Jennifer Berry - Seminar Worth a Look
I don't think that small cells ARE, on their own a cure for varroa - if they do contribute in some way I would suspect it would be along with several other factors - as I said in one of my earlier posts, I've never had it at the top of my list of cures for varroa, but unless there's mistakes with the reporting in that link, they have in no way reproduced the work of those who said that it did make a difference, so it's hardly definitive proof, which is why my "pseudo-science" detectors went off loudly
I am kicking this one off again as Bee Craft arrived yesterday and Pam Gregory has a piece downing the Warre. I went to work quite grumpy and later googled Jennifer Berry (et al) to see if I could find any ammunition against the paper which scuppers the small cell controversy, as Gregory claims. I found a link to a talk by Berry from 2008, and actually I think I was guilty of pre-judging her. Take a look at the second 20 minutes of this, or better still watch the whole thing.
http://www.extension.org/pages/44732/has-research-been-done-on-honey-bees-comparing-54-mm-comb-cell-size-with-49-mm-i-have-heard-that-smal
The first experiment was on bees from large cell colonies tested from August 2006 for 40 weeks on small cell and regular cell comb drawn by small cell bees. Small cell bees drew the large cell foundation quite competently
The second experiment was 12 weeks from March 2007 with bees from small cell regressed bees given small cell and large cell foundation to work with. (Bees from large cell colonies would have made a mess of small cell foundation) The third part of the experiment was not covered in this lecture.
I was reasonably impressed by Dr Berry's attempt to tackle a very difficult subject. Berry describes what they did very fully and is an interesting speaker. The message I got was not that they were trying to dismiss small cell, which would be a very useful tool in IPM, but that their results, and those of others, were not compatible with the "small cell theory". Granted I think the subject needs a much longer study period which would be a very difficult proposition requiring huge resources, and mixing bees with foundation to which they are not adapted is somewhat artificial.
I don't want to comment either way on the efficacy of small cell BUT... what I did note was that Berry's colleague Bill was a small cell beekeeper who, she says, does not treat for varroa mite, and does not have severe problems with varroa either.
Dr Berry is very far from advocating widespread use of chemicals to treat varroa, declaring that we are in danger of breeding a super mite with all the chemicals that are used. She is also quite open to the possibility of treatment free beekeeping - check out her attitude to ferals.
If it turns out in the end that small cell is a blind alley, it is better that we entertain that possibility. If not, somebody needs to prove it. Michael Bush, Dennis Murrell and Dr Berry's colleague Bill, the small cell beekeeper, all seem to have one thing in common, the ability to keep bees treatment free, despite the presence of varroa. We need to know what they are doing right.
I didn't think that Dr Berry was in anyway dismissive of that message, and she hopes that other groups will repeat similar experiments, which is how the scientific method works... repetition, repetition, repetition.
Just a thought - John
Good Beekeeping
