> Does anyone believe that commercial extractors could [extract pollen from
cells]

I've never noticed it happening much, but I think that uncapping alone is
going to knock some pollen loose at the top of any pollen cells on a honey
frame, so that even minimal centripetal force would "dislodge" and thereby,
"extract" some pollen.  I certainly do see some pollen on my filters when I
wash them off.

But the equation for centripetal force is F = (mv^2)/r, so for any one
extractor, each doubling of the RPMs will increase the centripetal force by
a factor of 4. This means that the RPMs matter more than the size of the
extractor.  As larger extractors tend to rotate slower than smaller ones,
I'd guess than no commercially-sold extractor can be run much over 400 RPM
without "creative" modification, and hobby units may well have higher max
rpms than commercial units.  

> forcing the honey thru pumps and filters could break up the lumps of
beebread  

Bee-gathered pollen seems to be pretty much completely filtered out at about
200 microns, which is an affordable and practical filter for even a hobby
beekeeping doing gravity filtering with 60-lb plastic pails.  Dadant sells
the plastic spray-paint-filter type filers that fit perfectly in plastic
pails for a few dollars each.  While gravity-filtering through a 200-micron
screen may seem "slow", it yields a very clear honey, which looks nice on a
polarascope or in a jar.

Wind-blown pollen tends to be much smaller than 200 microns, they are 20 to
50 microns, so the actual "GMO threat" may be posed by not what the bees
forage upon, but what wind-pollinated GMO grain pollen sources might be
upwind of the bees when they fly, perhaps pollen sources far beyond foraging
range. Recall that a flying bee develops the same static charge that any
aircraft would, and, to parapharse Jerry Bromenshenk, "is a little flying
dustmop".  So, what is the travel distance of wind-blown pollen?  If the
Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia suffer acid rain caused by coal-fired power
plants in Kentucky, Ohio, and West Virginia, doesn't this imply that
wind-blown pollen could travel just as far as pollution?

And that windblown pollen can apparently get everywhere in a hive.  In every
nectar cell, brushed off the hairs of every house bee by the edges of the
cell itself when the bee sticks its head in to work on the nectar as
contents of cells are combined into honey.

So, except for Cyprus, I'd guess that the EU is setting itself up for a big
self-inflicted gunshot wound to the foot the moment anyone with a little
beekeeping knowledge and a little physics education decides to join the
anti-GMO forces.

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