Guilfordbeekeepers.org

Ski...Didn't you tell me that you did small cell wax with your hives???

Did I use small cell ?
Here is what I did.
I purchased two 5 frame nucs which most likely were not small cell. I filed out the deep with small cell wax. I added mediums above the deep and these were small cell for for 6-7 frames and small cell starter strips for the other 3-4 frames.

What is you question?

How did they do??? Do you think it was worth it??? There is suppose to be some benefits to going to small cell. I am tinking about moving mine towards that. I was just checking to see the progress of your small cell.

How did they Do?
They started from nucs. One hive has a deep and a medium for a brood chamber the other has one deep but it lost a queen and got set back a bit.
Was it worth it?
Not sure I spent that much more on going small cell for the frames that have it.

As far as mite counts I did both hives the same so I cannot compare small cell to non small cell. The small cell and fogging and a few sugar treatments was the plan for mite control but the counts got to 100 natural drop per 24 hours in October from a 24 count in August. I was gone most of September. A partial Apiguard treatment was applied. Partial because of temps so we will see what spring brings.

I popped the inner cover yesterday and there were lots of bees and capped stores in the few frames I checked in the mediums above the brood chambers for the 2 hives.

I can’t say small cell is THE answer. I am planning on fogging along with the cords per Dr. Pedro Rodriguez’s protocol for next season to see if that will help with the counts in the fall. Already have screened bottoms.

There is a lot of info on how to regress the bees to small cell on beesource, can’t say I am heading down that road very fast.

Right now I am open feeding on 50+degree days and they are drinking it down so hopefully they will make it through the winter. I will look at it as a good first year if they make it to Spring.

Are you still open feeding?

I feel good about 6 of my 8 hives as far as honey stores go. The two hives on my mind were late bloomers. They looked great at the end of October but I wasn't able to give them the opportunity to store up a medium of honey. All other hives had a FULL 10 frames of honey going into November. A medium that is. I then turned my attention to pollen stores as I was clued in to the importance of that aspect. I feel really good about 4 of the 8 hives and I plan to experiment with pollen patties on the 4 I worry about. I only really noticed mites on 2 hives so I just did my regular fogging. I read that if the hives have made it this far the wouldn't be wiped out due to mites. Is that right??? Are we out of the woods as far as mites go?? If the hive is still alive and going strong then they made it through mite season?? I want to go small cell and will try atleast one hive right off the bat. Then I will see what happens and go from there. My son has already told me to get with Wally and get some supers for the spring.....he has gotten money from family for Christmas!!!!
I like the way that boy thinks!!!

It appears that after much reading and studying that I can introduce a frame of small cell at a time until all frames are replaced. Since bees build different size cells anyway this shouldn't be to dramatic. I will be doing one hive this year as an experiment to see how the ladies do. I will be doing starter strips in the supers this year anyway as opposed to the full sheets of wax that I put in for them last year. Plus it will save money!!!

I have had good luck using starter strips hre at home and in Georgia. The hive in Georgia I just put in empty frames between frames with plastic foundation and they filled all of them to the point you cannot tell which ones are plastic and which ones were empty. I had to poke a hole through the wax to find the one that was all comb. But when using starter strips I am not sure we are doing small cell as much as natural cell. What do you think?

I am under the impression that small cell is natural cell. That is what I am reading. Do you buy starter strips or just cut sheets into strips? That is how I will do it.

I have read different things on small cell and natural cell and I think there may be a difference.

My understanding which could be skewed or completely wrong:

Small cell is where you use small cell foundation measure the cell size the bees build and if its not the small size then you cut it out replace it with small cell foundation and repeat until they finally get to the 4.9 size or whatever you are trying to get.

Natural cell is starter strips or pieces of wood for the bees to begin building on as a guide and the bees build what ever they want, most likely it will not be small cell, but it could be.

I had extra deep wired foundation that I was putting in some of the medium frames as guides. The piece of foundation I cut off I cut into strips and used as starter strips in frames between the full foundation guide frames. I would then mark the frames with SS for starter strips.

My understanding of what I read, and I may be wrong also, is that the feral hives that were studied had 4.9mm comb that was used for brood rearing. Of course the bees made other size comb but it was not used for brood. This would apply to natural size, IMO, because the bees would build what size they need. Whereas small cell "forces" them to draw only 4.9mm. I see your point. Thanks for the input. I just made the connection!!!

Ski.. Have you ever seen these?? Thought these were a great idea.


www.smallcellbees.com

I have not seen any, just read a few posts on Beesource.
It does sound interesting.
I have not seen a price but I think they are somewhat expensive and only come in deeps. I am trying to get to all mediums. I am also not convinced at least not 100% that small cell does help with mites. I keep hearing some people with success and some not. I am kind of waiting for the dust to settle to see what the final story might be if there ever is one lol. Mean while I am going forward with small cell wax and starter strips maybe HSC for 2009.

Are you going to give some a try?

I really want to get these. Must convince mama first. I thought the price wasn't bad. 149.00 includes shipping. These are already drawn and all the bees will do is cap them over. That price is for 20 which would do two hives for me. If you are to try and transition them yourself you have to go down gradually. I took this as you would train them to build 5.9 then 5.5 then 5.2 then 4.9. Something like that, I think you understand what I am saying. This would eliminate that. Just replace all your frames and then the queen lays her eggs. I am sure it won't flow that easy but it sounds good. Plus you would save lots of time. Well that's my two cents. If get them I will post how it goes.

Food for thought...
Since you newbees are HOT on this small cell... I was looking into it over 7 years ago ( I think it was 7 years...hmmm)
You have mentioned that the feral bees seem to have cells around 4.9mm and that is why this size is thought to be the best.
My question... Why then did most of the feral population die out when Varroa was introduced in the mid to late 80's?
If 4.9 leads to a natural resistance, then shouldn't the feral bees all have survived?

While we dont have near as many ferral bees as we used to they are still there. As far as I know they have never actually been able to pin the decline 100 % on verroa. More likely a combination of several different things. Pesticides for one.

I look at small cell as part of Integrated Pest Management.
With the screen bottom boards, fogging, thymol cords, drone comb comb cycling and 4.9 cell size. If each one does a little to restrain the mites maybe they can be kept under control. If not then fall back to apiguard or aplilife or something else. Maybe Certified Russian Queens.

So why have the feral bees declined if not disappeared? Maybe a combination of a lot of things. HEY, NEWBEES don't have thsoe kind of answers.

I concur!!! Well put Ski. Just trying to every little bit we can. Bees didn't start dying off until man stepped in with his ideas. Now look where we are at.

This was the reply I got from a beekeeper on another forum:

Note....He does NOT have small cell.


Okay,

Lets me step carefully into this quagmire. And it is a quagmire.

You ask a great question.
Don't ever do anything like that again(sarcasm)
It upsets the balance and asks for reason and logic to be applied to a situation. (somewhat sarcastic).

My non scientific answer is basically this. Varroa had an effect on some feral hives. But not as many as the brain surgeons would have you believe.

Here is what is going on. Varroa entered Florida in 1987(and that year is up for debate) and spread across the US. Leaving in it's wake a mountain of decimated domestic hives and a good amount of feral hives. However we need to look at the feral hives a bit more carefully.

Domestic hives had no real way to deal with Varroa due to standard beekeeping managment at the time. Cells are larger. Drones are trapped by queen excluders and a myriad of other reasons. Those domestic hives were hit hard. Now domestic hives cast off swarms. Those swarms found homes in the wild and become feral hives. Since there is no real human intervention in their lives.

Now feral swarms from domestic hives that have not had a long time to regress and requeen themselves and bred with feral drones don't do well. They get overwhelmed by Varroa and die.

Now hives that have been around for a while. Have established themselves in a wild enviroment and regressed. Didn't do so badly. But a hove that is well established in the wild is just that well established. And it's not like every feral hive is going to end up being a cut out.
They hide well. The problem is people think a feral hive is the hive that just moved into the soffit of their house.

So in a nutshell swarms from domestic hives didn't do so well with Varroa. Recent feral hives may have had an issue also. Wild well established hives had no real issues.

So you will read these articles that say 75% or more of feral colonies destroyed by Varroa.
And it's true if you limit it to the small area that was studied. However that will not be an accurate representation of the overall picture.

The feral bees survived and will continue to do so.
END OF POST



I tend to agree with him.....Locust&Honey

You can agree with him if you want, but I say he is full of organic fertilizer up to his ears.

Wayne had over 25 hives when the mites came on the scene. None had foundation. All had natural cell and always had. He lost all but 1 hive. Him and I both knew of numerous bee trees in the area that had been occupied many years. None of them survived. I never saw a tree swarm during the years 1992 to 2000. I never saw a tree hive after 1995, until after 2001.
I think it safe to say that this area lost over 90% of the feral hives. 100% of all the ones I knew about. The hard core small cell beeks will tell you they lost nearly all their bees for 2 or 3 years, until they were fully regressed.
TA! TA!
The beeks that quit using chemicals and built on natural resistance also lost most their hives the first 2 or 3 years, but then the resistance started developing and the losses began to decrease. Notice the similarity? Wayne gave me a swarm from the one survivor hive in 2002. It is strong now, with 2 supers of honey on it, as of Sunday. I hived it on LC foundation and it has been on the same ever since. It has never been treated, unless you consider feeding sugar water and pollen patties as treating.

Who answered your post, MB or Dennis? They are the only two I know that are that convinced.

Neither...and there are more beeks than I can keep up with that use small cell. One thing was right about the guy who responded..."Let me step carefully into this quagmire. And it is a quagmire.".... If one guy uses small cell and it works does it make it right??? If another guy uses super duper large cell and chemicals does it make it right??? I say different strokes for different folks.