Hi Allen

> _But_, I am reminded that Europeans tend to have a wider range of cell 
> sizes and access to some foundations with much larger cells than 
> Americans.  I have always found that odd, but maybe the bees there or 
> some environmental factors there are inexplicably different? 

Yes, we do have bees that are different.

We have strains and hybrids of A. m. mellifera that are physically 
larger and more bulkily built than occur in US (Most A. m. mellifera 
strains have been systematically culled in US so that only 3% A. m. 
mellifera genes exist in the US bee population)...
http://www.dave-cushman.net/bee/us_uk_dna.html

The larger bees need and naturally produce larger cells.

This is further complicated by the A. m. mellifera bee having an ability 
to inhabit a wider range of cell sizes than other races and so can 
survive well on almost any size of foundation that is supplied to it. 
There is an exception however, it seems that some strains of A. m. 
mellifera have difficulty with sizes smaller than 5.6 mm, these strains 
come from Russia (not Primorski) and are the reason I mentioned 5.6 mm 
in a previous post.

> That is not to say that Americans have not made some big foundations, 
> but the ones I am aware of were intended to be an intermediate size 
> between worker and drone.

The intermediate size has also occurred in UK, but because of the things 
mentioned above, such foundation was largely used by breeders of A. m. 
mellifera bees as brood foundation.

The UK has a range of cell size in its comb, as in US, but that range is 
both larger and shifted upwards in size by about 0.2 mm when compared to 
the races than inhabit it.

According to those that put credence on small cells influencing varroa 
numbers, that should mean that we are overrun by varroa, but this is not 
the case... Varroa is no bigger (or smaller) a problem in UK than in US.

-- 
Regards & Best 73s, Dave Cushman, G8MZY
http://melliferabees.net Email: [log in to unmask]
Short FallBack M/c, Build 7.21/2.01
Son of ORAC M/c, Build 5.o1/2.o1

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