For those of you who are holding your breaths in eager anticipation, it's
sunrise in Calif right now, and I'm back from the test hive.

I inserted the probes at sunset into the honey an inch apart at the edge of
the cluster, and then left the lid off the hive for the night.
 Unfortunately, it did not get as cold last night as is has been the past
few nights--the ground surface was not frozen.  This morning, the cluster
had moved slightly (and was audibly roaring with heat generation), so I
reinserted the probes a half inch above the highest bee, and then an inch
below that (a half inch into the area covered by the cluster).

Results: 59.0F and 67.0F.  So an 8-degree (F) difference in temp over a
distance of 1 inch in the honey comb.  So the bees appear to be sharing
heat across the honey combs, but not losing too much by conductivity to the
unheated cavity space.

I will repeat tonight when the colony settles back down.
--
Randy Oliver
Grass Valley, CA
www.ScientificBeekeeping.com

             ***********************************************
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