Hi Jim & all who care to continue,

> A "caring and honest" researcher has better avenues of inquiry
> to explore.  He/she HONESTLY considers what is known about
> "small cell", and CARES enough to not waste time and money
> that could be better used to examine something else that stands
> a chance of yielding some tangible results of value.
>

This is one of the problems, small cell beekeeping only stands to have value
for beekeepers and not for chemical companies wanting to patent a new treat.
Please do not take the words caring and honest wrong, I realize their are
caring and honest researchers out there. When I said
a caring researcher, all I meant was one of many who love bees as you and I
do. When I said an honest researcher I meant one of many capable of doing
the work and spend the three to five years required to study small cell
methods correctly. Small cell methods can not be studied with a short term
experiment. A short term experiment would not prove much. Like you said "it
takes time, so we must wait", so the researcher must look at the research as
a long term experiment. This as, far as I know, has not been done by a
researcher.

> 3)  An April 2001 progress report "Can the Reduction of Cell Size
>      Reduce the Impact of Varroa?, Sustainable Farming Quarterly
>      Progress Report, HortResearch Client Report No: 2001/291" by
>      M.A. Taylor and R.M Goodwin was quoted on Bee-L here:
>
>
http://listserv.albany.edu:8080/cgi-bin/wa?A2=ind0107D&L=bee-l&P=R1042&D=0&H
=0&O=T&T=1
>
>   There appears to have been no further reports from this study, so I
>   have sent an e-mail to Dr. Goodwin asking about the status of the
>   project. I suspect that things went very badly, and the project was
>   abandoned, but I'll let him tell us.  (More later)
>

Or possibly they did not follow small cell methodology correctly but really
who knows.

> EVERYTHING has changed in transportation. The past 30 years alone have
> seen increases in both the speed and the volume of international shipments
> at a rate that can only be described as exponential.

But really no great strides. If it were exponential then we would be we
would be in hyperdrive or beaming stuff around like Scotty in Star Trek.
d:~)> So we can get things half way around the world in two days instead of
three days to a week.

> See above. To repeat, everything has changed.
>

Not as much as you would like to think. I was talking the modes not the
logistics.

> There is no support for this claim.  In fact, bees allowed to
> build comb on "strips" or on non-embossed wax sheets have shown
> no general tendency to build smaller cell sizes, and even feral
> hives have not been shown to have smaller cell sizes.  The only
> bees shown to build smaller cells are different, smaller bees,
> such as AHB, and bees that are "forced" into smaller cell sizes.
>

This is not true, just the other day someone on the biobee list told of
finding a feral colony in UK that had these smaller cells. Also you can not
expect larger bees to take wax strips and make any other size cells than the
cells they were born on. They have a memory. When bees were sized down they
were forced down with a progression of foundation just like small cell
beekeepers do to regress bees to a smaller cell size. It happens a little at
a time. Large cell bees were not enlarged over night let alone one year.

So far nobody has been able to answer a question I have regarding the cell
size of the Primorsky bees in Primorsky. Does anybody know?

> What specific "mistake" did everyone make?

I did not say everyone only beekeepers and when I say beekeepers not all
beekeepers. Most beekeepers only have to live with and make due with the
mistakes of some beekeepers. Well if there were no mistakes and there were
no problems there would not be any talk on Bee-l would there? First mistake
was probably putting them in our man made hives just so we could see what
was going on. Second we made a copy of their comb by making a foundation we
hoped would be a size they would like. Then according to my older bee books
it seems some beekeepers thought bigger bees would be a better bee, and it
went that route for a lot of beekeepers. Albeit there are some beekeepers
still today that keep smaller bees on the 900 series foundation. Not all
beekeepers went so for up in size as others. Some beekeepers even went as
far up as 5.6mm to 5.8mm cell size. We as beekeepers in the past mongrelized
the bees real good where some beekeepers wish they were not so mongrelized
at present. I know pollination is important but this is how a lot of these
pest are getting around. Some would say this is a problem while others would
say this is a necessary evil. AHB's is one mistake that lots of beekeepers
wish never started, but we must live with it. I say we should use it, and
work with it. It's really useless to eradicate it, which also may be a
mistake. While a lot of things seem to be a wash, here is a bee at our back
door that seems to thrive. What a terrible rotten bee.

If I had more time I could probably think of more mistakes or so called
mistakes. If all is ok with beekeeping to you this is a good thing. Maybe
other beekeepers would like to add to my list of mistakes or so called
mistakes. d:~)>

> There is a great deal of difference between wanting something to
> be "true" "easy", and "simple", and the actual state of reality.
> Admitting that there is no single "simple" answer to the problems
> posed by pests and diseases is the first step on the road to staying
> a beekeeper for more than a season or two. The truth is that one
> needs a more complex toolkit to deal with the more complex environment
> our bees must survive.  It is not "simple", and it is not "easy".
> It is hard work.  Just like beekeeping always has been.  Now it is harder.
>

Small cell methodology and small cell beekeeping is not easy or everyone
might give it a try. The truth is it is not easy. There is a lot more to
small cell beekeeping than just small cells but you would know this already
from reading all the material on small cell methods. You are right there is
no single "simple" answer to the problems posed by pests and diseases. You
Admitting that there is no single "simple" answer to the problems must mean
your just about ready to put the hard work into sizing down some bees and
giving smaller cells a good go for the honey.

> It saddens me to see the effect of "true believers", since most not only
get
> discouraged and give up beekeeping after a season or two of frustration,
> but their initial enthusiasm drags many neophyte beekeepers down the tubes
> with them.  One can see this in analysis of subscriber lists to beekeeping
> magazines, mailing lists for beekeeping catalogs, and one might be able to
> see the effect in the backups of the subscription list of this mailing
list.
> The sad dirty little secret about fashionable nonsense as applied to
beekeeping
> is that it turns relatively new beekeepers into ex-beekeepers at an
alarming rate.
>

One of the most fashionable things applied to beekeeping right now is
chemical treats and a lot of older beekeepers left the craft because they
did not want to treat their bees. Neophytes do not even want to get into
beekeeping because they change their minds when they realize all the
problems that come with the craft. Are you calling Small cell beekeepers
"true believers"? You can't blame them for all the woes of Magazines and
email lists. Small cell beekeeping is not the dirty little fashionable
nonsense you would like it to be. Somewhere you are missing something and
you need to look deeper to find the truth, but I would imagine you have not
the time to find the truth out about what you so readily ridicule. Look at
some of the other list that are discussing and sharing information on Small
cell beekeeping and you will see for yourself that there are beekeepers who
are breaking away from treats for bees. If you would have me not discuss
this issue on this list tell me point blank and I will stop but I would bet
that there are those even on this list that would not mind hearing more but
do not want to be laughed at for their inquiries. You can hand it to me, if
you wish, for I know the horse laughs. Yuck! yuck! yuck! Look at this small
cell beekeeper doing what I know can't be done, just who does he think he is
discussing small cells on this prestigious list?

> It threatens the industry itself, since equipment suppliers, magazines,
and
> breeders all need a minimum number of beekeeper customers to exist to stay
> in business, and without such vendors and services, beekeeping would be
> impractical for most.
>

So I am a threat to the industry, there must not be much there to begin with
if I and beekeepers like me, who only have a need to keep bees without
treats, are a threat to the industry. I wish not to threaten nobody if I am
truly a threat you better let me know everybody. Email me privately like you
have Jim and let me know how you feel. Am I a threat to you, am I the fool
on the hill, or are you just into it for the laugh? Well the woes of
beekeeping today are not a very funny subject to most beekeepers I know and
my close beekeeping friends are doing something about it.

> > This is not Rocket Science and you do not need a Ph.D. to figure it out.
>
> Yes it is, and yes it is.
> That's what's different about beekeeping now.
> We have all these exotic invasives to deal with.
> They kill colonies.
> Voodo and crystals don't save coloines.
> Science does.
>

I hope you noticed your misspelled word above.

Not as much as you would like it to be, all you need to be is a real
beekeeper. Not implying your not a real beekeeper. d:~)>
Actually some are using acid crystals to treat mites.

> Quick, how many of these could YOU test for and detect?
>

Most of on the list does not even exist in the USA much less here in Alaska,
so that is not a fair question. So tell me how would you do with your
inquirer. Any on the list that we have up here I could see. So what's you
point.

> The bad news is that there have been no "small cell" beekeepers
> sending samples to Beltsville for tests, something that might help
> to support the claims being tossed about.
>

Perhaps they don't need to.  Most doing small cells are not neophytes. Maybe
the USDA should go to them. By the way, the USDA did go and visit my friend
in Alabama, Bill Gafford of Bolling Bee Co., and inspected his apiaries.
Bill is on small cells and has sold me package bees and queens. Most
beekeepers in his area lost numerous colonies last winter but Bill only lost
two out of 500 colonies. I spoke with him two weeks ago and he told me after
the USDA finished inspecting his Apiaries they told him his apiaries are
exemplary and later sent him a letter with heading stating this to him for
his records. So even the USDA knows of the benefits of small cell methods.
Bill said he would send me a copy of this letter from the USDA and I asked
him if I could post it on a page at my web site and he agreed to me doing
so. All will be able to read for themselves what is in the letter.

>    The proponents of alternative approaches are using far to many
>    words and terms incorrectly, indicating a need to master
>    ETYMOLOGY (the study of words), but they are doing far too little
>    actual ENTOMOLOGY (the study of insects) to provide more than
>    unsupported claims.
>
>    This leads us down the path of getting into EPISTEMOLOGY, where
>    we are forced to address "how we know what we think we know".
>
>    We end up stalled and out of gas at a dead end in "OLOGY", where
>    we get way off-topic in "the study of" everything and anything.
>
>    (I should not poke a simple typo so hard, but the typo
>     was very revealing of a basic problem in the discussion!!)
>

I have no strong points as big as my weakest ability to spell correctly, I
am sure you never misspell any for I am sure you are an Epistemologist.
d:~)> So what is the basic problem in the discussion, your ability to use
your degree in epistemology? Maybe I am not worthy to discuss anything with
yours. Some would even think that the sentence in parentheses above would be
flaming me. You are going to fault me for not spelling a word correctly when
I see this all the time on this list and others. Shame on you. Most readers
would have corrected this mistake in their minds and went on not making a
big deal out of it.

> One simply never hears from most proponents of alternative
> treatments and approaches after their initial and highly speculative
> statements.
>

I wonder why? Look how your treating me. A real example I am and so are you.

> I remain certain that even minor successes will be
> trumpeted from the rooftops, but the silence has been deafening.
>

It is not silent you are just in a chemical cloud. d:~)> Things get a little
fuzzy in there. Every now and then you have a person from Wyoming tell of
his small cell beekeeping even on this list, for sure on others.

> OK, but when someone presents a mix of random claims and fuzzy reasoning
> as a basis for diverting the tiny amount of funding available to "bee
> research" into their pet theory du jour about bee management practices,
> please understand that nothing is being "ridiculed". What is being REFUTED
> is not the basic idea, but the complete lack of any rigor in the arguments
> offered in support of the idea, and a complete lack of any tangible
evidence
> to support the claims made.
>

This is your take on it and do not be surprised if things do not turn around
real soon. Remember my statement in my earlier post that what I wrote was my
take on it. You have your opinion and I have mine. I my be in the minority
now but...................

> Anyone else who calls a group of scientists by insulting
> names can expect another Norse Saga like this one in reply.
>

I did not call any scientist an insulting name, as a matter of truth I
called some caring and honest. Do not try and put words in my mouth. By the
way anybody trying to insult me with such ramblings such as this dragged out
episode can expect the same in reply. Another dragged out episode. If this
post makes it to the list it will be because of your episode that was
allowed for some reason.
  .  ..
c(((([
Keith Malone
Chugiak, Alaska USA
[log in to unmask]
http://takeoff.to/alaskahoney
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Norlandbeekeepers/

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