Greetings Everyone,

It's been awhile since I posted any small cell hive updates. My small
cell hives have continued to perform as I have reported in the past with
no mite buildup, great overwintering and spring buildup. Different
races/selections of bees did equally well when established on small cell
comb.

But lots of questions have been raised by my experience with small cell.
If the size of the cell could make such a dramatic difference in colony
health, what other aspects of comb structure could be important? Watching
what the bees do by themselves seemed to be a good starting point. And as
suggested by Allen Dick, way back when small cell was first discussed on
Bee-L, putting small cell bees in a topbar hive could yield some answers.


So Barry, another beekeeper in the Chicago area, and I did just that. We
transferred bees that had been exclusively on small cell comb into topbar
hives and watched what the bees did for themselves. Because of the
climate differences between Chicago and Casper, Wyoming, Barry got about
a 2 week head start. My bees were generic Italian - Carniolan mutts and
Barry's were Lus bees.

The results were quite unexpected. In both cases the bees started by
building typical large cell size comb. In my hive that's about 5.3mm.
Barry's bees did the same thing.

The dynamics of how the bees utilized the space in the topbar hive as the
colony needs and food availability changed was quite interesting. At
times the bees would expand comb building more horizontally, then
suddenly shift and fill comb vertically.

It quickly became apparent that comb building was much more complicated
than I had anticipated. The nest was not as random a structure as I
thought. The bees were able to effectively utilize the space and put what
kind of cells and comb just where they wanted them. If food resources or
other colony needs like producing drones before swarming changed the comb
building priorities, the bees would shift the comb building activity to a
different location and then return later to finish work that had been
started in other areas.

When some small cell starter strips were placed in the hive, the bees
quickly reworked them into drone size comb. They knew what they wanted
and where they wanted it. How they could know this is an interesting
question to think about. :>)

After 5 weeks and in the middle of a sweet clover flow, the bees returned
and finished building comb vertically in an area of the hive. Small cell
size comb was constructed! Those combs that initially were drawn at 5.3mm
near the top of the comb had cell sizes that gradually tapered to 4.8mm
toward the bottom of the comb. Interesting!

Well, if you've read this far, your eyes could be as tired as my fingers.
So I will continue with additional posts later. :>)

I have prepared a very simple web page at:
 www.geocities.com/usbwrangler/confessions/confessions.htm

It's not very fancy and may put you to sleep if you like lots of bells
and whistles. But it has some interesting pictures of my topbar hive and
comb

Barry has posted some of his shots at:
http://www.beesource.com/eob/althive/birkey/index.htm

Regards
Dennis

::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
-- Visit www.honeybeeworld.com/BEE-L for rules, FAQ and  other info ---
::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::