Thanks John,  I ment to type 20,  not 200,  It runs from plus or minus 20
for a swing of around 40.....
Personal issue of mine,  I can't proof my own work worth a DANG..  I always
read what I wanted to say,  not what I typed.....part of my dyslexia.


We have counted packages,(all that we shook) from fresh with little to no
smoke,  to heavily smoked and allowed to sit (theory is they gorge)  and 2
small swarms.   All packages were taken during nectar flow  as well as
swarms during flows.  

I have many charts and graphs of weight loss on clusters,  we did about 200
last fall with different types of feed.

Very interesting note generally as a guide,  they start dying once about 30%
of the weight is lost. And surprisingly enough fresh dead bees don't loose
much more weight.  
IE a  package that weighs 3 lbs,  once it drops to about 2 lbs they start
dying off,  but 2 days later when they are all dead they still weigh around
2 lbs.

Normally a  3 lb cluster will loose about 2 ounces a day if they are fed,
slightly less if they are not fed.

Bees that are not fed run cooler,  but do not build wax as well after they
have been hived,  if the time period is more than about 48 hours.

For best wax production,  feed t cluster well but keep them clustered. Caged
for about a week.  That stimulates the most wax production.  After that it
starts to be diminishing returns. On bee life

OH,  AND FYI if you get a light package,  normaly its because its been in
transit to long,  not because it was light when it was filled.

Charles

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