I don’t think that’s really a rational argument. That people are not doing does not correlate necessarily to whether or not it works. Handwashing of doctors worked to prevent infections yet not only was everyone not doing it, they drummed out Dr. Ignaz Philipp Semmelwis in 1847 for suggesting it. It wasn’t until Pasteur gave a mechanism to explain Seemelwis’s results that people finally listened.
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Michael, quoting hand washing or drummed out doctors is not a rational argument for small cell either. I’m not going post a list of links refuting the argument. You have many fans on this site. I’m sure they would be bored to death watching us fight with links like wizards across a battlefield.
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/casts Fireball 
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Ha ha…Dawn, my friend. You’ll have me whispering to the bees next 
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#DeeBushWizardfight
It’d go viral
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I am guessing that there are many variables at work here Dee, not just cell size, which accounts for the ability to be treatment free and not have issues with varroa.
So, I’m a little confused at what you are taking issue with? What theory has been disproven?
Exactly. My point was that if small cell disrupted the reproduction of varroa to any significant extent it would be huge news. Why doesn’t everybody use small cell?
While we are talking about small cells…
What happens to bees left on old comb, I wonder? It matters not whether its their own comb or foundation (though not HSC for obvious reasons). Do they get smaller? Do they regress themselves?
Now THIS is interesting
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Just to clear things up here, I am saying that in my experience with foundationless naturally-drawn brood, combined with being treatment-free and not feeding sugar or supplements, we have had remarkably healthy bees. When we do do add a new colony, whether a local swarm or California Italians, they seem to have no issues using the provided brood comb interspersed between empty comb. I don’t really know what the cell measurements are anymore; the bees make those decisions.
I wonder if it would make a difference if the whole of an area had the regressed bee and small cell before varroa gets here, rather than only parts of a place? If not all of Australia, perhaps Tasmania? There are only 1/2 a million people on the whole island of Tasmania, so possibly more achievable.
If & or when we DO get Varroa in AU, what does small cell comb do to combat Varroa?
I saw a Youtube video where a bloke used 2 foundationless frames in the brood that was normally built on foundation. The strategy being that the bees built mostly drones on those 2 frames. Then after a certain period the drone comb would be destroyed, killing most of the Varroa mites at the same time. Keep on repeating that process. Apparently it’s a treatment free strategy.
- Hi Jeff- funny story I have for you.
Last year I was inspecting one of my hives. Something caught my eye on the back of a bee. A small reddish brown thing. Another bee, and another tiny reddish brown parasite thing. I wasn’t seeing things. My heart starts racing. Here I am, this backyard beekeeper in Tasmania, the first person in Australia to get varroa mite on his bees! Panic sets in. Quickly I ran inside frantically looking for a magnifying glass. Went over to my neighbour …“mate…quick, have you got a magnifying glass?”. Cold sweat breaking out. A bee was grabbed with two of these things on it, and wrapped in kitchen paper and brought inside on the kitchen table for inspection. Urgent internet searching for images of braula fly and varroa. Anyhow, turned out it was braula fly. I don’t reckon any beekeeper has ever been more relieved to find out they had a braula fly infestation in one of their hives.
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Hi Dan,
I just looked them up, and I can see why it got your heart racing!
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Hi Jeff, I’ve heard that the mites tend to go more for drone comb due to the incubation time, so that would make sense. I wonder if they used foundationless because it would be easier to cut the comb out and reuse the frame? (compared to frame with foundation)
Absolutely
I was talking about this, as one example.
They go for drone comb as a function of its cell size and pheromones the larva produces. Newly emerged mites are attracted to newly emerged bees because it is these that will become nurse bees just at the time these new mites become ready to breed.
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These are quite common where there aren’t varroa in the UK, Orkney, Isle of Man etc.
They are rare elsewhere and I have never seen one except on a slide. Varroicides get them like Acarine I suspect.
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Grout did the research. The cells will shrink to a threshold and then the cocoons are chewed out by the bees. Yes, they regress themselves by allowing the buildup of cocoons until they reach the cell size they want.
A Biometrical Study of the Influence of Size of Brood Cell Upon the Size and Variability of the Honeybee (Apis mellifera L.) by Roy A. Grout
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Is it true that wild bee colonies in the US and elsewhere are badly affected by Varroa? I seem to recall reading that a large percentage of wild colonies died off after varoa spread and that managed colonies fare better due to treatments by beekeepers.
If that’s the case- wouldn’t wild colonies often have smaller average cells sizes- and they are all foundationless- treatment free and never fed sugar? So shouldn’t that help them combat varroa?
I’m not trying to make any point- I’m just curious and I know next to nothing about varroa and the various management theories.
Hello Jack,
To answer some of your questions, check this out:
http://wildernessbees.com/
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Yes I believe that it would be on foundationless frames into hives that are on all foundation.
Because a hive is on all foundation, the bees will naturally want to build more drone comb. So therefore the minute you introduce foundationless frames, the bees will build drone comb in them.
The drawback that I can see with this strategy is that as a colony heads closer towards winter, they will not make any drones. Therefore treatment could be warranted during that time of season.