Heads up re Amm from Greece

[foghornleghorn]

Shall I put that one in my Great Book of Beekeeping Myths????

Good excuse for beekeepers bees going nasty....


Yeghes da

I didn't mean my local bees I meant the yellow locals out in Greece/Cyprus etc, it was the original queens (still marked) that I found were useless. Going to be rearing all my own queens going forward

 

[madasafish]

Imported queens will be banned soon.

You heard it here first !

Then I will raise queens to overwinter and sell at £100 ( each of course) in spring.

Thanks for the heads up.. Will plan to buy a few polynucs for such eventuality...

And it's YOUR fault if they are not banned

 

[Stiffy]

I remember a similar thread some seasons ago when PH was deriding his Greek amm's.
Whatever happened to "once bitten twice shy"?

Bought a few Greek AMMs at the same time and they were shockers, didnt go back! They were nearly as bad as some of the local swarms I have picked up lately, absolute pigs but soon re-queened.
S

 

[Always Cross]

How would you reueen?

 

[Stiffy]

How would you reueen?

Not sure what you mean?
Do you mean why would I re-queen?
I would re-queen to get rid of the agressive bees

Or do you mean how do I re-queen?
I take the old (queen with agressive tendancies) out of the hive and replace with one I know to be calm and productive

S

 

[Always Cross]

Do you just take the old queen and put new laying queen in in a travel cage straight in the hive or in a nuc then unit?

 

[Stiffy]

Do you just take the old queen and put new laying queen in in a travel cage straight in the hive or in a nuc then unit?

Take old queen out, leave for a few hours, put new queen in (inside cage). Check next day, if no sign of aggression to her take off tab to slow release, if aggression, leave until they accept her. Knock any queen cells out if it takes time for her to be accepted.
As with most aspects of beekeeping, it takes patience don't try and rush or you will lose your new queen
S

 

[Into the lions den]

No. I am not saying that non UK breeders are bad. The point I'm making is that if you import bees from abroad that have been bred in differing climates, and are used to their local climes and foraging behaviours, do not be surprised when you suddenly have a horrible hive. After all, if you took one of our locally bred native queens and exported her to Dubai, in their extreme conditions, would you expect her to do well, and within one generation adapt to a very severe and challenging environment?

I think many people misunderstand how these PROFESSIONAL breeders operate. They produce bees bred to the CLIENTS needs, not to their local climate.

The GOOD ones are purely exploiting their early seasons compared to here where it is a far more hit or miss affair (and yes, we run 1000 mating boxes and produce a LOT of home raised queens but ride both horses.)

If a gentleman in, say Cyprus, produced queens which were perfect for Cyprus he would not sell many to the north. Yet he does. Why? He is not breeding stock designed for Cyprus, nor ultimately sourced and selected from there. It is northern adapted and just southern raised.

Ditto our friends in Piemonte. They drone flood their area, they select breeder queens from as far north as Finland (in fact one of them was there in the last two weeks). They trial them and then reselect again, and then graft and mate them in the areas dominated by their sought after drones. It ain't perfect but the idea that you are buying bees adapted to a southern climate if you buy from a southern source is just not accurate. It CAN be true, but that's why you have to be choosy.

What about our Piemonte project? Scottish raised queens sent out for grafting from, others sent out to head colonies in the mating units, then done in high hills. Soft southern ill adapted bees?

Good quality imports can be a lot better than unimproved local stock..............but can *on occasions* be worse...and that what gets 'imported' a bad name. On the other hand I am a near incurable experimenter with bees and some of the poorest I have had were both imported AND UK.

 

[B+.]

Good quality imports can be a lot better than unimproved local stock..............but can *on occasions* be worse...and that what gets 'imported' a bad name.

Spot on.
I have two sister queens in my test group at the moment that were island mated to the same drones. One has stayed in two boxes all through the osr flowering while the other grew to six boxes high. They do vary. That's why testing is important.
I think a lot of people forget that you can have a rubbish colony that has excellent drones. If a queens mother was good, her drones should be too. It's not all about how her workers perform.

 

[Swarm]

So imported species that do well in the new environment are a good thing, Himalayan Balsam should be encouraged. Why not work with what you've got?

 

[mbc]

I think many people misunderstand how these PROFESSIONAL breeders operate. They produce bees bred to the CLIENTS needs, not to their local climate.

The GOOD ones are purely exploiting their early seasons compared to here where it is a far more hit or miss affair (and yes, we run 1000 mating boxes and produce a LOT of home raised queens but ride both horses.)

If a gentleman in, say Cyprus, produced queens which were perfect for Cyprus he would not sell many to the north. Yet he does. Why? He is not breeding stock designed for Cyprus, nor ultimately sourced and selected from there. It is northern adapted and just southern raised.

Ditto our friends in Piemonte. They drone flood their area, they select breeder queens from as far north as Finland (in fact one of them was there in the last two weeks). They trial them and then reselect again, and then graft and mate them in the areas dominated by their sought after drones. It ain't perfect but the idea that you are buying bees adapted to a southern climate if you buy from a southern source is just not accurate.

The idea that there are places which are good for queen mating in southern Europe which can be successfully drone flooded by bringing in foreign drone producing stocks is fanciful, all good areas already have their own bees which will dominate the mating in these areas for sure. Maybe I'm wrong but I doubt it.

 

[beebopper]

The idea that there are places which are good for queen mating in southern Europe which can be successfully drone flooded by bringing in foreign drone producing stocks is fanciful, all good areas already have their own bees which will dominate the mating in these areas for sure. Maybe I'm wrong but I doubt it.

Don't follow your logic. Take an isolated site in Southern Europe and set up drone colonies - job done - or am I missing something.

 

[B+.]

So imported species that do well in the new environment are a good thing, Himalayan Balsam should be encouraged. Why not work with what you've got?

The human race was once an invasive species (some might argue it still is). Are you against all imports?

 

[Finman]

.
Greece has never been natural area of Black Bee race.

 

[Fusion_power]

Cecropia and Macedonica are native races from Greece. Unfortunately, widespread importations have diluted these races significantly.

 

[maddydog]

Cecropia and Macedonica are native races from Greece. Unfortunately, widespread importations have diluted these races significantly.

I wonder if Greece has 'local bee only' zealots who hate the thought of AMM imports? Funny old world

 

[Swarm]

The human race was once an invasive species (some might argue it still is). Are you against all imports?

Not reintroduction of indigenous species in an attempt to re establish species that we have abused, no.
As a whim, yes.

 

[madasafish]

Not reintroduction of indigenous species in an attempt to re establish species that we have abused, no.
As a whim, yes.

I think we should bring back Neanderthals... after all we were probably responsible for their demise.
And the woolly mammoth - ditto.
And the dodo - ditto.

Just as sensible as bringing back AMM - in my views..

(runs away and hides...

 

[mbc]

Don't follow your logic. Take an isolated site in Southern Europe and set up drone colonies - job done - or am I missing something.

So honey bees have been in southern Europe for millions of years (even uninterrupted by the last ice ages!)and you imagine there's still isolated suitable habitats for bees just waiting for an enterprising bee breeder to move his desired stock into with no influence from the indigenous drones?
I'm not entirely certain but my money is on that scenario being highly unlikely and even more unlikely if such places did exist they'd be used to satisfy the tiny uk queen bee demand.

 

[mbc]

I think we should bring back Neanderthals... after all we were probably responsible for their demise.
And the woolly mammoth - ditto.
And the dodo - ditto.

Just as sensible as bringing back AMM - in my views..

(runs away and hides...

What about preserving pandas and tigers ect.? Sensible or a waste of time and resources?
Biodiversity is where it's at and keeping those canaries in the coal mines alive might give us a chance too.