On Tue, 17 Oct 2006 13:42:08 -0400, Bill Truesdell
<[log in to unmask]> wrote:

>Dennis Murrell ran some exceptional trial of bees on small cells and
>found that bee size was not uniform but varied by season. Also, cell
>size varied.
>So big bees exist in a small cell colony.

* Some problems with these measurements are method and accuracy. I wonder if
the average beekeeper is capable of producing work as excellent and unbiased
as someone like Friedrich Ruttner, for example.  He writes:

> It is not true that A. cerana is smaller than A. mellifera. These species
greatly overlap in size. The northern types are generally larger than
southern types. In Siberia where both species are kept together, [varroa]
infested A. mellifera colonies and became a sever pest to the unadapted host.

* This is important because it shows not only that the size difference may
NOT be the key as to why A. cerana can tolerate varroa, but also that even
A. cerana is larger in the north (or were they "upsized" too?)

> Considering all measurements collectively, A. m. scutellata is a very well
defined and relatively uniform race. This bee is believed to be the central
type of the species A. mellifera, from which all the other races evolved. In
consequence of the smaller body size, the cell diameter of the worker comb
is smaller than the European races (4.7-4.9 mm). 

* This shows that the cell size is determined by the size of the bee. They
make cells according to how big THEY are. (I know, it's a chicken and egg thing)

> A. m. carnica is a large bee [with] characteristics which place this race
at the extreme end of the C-branch in the multivariate analysis. 

* Here he sets it down, the Carniolans are naturally a bigger race. Of
course, size varies from region to region, and perhaps from hive to hive and
even within the hive. These measurements have to be done scientifically and
subjected to statistical analysis. 

* I doubt most beekeepers have the knowhow to do it. And if the motive is to
prove some point (as Ruttner was NOT doing), then the whole thing is supect,
because the investigator would be tempted to throw out data that didn't
confirm his or her hypothesis.

pb

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