F2 aggression

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We seem to be going a bit off topic here.
The purpose was to try and understand why aggression with successive hybridization usually occurs second generation down stream from pure mated queen, not why they swarm.

You should first understand what is natural habits of the bees and what is made by human selection.
Along many crossings bees genome tend to return to its original model. Retarded, as they say.

When you buy a "pure" queen, actually you do not know what you bought and how "pure" it is. I have seen that professionals may sell what ever. There is no guarantee.

What is pure queen. Nature try to mix genes. That us why there is sex and queen mates with 16 drones.
 
all of which is then confused with environmental factors
the hive the pigeonson land on will be bad tempered. The hive the beekeeper drops kit on or regularly disrturbs etc ...
 
When you buy a "pure" queen, actually you do not know what you bought and how "pure" it is. I have seen that professionals may sell what ever. There is no guarantee.
What is pure queen. Nature try to mix genes. That us why there is sex and queen mates with 16 drones.

Pure is a relative term as all races have their own genetic diversity within their ranges. By pure I mean crosses within the same race where the established characteristics persist. Not a cross hybrid between two different races.

The change in behaviour after adding a queen took about 1 hour, although as the subject of bee aggression is quite complex the suggestions was the queen did have some influence, (nurture effect), BUT this was not the full story, just part of it, as you should know this is only part of a very complex story where many defensive/aggressive genes have yet to be defined. In confirmation of this I have found aggressive colonies quieten down within a few days of new queen addition....BUT not as quite as they will become when all the older bees have died off, just enough to take the edge off them.

There is a great deal of evidence that aggression in bees is mediated by at least three factors genetics, age and environment (Both Nature and Nurture at work) microarray techniques are now showing how environmental factors can affect aggression. It's interesting stuff but doesn't need to be discussed on this forum.
The advice to change queen is solid and works. What more does one need to know.
 
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Hiya

For some reason I just can't get my head round the topic of F2 aggression (and there's a reason I've posted in the beginners section). As I understand it if I buy an II mated queen her offspring will be F1. So if I raise queens from her they'll be F1 queens and if they're open mated their offspring will be F2. So will workers produced from the F1 queens be likely to exhibit F2 aggression, or does that not occur until you're producing workers from F2 queens?

Thanks

Hmmmm, am I right in thinking if F1 open mates then her drones will effectively be F1 as they get all of their DNA from the queen, whilst workers will be F2 as they'll be F1 x something so will exhibit any F2 aggression?

Try this web page:
http://www.glenn-apiaries.com/genetic_aspects_queen_production_1.html


Seems that the misunderstanding is due to the fact that Honeybees are diploid / haploid so do not follow classic simple diploid Mendelain genetics.

Any colony of honeybees can suddenly show signs of aggressive behavior, the best thing to do is to have an out apiary where they can be taken to be away from your child / relatives and other whom one would not like to be stung!

I have not found Amm crosses to be any more agressive than any other hybrid that has Carniolian in its make up.
Pure Carniolians do not seem to be particularly aggressive, but once any hybridisation occurs ,attempted accidentally or otherwise with any other sub species bee ( in my experience) all hell breaks out!

Beware hybrids!


James
 
microarray techniques are now showing how environmental factors can affect aggression


Peer reviewed.

James
 
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Pure Carniolians do not seem to be particularly aggressive

Used our first carnica in the mid 90s and others at different times, from various sources, since then without undue problems. But there is an interesting paper online for those interested in the subject. Nothing's ever quite as clear cut as it seems with bees...

MORPHOLOGICAL AND PRODUCTION CHARACTERISTICS OF CARNIOLAN HONEY BEE (Apis mellifera carnica Poll.) FROM DIFFERENT PARTS OF SERBIA



The colonies demonstrated considerable variability of disposition during
examination. The Rasina ecotype was given satisfactory grades for that
colony characteristic. Pešter colonies were problematic, being very
aggressive during inspection and handling, so that this characteristic was a
limiting factor for work with bees. The Morava ecotype displayed very
similar behavior to the Rasina ecotype. Their disposition was satisfactory
and the bees caused no problem in handling them. The colonies of the
examined Banat ecotype displayed different dispositions and work with them
was therefore partly difficult....

https://www.google.co.uk/url?sa=t&r...Hq27cxcUdPc1Q3MTQ&sig2=9B2yQZemsY4E5Ov-aR9vNA
 
Thanks Rolande an interesting paper, will take it to bed with me!

However I did say

Pure Carniolians do not seem to be particularly aggressive, but once any hybridisation occurs ,attempted accidentally or otherwise with any other sub species bee ( in my experience) all hell breaks out!

I wonder if there was in fact a form of hybridisation within the genetically "pure" Russian deme of Carniolians?

The rapidly moving forward of DNA SNPS ( Single nucleotide polymorphisms) technology is most certainly moving forward our understanding the mechanisms of honeybee genetics.

Hopefully eventually helping us humble beekeepers!

James
 
Peer reviewed

Peer reviewed. One example can be read at this link.

The word you were looking for is haplodiploid mode of sex determination, pretty well unique to eusocial insects, although some mites use it as well. Pretty handy for finding and spotting mutations.
Whenever 2 sets of chromosomes unite in a fertilised egg Mendelian genetics operates. Unfortunately not many phenotypes, like aggression, are controlled by simple dominant recessive genes. Rather they are often multiallelic with other complicating factors, such as maternal DNA methylation, that affect the final phenotype.
Studies into bee aggression are still in their infancy and there is much debate about how it all operates. One interesting development, in certain crosses, is that paternal genes appear to have a lot of influence on how aggressive the bees are in the subsequent generation.

Still there is much to discover.

Perhaps simpler and more practical to requeen aggressive colonies and concentrate on beekeeping. Leave the scientists to get on with understanding the whys and wherefores.

We also seem to have wavered way off explaining how F2 aggression might arise as subsequent generations of pure mated bees becomes successively hybridised.
 
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Peer reviewed. One example can be read at this link.

The word you were looking for is haplodiploid mode of sex determination, pretty well unique to eusocial insects, although some mites use it as well. Pretty handy for finding and spotting mutations.
Whenever 2 sets of chromosomes unite in a fertilised egg Mendelian genetics operates. Unfortunately not many phenotypes, like aggression, are controlled by simple dominant recessive genes. Rather they are often multiallelic with other complicating factors, such as maternal DNA methylation, that affect the final phenotype.
Studies into bee aggression are still in their infancy and there is much debate about how it all operates. One interesting development, in certain crosses, is that paternal genes appear to have a lot of influence on how aggressive the bees are in the subsequent generation.

Still there is much to discover.

Perhaps simpler and more practical to requeen aggressive colonies and concentrate on beekeeping. Leave the scientists to get on with understanding the whys and wherefores.

We also seem to have wavered way off explaining how F2 aggression might arise as subsequent generations of pure mated bees becomes successively hybridised.

Getting excited then!

Thought you were about to explain!

James
 
Seems to me James you are going back to your trolling ways, yet again.

But to answer the F2 question, it is due to gene regulation.
 
Let's not go down this path again, eh? It get's quite boring when thread after thread become sh!t slinging contests.
 
But to answer the F2 question, it is due to gene regulation.

Basic is that workers have only 25% of original genes. Daughter colonies show big variation.

My case to tell, I am lucky that I have a very good beekeeping neighbour. He has well selected stock. He is very allergic to venom and he takes care that colonies are calm.
 
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You are right they overall F2 population has only 25% of the original genotype. But there will be 2 different ratios within the F2 population, 50% of the workers will be 1/2 genes Original, 1/2 genes Local. Other half will be 100% Local.
This doesn't take into account the crossovers occurring during meiosis in egg production, but is close enough.

I'll write down the original crosses and see if you agree with them.
Call original daughters OO (O for original) and drones L (L for local)
All F1 daughters will be a cross of OO x L
get OL + OL
ALL will be OL (okay the L will vary depend on which drone sperm used).

F2 cross is OL X L (local drones again)

Gives OL or LL , Overall 25% of original (O) genes but depends on individual worker as to whether 100% L or 50% L with the other 50% being O (original).

If either one of these siblings is aggressive and the other isn't. You won't notice whether half of the the little darlings are not trying to sting you, it's the half that are pinging off your veil that will determine whether you think the colony is aggressive or not.

Obviously there are other factors that interfere here, but those are the genetic ratios.
 
My case to tell, I am lucky that I have a very good beekeeping neighbour. He has well selected stock. He is very allergic to venom and he takes care that colonies are calm.

You are very fortunate. The area I live is populated with local mongrels that in my area are very swarmy and quite grumpy overall. I think they may be the local equivalent of the sub-division called "heather Bee" that Ruttiger described for the original Amms (now well mongrelised, here at least).

Non of the local keepers appear to care about improvement and seem to simply accept that our local bees are swarmy and stingy.

About 25km away the local bees appear very different. I think it's adaption to the microclimates we have.
 
I'll write down the original crosses and see if you agree with them.
.

Writing does not help in colony crossings. When a queen flies to the drone swarm, nobody knows, what those drones are.

I have founded mating yards far from home but then I have noticed that there are wild Carniolan colonies in empty farm houses. I believed that there are no beehives on those districts because I did not see bees in flowers.

Then, if queens mate with own relative drones, inbreeding problems may be severe. Yes, i have seen it several times.
 
Finman, to go off topic for a moment, when you have your long summer days. Does foraging go on for the length of the daylight? i.e if you're bees were close to the arctic circle would they forage 24 hours a day in mid summer?
 
.
Mostly bees stop foraging before sunset when temp goes to 18C.
Some stop sooner and some later. In Lapland bees keep rest time even if there is light.

I have seen that when we have 30C temps on day, bees get two extra working hours because evening is warm. But it depends if flowers have nectar. If flowers are empty, bees stop quite early.

Inspecting near sunset makes hives quite furious. A calm hive may give tens of stings in the evening, and next morning it is calm again.
 
That's very interesting. Particularly the Lap bees. Seems nectar and temp may have more to do with foraging than day lengths. Are these locally adapted bees, or recent imports? Apologies if this seems a stupid question but I've got no idea what the indigenous Finnish/Lap bees are/were.

In North Yorkshire they are active from daybreak to sunset. At most we have approx 18hrs daylight Mid June.
 
Let's not go down this path again, eh? It get's quite boring when thread after thread become sh!t slinging contests.

Not me
I have no need to teach my granny how to suck eggs!
Just attempting to steer OP to some web pages that may assist in the average beekeepers in understanding the complexity of honey bee genetics.
James
 

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