Sampling Method for Block
FOR FULL STYRO BLOCKS
1. The most critical part is obtaining a representative sample and cutting the sample immediately before the cells that may have been crushed become too dry to separate and count accurately.
2. Obtain a 20-40 gram sample. In order to get this we punch one random full tunnel from each block and typically need to sample between 30 and 40 block to acquire an adequate size sample. These block are acquired randomly from the lot as they are being stacked for transport. It's important to keep track of how many tunnels are sampled so the average bees per tunnel can be determined.
3. To determine how full the block are, we count the amount of non full tunnels down one random row - the full length of each block in the sample lot. We then subtract the average amount of non full tunnels from the total amount in the length of the block. A typical nesting block is 118 tunnels long by 30 tunnels wide but this can vary if the producer has trimmed the length to fit surrounds etc.
4. Then cut the sample taking care to count everything, including the cells that were crushed.
They are easy to separate and count accurately while they are still damp. Count them as good live larvae because they would have been fine had they not gotten crushed during sampling.
5. Once the sample is cut we now have the number of live bees from the number of full tunnels punched. Then we divide the number of live larvae by the number of tunnels sampled to get the average number of bees per full tunnel. Being that the non full tunnels are neither full nor empty we assume each one contains 30% of the average amount we find in the full tunnels.
We should now have all the data needed to determine how many gallons of bees are in this lot.
Formulas:
Average of Non Full Tunnels/Row = Non-Full Tunnels ÷ Rows Counted
Average Full Tunnels/Row = 118 - Average Non-Full Tunnels/Row
Bees/Tunnel = Bees Found ÷ Tunnels Probed
Bees in Full Tunnels = (Bees/Tunnel x Average Full Tunnels)
Gallons of Bees/Block in Full Tunnels = Bees in Full Tunnels x 30 ÷ 10,000
Bees in Non-Full Tunnels = Gallons of Bees/Block in Full Tunnels x Average Non-Full Tunnels
Gallons of Bees/Block in Non-Full Tunnels = Bees in Non-Full Tunnels x 30 ÷ 10,000
Total Gallons Per Block = Addition of Gallons of Bees in both Full and Non-Full Tunnels