Genetic mutation

[Thymallus]

Sorry...I am always doing that too.
Yes. It is possible that the drone(s) had impaired vision although the article you cited (and other sources I have read) suggests that they are blind. I wonder if they are able to maintain contact with the swarm via other means?
My understanding is that it is a caused by a gene, and not a virus. If it is a recessive gene, it would be expressed in all drones from that queen (excluding variation) because there is no suppression of the recessive with a dominant gene from a drone. Drones express all of their characteristics because they only have 16 chromosomes.

You can check if it s recessive by counting drones with white eyes and those without, should be about 50:50. If all the drones are white eyed, suggests something else.
Your pictures suggest it's not 100% coverage over the eyes, which will leave some vision. But it may be progressive, perhaps the faulty gene only starts to kick in as the eyes develop (age related) such that it starts out in few ommatidia and spreads with time to encompass the whole eye. You would need to check several drones to see if this is happening.

Alas, I no longer have access to the in depth research papers online, unless public access, so can't point you their direction as I can't get to read them myself. But have a look at this where you can read some of the details on eye mutations in bees from advances in genetics volume 8.

 

[Thymallus]

Can you confirm that the white-eyed drones are blind Michael? I would have thought this would prevent them from finding the virgin queen to mate with and would fizzle out of any population it was found in. If you see it every year, does this mean you have a lot of it or that they can still mate?

It will get passed along the daughter (queen) lineages as they are diploid niot by the drones.

 

[B+.]

So a dominant/recessive pair of genes in the queen will produce recessive in half the drones they lay. That assumes it's a single gene responsible for a specific trait, it could be dependent on other genes too

Thank you. I had to think about the punnet square for that but you are right. Its strange that I have never come across it until last year.

 

[Michael Palmer]

Can you confirm that the white-eyed drones are blind Michael? I would have thought this would prevent them from finding the virgin queen to mate with and would fizzle out of any population it was found in. If you see it every year, does this mean you have a lot of it or that they can still mate?

I really don't know B+. I see white eyed drones but don't know if the drones are blind, or if the genes are passed on by them mating with my virgins. There are usually only a few in a colony, but I've seen colonies with lots.

 

[B+.]

Your pictures suggest it's not 100% coverage over the eyes, which will leave some vision. But it may be progressive, perhaps the faulty gene only starts to kick in as the eyes develop (age related) such that it starts out in few ommatidia and spreads with time to encompass the whole eye. You would need to check several drones to see if this is happening.

Unfortunately, I didn't have the time to investigate further. I don't have my university account now either so I am also limited in what I can access. Your reference suggests that they don't mate very often so this would support the argument that they are blind. Perhaps it is as alanf suggested.