Does anyone keep native black honey bees?

[mbc]

On second reading maybe you're right SDM , the number of British Amm is probably dwarfed by those on the continent and the Republic of Ireland.

 

[B+.]

Interesting, despite your dislike of the Buckfast your results show they produced as much or more than your other crosses.

If I was looking at it purely from the honey production side, you'd probably be right. If they had all produced consistently above the others, I'd have been a lot more convinced.
My reasoning was as much to do with the effort required to keep them as other factors. That massive colony required so much work compared to the others that I'd have had to go through the stack every couple of days knocking down queen cells. They were determined to swarm, and eventually did.
If I had a small number of colonies, that effort might have even been worthwhile, but, the thought of doing that much work on 50-100 colonies was a no-brainer.

The Torfhaus group came from a land-based site which couldn't be desribed as completely secure but the Neuwerk queens were pure A.m.c. None of them were crosses. I should, perhaps, explain that the German system is based on a number of well established lines - all pure Carnica. Although these lines have increasingly been crossed in the search for varroa tolerant bees

To give you an idea of just how big this programme is, I have copied the country codes below:

Code numbers of Associations

A.m. carnica


Present code* New code* Name
1 DE-1 State Association of Baden Beekeepers / Landesverband Badischer Imker e.V.
2 DE-2 State Association of Bavarian Beekeepers / Landesverband Bayerischer Imker e.V.
3 DE-3 Beekeeping Association Berlin / Imkerverband Berlin e.V.
4 DE-4 State Association of Bradenburg Beekeepers / Landesverband Brandenburgischer Imker e.V.
5 DE-5 Beekeeping Association of Hamburg / Imkerverband Hamburg e.V.
6 DE-6 State Association of Hanoverian Beekeepers / Landesverband Hannoverscher Imker e.V.
7 DE-7 State Association of Hessian Beekeepers / Landesverband Hessischer Imker e.V.
8 DE-8 State Association of Beekeepers in Mecklenburg Vorpommern / Landesverband der Imker Mecklenburg Vorpommern e.V.
9 DE-9 Beekeeping Association Nassau / Imkerverband Nassau e.V.
10 DE-10 Beekeeping Assocation Rheinland-Pfalz / Imkerverband Rheinland-Pfalz e.V.
11 DE-11 Beekeeping Association Rheinland / Imkerverband Rheinland e.V.
12 DE-12 State Association of Beekeepers of the Saarland / Landesverband Saarländischer Imker e.V.
13 DE-13 State Association of Saxon Beekeepers / Landesverband Sächsischer Imker e.V.
14 DE-14 Beekeeping Association Sachsen-Anhalt / Imkerverband Sachsen-Anhalt e.V.
15 DE-15 State Association of Schleswig-Holstein and Hamburg Beekeepers / Landesverband Schleswig-Holsteinischer und Hamburger Imker e.V.
16 DE-16 State Association of Thuringian Beekeepers / Landesverband Thüringer Imker e.V.
17 DE-17 State Association of Weser-Ems Beekeepers / Landesverband der Imker Weser-Ems e.V.
18 DE-18 State Association of Westphalia and Lippisch Beekeepers / Landesverband Westfälischer und Lippischer Imker e.V.
19 DE-19 State Association of Wuertemburg Beekeepers / Landesverband Würtembergischer Imker e.V.
20 IT-20 Carnica Breeders in Alto Adige
30 HR-30 Mating station in Croatia
51 CH-?** Société Romande d'Apiculture, Schweiz
52 CH-? SCIV - Schweizerische Carnicaimker Vereinigung
53 FR-? France
55 NL-? Netherlands
57 BE-? Belgium
59 LU-? Luxembourg
62 SE-? Sweden
64 NO-2 Norway/Carnica
99 AT-99 ACA (Austrian Carnica Association)
FR-? France/SmartBees
HR-1 Croatia/SmartBees
PL-1 Poland/SmartBees
HU-1 Hungary/SmartBees
SI-1 Slovenia/SmartBees
RS-? Serbia/Carnica,SmartBees
LT-1 Lithunia/SmartBees
A.m. mellifera


Present code future Code Name
4 DE-24** Landesverband Brandenburgischer Imker e.V./Mellifera
8 DE-28 Landesverband der Imker Mecklenburg Vorpommern e.V./Mellifera
14 DE-34 Imkerverband Sachsen-Anhalt e.V./Mellifera
15 DE-35 Landesverband Schleswig-Holsteinischer und Hamburger Imker e.V./Mellifera
50 CH-? Verein Schweizerischer Mellifera Bienenfreunde
57 BE-? Limburgse Zwarte Bij (LZB vzw)
64 NO-1 Norway/Mellifera
99 AT-1 AMZ (Austrian Mellifera Züchter)
FR-? France/Mellifera
A.m. ligustica


Present code New code Name
1 IT-1 Ligustica breeding Italy/Abruzzo
2 IT-2 Ligustica breeding Italy/Basilicata
3 IT-3 Ligustica breeding Italy/Calabria
4 IT-4 Ligustica breeding Italy/Campania
5 IT-5 Ligustica breeding Italy/Emilia-Romagna
6 IT-6 Ligustica breeding Italy/Friuli-Venezia Giuli
7 IT-7 Ligustica breeding Italy/Lazio
8 IT-8 Ligustica breeding Italy/Liguria
9 IT-9 Ligustica breeding Italy/Lombardia
10 IT-10 Ligustica breeding Italy/Marche
11 IT-11 Ligustica breeding Italy/Molise
12 IT-12 Ligustica breeding Italy/Piemonte
13 IT-13 Ligustica breeding Italy/Puglia
14 IT-14 Ligustica breeding Italy/Sardegna
15 IT-15 Ligustica breeding Italy/Toscana
16 IT-16 Ligustica breeding Italy/Trentino-Alto Adige
17 IT-17 Ligustica breeding Italy/Umbria
19 IT-19 Ligustica breeding Italy/Veneto
A.m. macedonica


Present code New code Name
MK-1 MacBee Macedonia
RS-?** Serbien/Macedonica
GR-? Griechenland/Macedonica
Carpatical bee


Present code New code Name
RO-1 Romania
A.m. iberiensis


Present code New code Name
ES-1 Spain
PT-1 Portugal
A.m. ruttneri


Present code New code Name
MT-1 Malta
A.m. siciliana


Present code New code Name
IT-21 Italy/Siciliana
A.m. cecropia


Present code New code Name
GR-?** Greece/Cecropia
A.m. adami


Present code New code Name
GR-?** Greece/Adami
* The extension of BeeBreed.eu to more countries and races requires a change of nomenclature. Each association will be identified by a country code by ISO 3166-ALPHA-2 and a number. The bee race/subspeices will by identified by the association. For association active in several races, separate number will be given.

** Codes with a question mark are yet to be decided.

 

[For want of a better word]

Given your constant slating of your imported Italian bees, you should be in a good position to answer that yourself.

From my part there is no anti- any bee, just when idiots start promoting one type over another. Particularly when that bee is not a particularly productive honey producer.

You say your Cornish Amm;s brought in 2x your Italian imports and you mentioned in an earlier post that your Amm's brought in 20kg.....That is not a lot of honey.
My Amm's brought in more than that last year. And I don't rate them as honey producers.

This was in an apiary where a colony of my NZ I and Native Cornish Amm were set side by side... of similar size with both on a brood + 1/2 Std WRC National hives, which is my preferred method of keeping bees.
The Amm colony produced 2 supers of honey weighing in at 20kg once extracted.. the NZ Is produced nothing, except for their own overwintering stores.

I have somewhat more than 2 colonies of bees... fortunately!!

Please kick the ball .. not the player for once!

Yeghes da

 

[Beefriendly]

If I was looking at it purely from the honey production side, you'd probably be right. If they had all produced consistently above the others, I'd have been a lot more convinced.
My reasoning was as much to do with the effort required to keep them as other factors. That massive colony required so much work compared to the others that I'd have had to go through the stack every couple of days knocking down queen cells. They were determined to swarm, and eventually did.

Were these Island or II mated queens or open mated F1's?
The source and breeder are very important factors when you buy queens of ANY strain. A poor source of Buckfast is as bad as a poor source of Carniolan/Italian etc.
It's not clear if you only had one of your Buckfast colonies trying to swarm or all three...in which case I really would change your supplier.
I find Buckfast, in my hands, are very low swarmers, but like any bee they will swarm at some point. My island mated queens usually go for it in their third or fourth season, whereas the open mated F1s I breed usually go in their second or third full year. My first line of swarm control with Buckfast is to knock the first lot of queen cells down.This works about 50% of the time, but like any strain of bee once they are really determined they mean it. So I'm a little surprised one of your reasons for not favoring Buckfast was their swarming....particularly given the notoriety of Carniolan bees for their swarming.

 

[Beefriendly]

This was in an apiary where a colony of my NZ I and Native Cornish Amm were set side by side... of similar size with both on a brood + 1/2 Std WRC National hives, which is my preferred method of keeping bees.
The Amm colony produced 2 supers of honey weighing in at 20kg once extracted.. the NZ Is produced nothing, except for their own overwintering stores.

As has been said, last year was not a good year weather wise for Italian bees.
But in other years don't Italians wipe the floor with your black bees in terms of honey production?

In my case I compared colonies of Amm's to Buckfast in the same apiary on the spring oil seed rape flow. Amm's brought in 1 1/2 supers per hive whereas the Buckfast brought in 3 and the weather was not good over that period, dry but cold.

 

[B+.]

Because they were probably from Germany instead ?

I think the point that often gets overlooked in all the rush to claim Br Adam as the founder of a British cross is that he was German (https://youtu.be/QF0fvNLrT7c), as were a lot of his peers at Buckfast Abbey at the time. I suggest that it was his ability to read German that enabled him to access research material that others couldn't read.

 

[B+.]

Were these Island or II mated queens or open mated F1's?
The source and breeder are very important factors when you buy queens of ANY strain. A poor source of Buckfast is as bad as a poor source of Carniolan/Italian etc.
Only that

I agree. The source is very important.

The Buckfast line came from Buckfast Friedrichskoog (http://www.buckfast-zucht.de/) which, although based on a peninsular, are controlled by German law so it is exclusively Buckfast in that area.
The Carnica came from two sites managed by Institut für Bienenkund Celle (http://www.laves.niedersachsen.de/w...te/institut-fuer-bienenkunde-celle-73995.html). Neuwerk is the island mating station which produces certified A.m.c and Torfhaus is a line breeding station in the Harz mountains. As a land-based mating station, Torfhaus is considered less secure than the islands by the German authorities.
None of them were instrumentally inseminated.
It was only that single colony that swarmed. I don't regard that as a problem with the supplier. In fact, I had bought queens from Friedrichskoog before I set up that test.
Over the years since this test, I have gained quite a lot of experience with carniolans. I find them more suitable to my area. I think you have to remember that Br Adam was breeding a bee that got the most of the forage he had on Dartmoor (i.e. Heather). I am not saying that they develop late though. This seems to have been addressed by the inclusion of other material from other races (e.g. Carnica, although others too).
As you said, the supplier is often crucial in determining the characteristics of the bee you receive. That is why I have stuck with I.B.Celle for so long (~10 years). The breeding values are freely available on all of these so I would suggest anyone looking to buy queens looks at the swarming index. Anything above 100% is above the 5-year moving average.

 

[For want of a better word]

As has been said, last year was not a good year weather wise for Italian bees.
But in other years don't Italians wipe the floor with your black bees in terms of honey production?

.

We must have had a run of 4 bad years here in Cornwall,... in the Tamar and Lhyner river catchment areas at least... the black bees seem to average out on honey production at the same year on year, although the 2013 season was particularly good.
The Italians vary... but produce a massive amount of brood in the Spring that provides young surrogate bees to bring on the new Amm queens.... there is more to bees than honey!

Yeghes da

 

[Finman]

there is more to bees than honey!

Yeghes da

You need better pastures. Over grazing.

Or timing was not right. Italian bees were too youg to forage. They make the yield later, if they have pastures.

.

 

[Beefriendly]

The Italians vary... but produce a massive amount of brood in the Spring that provides young surrogate bees to bring on the new Amm queens.... there is more to bees than honey!

Which says everything there is to say about the fecundity of Cornish black bee queens. As Ruttner so aptly put it, a modest bee in all respects.

I wish you luck with your inbreeding program. It will be a lot of work. Where I (and others) despair is having a rational conversation/debate with a "black bee man". They tend to alter and distort facts to try and promote the acceptance of a bee that is quite frankly not anywhere near as good as other available strain's and crosses. Conservation wise, great I'm all for it, but distortion wise I'll continue to criticise until words of truth emerge. Having kept Amm's myself I know their limitations and how they compare to other strains of bees.
One thing you neglect to mention is the temper of your black bees. I hear on good authority they can be quite feisty.

 

[Beefriendly]

I think you have to remember that Br Adam was breeding a bee that got the most of the forage he had on Dartmoor (i.e. Heather). I am not saying that they develop late though. This seems to have been addressed by the inclusion of other material from other races (e.g. Carnica, although others too).

I think you have to remember he wasn't breeding a bee to specifically target a crop of heather, so it's strange that you imply this. May I suggest you read "Breeding the Honey bee" by Br. Adam. His aims and goals in breeding the Buckfast strains are expressed far more eloquently than I could ever put them.

 

[B+.]

May I suggest you read "Breeding the Honey bee" by Br. Adam. His aims and goals in breeding the Buckfast strians are expressed far more eloquently than I could ever put them.

Thank you BeeFriendly. I have read it.
Whatever the explicit goals of a breeding programme, there are always things that affect it but are uncontrollable i.e. the weather, available forage, etc. This has an effect on the rate at which a colony builds up as well as its eventual honey crop.
I didn't mean it as a criticism. Not at all. In fact, if I had more data, I'd be looking at the statistics on which of my own test colonies developed better for early (before 15th June), mid-season (16th June to 15th August) and late (after 15th August) yields. All I can say anecdotally is that they produce best during mid-season but this belies the fact that they have built up to fill double Langstroth brood boxes on early nectar flows. I also don't have heather nearby so my late season figures don't reflect their later potential.

 

[SDM]

Your post posed a question to which the answer was was "no".
Inconceivable to you or not, the areas which retain relatively pure Amm do so because they haven't been particularly heavily influenced by restocking, imagine that!

And those tiny areas amount to "most"in your understanding ?

 

[SDM]

Is there any documentation to support the implied total immunity of Cornish bees to acarine ?
Did Cornish Beekeepers not report losses similar to other parts of the country?

 

[SDM]

From what I can find acarine was rife in Cornwall by 1902. I can find nothing to suggest any difference in Colony mortality to any other area.

 

[Beefriendly]

Whatever the explicit goals of a breeding programme, there are always things that affect it but are uncontrollable i.e. the weather, available forage, etc. This has an effect on the rate at which a colony builds up as well as its eventual honey crop.

If you compare hives in the same apiary then all those variable are exactly the same for each hive and you can still tell which queen has produced the most brood (and when), most honey, most docile etc. I don't see how it affects the long term goals in any bee breeding program. Apart from in poor weather the full potential of any hive will probably not be realised.

 

[Beefriendly]

From what I can find acarine was rife in Cornwall by 1902. I can find nothing to suggest any difference in Colony mortality to any other area.

MAF imported 1000's of queens to re-stock the UK after IofW disease, including a lot of French Amm's. These may possibly be the ancestors of the Cornish black bees which have a close resemblance to french Amm's at the DNA level. Any records of restocking would be very interesting as they may determine where in France the Cornish black bees originally came from.....and possibly one might even find a similar DNA profile in the French area even today.

 

[Finman]

I think you have to remember he wasn't breeding a bee to specifically target a crop of heather, .

It cannot be truth that you breed a strain to each honey plant. Never seen that goal.

needs imagination.

 

[SDM]

It cannot be truth that you breed a strain to each honey plant. Never seen that goal.

needs imagination.

Not really when you consider there are commercial Beekeepers today who's harvest is almost entirely from heather.

 

[B+.]

I don't see how it affects the long term goals in any bee breeding program. Apart from in poor weather the full potential of any hive will probably not be realised.

I was referring to Br Adam who, presumably tested multiple lines in different apiaries.
In the case of the queens I now work with, sister queens that were mated to the same set of drones (drones produced by daughters of the same selected 4a queen) are island mated and tested all over Europe.
I am interested to see how my NL-Line and VSH-Line perform against the Celle line I have had for so long. On paper they should perform much better but, only time will tell.