Bees and Regression

[Stlnifr]

Bees that are kept in top bar hives and build natural comb, how long would it take them to regress to there natural state. What ever that may be. I am under the impression that it would be 4.9 in cell size in the brood chamber.

Honey bees that have been in the wild in a bee tree for 3 or more years would they already be regressed?

[bulldog]

i can't say one way or the other. but, i got a nuc this summer which was on lang frames, i don't know what size the cells are. i put it into a top bar hive where they began building their own comb, as well as using the existing comb on the lang frames. i have noticed after a few months that the majority of the bees look noticably smaller than when i first got them. maybe my eyes are playing tricks on me, but i'm pretty sure they are smaller. how much smaller i couldn't say.

[Bee-Bop]

I believe studies have shown that natural bee cells are large-medium-small and a mixture there of.
You may wish to check this research.
I think M.Bush has some info on his site.

Every body do their own thing !

Bee-Bop

[FRAMEshift]

Standard commercial foundation is 5.4mm and bees raised on that foundation are able to build cells as small as 5.1mm.  Bees raised in 5.1 mm cells can build cells of 4.9mm and smaller, so basically it takes only one intermediate generation to get to "natural" conditions.  But if you leave the 5.4 mm foundation frames in the hive, large bees will continue to be produced.  If you want natural, get the foundation out of the hive as soon as possible.

Yes, natural comb has a distribution of cell sizes and the sizes vary based on their position in the hive and on each frame.  But once you stop using foundation, you can just leave the decisions up to the bees.  :-D

[Michael Bush]

>Bees that are kept in top bar hives and build natural comb, how long would it take them to regress to there natural state. What ever that may be.

Once they have drawn it, it isn't really shrinking so you have to replace large comb so they will draw some smaller.

> I am under the impression that it would be 4.9 in cell size in the brood chamber.

Eventually.  Sometimes right off, sometimes several turnovers of comb.

>Honey bees that have been in the wild in a bee tree for 3 or more years would they already be regressed?

No.  They will have build something slightly smaller when they first established the colony and will still be living on that medium sized comb 3 years later.  Now a swarm from that one and a swarm from that swarm might be regressed.

http://www.bushfarms.com/beesnaturalcell.htm#whatisregression

[Culley]

I'm interested in regression too. I switched from using foundation to foundationless frames so I guess there'll be some changes sooner or later.

So far I haven't come across any information or speculation about the effects that having a range of different sized bees in the hive could have. The natural cell sizes seem to vary a lot, and the uniformity of the foundation cells may have significant effects.

[allend]

Bee size has a lot to do with nutrition and strain of bee, and possibly locale. 

We see this with humans, too.  Some medieval buildings have doorways around five feet high and a visit to the plantation museum in Baton Rouge, Louisiana area is also instructive.  The scale of everything from shacks to coffins is surprisingly tiny.

In my limited experience, have not seen 4.9mm to be a natural cell size for bees other than bees in AHB areas.  4.9 is at the extreme lower end of the range we see in EHB and apparently the upper end is somewhere around 5.4. 

In the early days of foundation, beekeepers measured "natural" cells and found that 5.1 was somewhere are 'natural' for the bees they were observing.  Root settled on 5.2.

So, what the size of your comb cells will be if the bees build comb from new several times in succession may or may not change, depending on the strain, nutrition, and possibly your locale.

[Kathyp]

was looking at a uniform display and the ww1 and ww2 uniforms are tiny.  not only were the folks smaller but so much shorter. 

before you think about things like regression, define your goals.  natural comb gives the bees the option of building what ever size comb they need.  it's also cheaper. 

if your idea is to take package bees and try to "regress" them for mite control, etc. do your homework first.  if you want to go treatment free, you'd do better to dig a couple of hives out of walls or find a tree with bees in it and set up a swarm trap.

genetics are more important than most other things.

[FRAMEshift]

if your idea is to take package bees and try to "regress" them for mite control, etc. do your homework first.  if you want to go treatment free, you'd do better to dig a couple of hives out of walls or find a tree with bees in it and set up a swarm trap.

genetics are more important than most other things.

Genetics is certainly important but why do you think variation in bee size with cell size is a matter of genetics.  There is plenty of evidence that  bees placed on large cell comb will produce large offspring and that bees raised on large-cell comb will produce smaller cells if left to make the choice themselves.  Regression does not mean that all cells will be 4.9mm but it does mean the bees will produce a range of cell sizes to suit themselves.

[Kathyp]

my questions are why do you care, and what do you hope to accomplish?  a lot of new  beekeepers get hung up on doing a thing without first answering the "why?".

i do think natural comb is the way  to go.  the bees can draw what they need rather than what we think they need.  if, in the process, they draw smaller cells and breed smaller bees, that's great too. it must be what they need/want. + it saves some money on foundation  :-D

however, "regression" is often mixed up with the small cell and treatment free arguments, and people become disappointed when they try to regress bees for disease or varroa control.  if the genetics are not there, the bees are going to die before they are ever regressed, absent treatment.  if you treat, you have defeated your original goal.

my only point is that you need to identify goals before you initiate procedure.

his example of bees that have been in a tree for 3 years are the type of genetics you are after.   

[FRAMEshift]

my questions are why do you care, and what do you hope to accomplish?  a lot of new  beekeepers get hung up on doing a thing without first answering the "why?".

The "thing" that most new beeks get hung up on doing without answering "why?" is to use foundation and chemical treatments.

i do think natural comb is the way  to go.  the bees can draw what they need rather than what we think they need.  if, in the process, they draw smaller cells and breed smaller bees, that's great too. it must be what they need/want. + it saves some money on foundation  :-D

It is what they want/need and that is the first answer to the question "why?"   :-D

however, "regression" is often mixed up with the small cell and treatment free arguments, and people become disappointed when they try to regress bees for disease or varroa control.  if the genetics are not there, the bees are going to die before they are ever regressed, absent treatment.  if you treat, you have defeated your original goal.

And this is what confuses me.  I'm not seeing the role of genetics here at all if you are talking Italians.  You are right to warn new beeks not to expect they can regress over a two year period with no treatments.  But there are ways around that which don't involve staying on foundation forever and don't involve finding bees in a hollow tree.  You can regress bees quickly by using foundationless frames with a new package (ok that's messy) or by using smaller cell foundation (like Mann Lake pf100).  You can treat with powdered sugar (which does not offend most new beeks trying to be chemical free) and use breaks in the brood cycle.  None of that involves genetics.

And as for those bees in a hollow tree, they don't necessarily have different genetics from the bees I get in a new package.  If they have swarmed a few times, they may have managed to survive by leaving the mites behind until they have regressed and are building small cell comb.  If you are talking non-Italians, I can't disagree with you since there are bees out there that really do have superior mite fighting genes.  Certainly the AHBs do.

[Kathyp]

It is what they want/need and that is the first answer to the question "why?"   

it's why they do it.