation seen.

5.  This one I have a question about:
"feeding them with a 50/50 (v/v) sucrose solution
brushed onto the wire screen of one side of each
package cage. "

…I thought it was well accepted that brushing feed onto a screen can injure feet and tongues, and was not advised…any thoughts?

6.  "There were no drone cells in any of the
frames of comb used in this study. "
And
"When we took our monthly measurements of the
colonies, we cut out any drone comb that the colonies
had built, usually along the bottoms of the frames. At
most, this involved removing 25 drone cells per
colony per inspection; none of the drone comb
contained drone brood. In this way, we prevented
drone rearing in our colonies and this meant that all
the mite reproduction in our study colonies occurred
in cells of worker brood. "

So, we are told here the following:

A.  That one can completely prevent drone production by inspecting once a month (or at least that they were able to do so).
B.  That the bees in the study didn’t make more than 25 drone cells/month/colony despite being completely void of other drone cells.
C.  That in those 25 drone cells, the bees didn’t try to raise any drones over the entire length of the study.

Something is wrong here.  Were these small nucs only making workers?  Were the bees overly stressed?  Bees that don’t even try to raise drones are suspect, at least in my book.  Any thoughts?

7.  "We measured the
mean width of the cells in each hive by measuring the
width of ten cells in a straight line (inclusive of wall
widths) in the center of one side of each frame of
comb. " 

Hold the phone….there are various definitions for the word “mean”, but to define “the mean width of the cells in each hive” by measuring 10 cells in the middle of one side of each frame?  We know that bees tend to make smaller cells in the center of the comb, and we know that even with foundation the cell size varies…so how can one cite a “mean” from measuring 10 cells/comb?

Also, note that the authors say “all hives”…not just the wax combs.  If they actually did this (or if you actually do this) with HSC, you get just around 5.4, as the cell walls are so thick (and the procedure described above measures “inclusive” of the cell walls).  

There is no way that they did what they say they did and got the answer they report.  I will say that the number they cite for the HSC cell width seems like it was measured inside the cell (exclusive of cell walls), at the bottom of the cell (I imagine with calipers, but they could have used an optical comparator or something)….it is the right number, but their procedure is not reproducible…they clearly didn’t do what they said they did.

8. “The colonies in the hives with the
plastic, small-cell combs grew noticeably less
rapidly than those in the hives with the
beeswax, standard-cell combs.”

…here is where talking to beekeepers who have used HSC would have benefited the research.  We have reported a number of times (since 2008) that the biggest problem with using HSC is that the bees are reluctant to accept it…most report that putting a package exclusively on new HSC delays the queen beginning to lay by 2 or 3 weeks.  I expect that there is also reluctance to expand on a comb to unused areas, which will also inhibit build up even after the queen does start to lay.  

We all know that installing a package and keeping the queen caged for 2-3 weeks will have a significant impact on how that colony can develop.  I don’t think you can compensate for these issues by calculating mites/bee and assuming that if the bees on HSC had not been slow to build up that the mites/bee would have been the same…there are too many dynamic variables in play.

All of the above excludes things like length of time of the study.  The issues with the HSC and drones are I think the most significant….too many variables are introduced between the control and experimental groups.
In any case, if you read my post before reading the study, now is the time to go read the study for yourself, and practice your own critical thinking…about the study, and about what I’ve written here.

http://www.springerlink.com/content/8g697443p6274022/fulltext.pdf

deknow

             ***********************************************
The BEE-L mailing list is powered by L-Soft's renowned
LISTSERV(R) list management software.  For more information, go to:
http://www.lsoft.com/LISTSERV-powered.html

Guidelines for posting to BEE-L can be found at:
http://honeybeeworld.com/bee-l/guidelines.htm