Dee Lusby wrote:
>,,,in chewing out are you seeing any pattern as to layout
>within your colonies, especially if they could be setup
>with housel positioning, with drone and larger culled to
>the periferies and smaller/more uniform to the center of
>the broodnest?
Concerning housel now, with my personal observations of feral nest
construction ‘in protected enclosures‘. I will generally see a center
comb develop with a horizontal cell type construction. But looking at the
many feral nests I have inspected, the rest of the combs built in voids
will have cells will be positioned vertically and in an arrangement that
I can only describe as a haphazard cell comb orientation.
Years back when I first entered this new world of progressive internet
beekeeping, the question was ‘how to cross check the information?’ I
decided it would be best to crosscheck everything by looking for it in the
local ferals. In knowing that the ferals will have developed the
necessary traits and behaviors essential and best suited for survival in
my environment, this is the rule I follow.
Local ferals give me clues as to what traits may be lacking in my bees and
give me the direction, but also the ability to independently verify all
information as to what is best for the bees in my local environment, and
this practice has not failed me yet. The local ferals are my partners and
also my competitors, so I like to keep track of want my competitors are
doing, lest they come up with a good idea I haven’t thought of. My
philosophy is that “it must exist in the fearls in my location for me to
adopt it“. Small cell sizes I am seeing in the thriving ferals population
here which indicate to me the direction to go, and upper end small cell
sizes I do see towards the outside, but still not seeing verification that
housel existing in feral nest construction in ‘voids’. Which ‘by rule of
the feral’ is telling me is not essential for what is best for honeybees
living in my environment. I’m not saying housel does not exist in open
air nests or in other areas, it’s just not being observed by me in nests
found in closed spaces of feral colonies in my area, still looking though.
> Are periferies more attractive to mites with larger cells
>laidout/culled to there; also with more slightly cooler in
>hive temps, that then might make the bees chew out there
>first, thus being maybe a more reproductive zone to watch
>closer? If they, the bees can keep these spots in tact and
>under control with first reactions there, then could mites
>be kept away by the bees from the core of the working
>broodnest for better control during active year?
Being on small cell, I am not having any mites infesting worker brood
until drone rearing ceases. At this time most mites are phoretic and are
pressed for time and less choosey needing to find uncapped cells of a
specific age, but the time in the phoretic stage increases the risk to
the female varroa. Varroa on average spend about 7 days in the phoretic
stage before entering a cell. And at this time, they must find a worker
cell to invade at the age of about 5.5 days or between 30 and 60 hours
prior to capping. This correlates to what I am seeing in that varroa
invading of worker cells during the fall is highly dependant on where the
proper aged larva happen to exist, and not so much dependant on the size
of the cell she chooses to invade. So if larva of the proper age happen
to be in the core, she will enter those cells, ‘<from what I am seeing in
my bees>’.
Joe Waggle
Ecologicalbeekeeping.com
‘Bees Gone Wild Apiaries'
Feral Bee Project:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/FeralBeeProject/
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