# Again.... 4.9mm question



## tworedroseman (Jan 7, 2002)

Randy - hunt up Dee Lusby and pose the questions to her. If you follow this site she has been into 4.9mm foundation for quite some time and can give you more than "a guess" answer.


----------



## Dee A. Lusby (Oct 4, 2000)

Hi Randy:
You wrote:

1. If I have my bees on 4.9mm comb what effect will a "normal" queen excluder have? Will the smaller queen be able to pass thru it?

Reply:
Depends upon the queen excluder, as standard sizing has changed over the years. Also if metal excluder, you need to make sure no rungs are warped and curved out of place which can in itself allow a small queen through. Then depending upon the race/strain I would say normally the queen will be contained, but I have known very small queens to pass through. That is small for the race/strain used i.e. caucasian maybe if any one can!!

2. Is there a problem with using larger foundation in the honey super (5.4mm)? Or should I still to all 4.9mm?

Reply:
This is a problem using larger foundation to some extent. Depending upon the uniformity of the mating to smaller when the queen shifts after downsizing, you can run into colonies that don't want to use the bigger stuff. 

Also on bad flows or in average years when much honey is not being stored, the bees have a tendency to pack the broodnest area first and then the honey supers last. It is far easier to use 5.1-5.2 size honey supers then it is the larger 5.4 or even bigger sizing like perma comb. Above 5.5 would be extremely bad IMPOV.

3. Lastly, What kind of problems would I encounter if as part of my normal comb replacement( of 5.4mm) just added some 4.9mm foundation. I would then plan on using that next generation as a seed frame.

Reply:
First of all it would be a real nightmare job as bees have a short term memory and would follow more the imprint of the cell pattern next to them. Also with abundent larger comb they are accustomed to and no regressing in sizing, depending upon the time of the year tried it could be almost impossible to do. 

Maybe first thing in the spring you could get some drawn, as bees are at their smallest early in the spring at starting up brood and only progress bigger in sizing as the year goes on. 

During honey flows of any magnitude, it would be near impossible as the bees then are in a honey gathering mode for cell building and not a brooding mode for the smaller cell size associated with worker brood.

Regards,

Dee A. Lusby


----------

