Local adaption

[bingevader]

(If you applied it to cows, or sheep or dogs or cats etc, the RSPCA will prosecute you for cruelty to animals..)

But look what we've done to them!

 

[madasafish]

But look what we've done to them!

You mean bred them to suit our needs?

Try milking an aurochs rather than a cow...
Or taking a wolf for a walk..

Or - I don't know what you can do with a cat except feed it.

 

[fiat500bee]

You mean bred them to suit our needs?

Try milking an aurochs rather than a cow...
Or taking a wolf for a walk..

Or - I don't know what you can do with a cat except feed it.

All true, but you'd be very unlucky (or maybe very lucky?) to find an auroch had inseminated your cow and messed up your breeding line.

 

[Finman]

I wonder what is the BIG problem with this local open mating.

Locally adapted.... yes they are , if they are alive next year. After couple of generations hives are not same as they were in the start. A belief, that their genome stays same from year to year, is wrong. And when a queen mates with over 10 drones, one hive already is quite a mixture.

I can see from my own hives, what happens when I take 15 queens from my hybrid queens. Daughter hives may be then from edge to edge. Good layers and not so good layers. Swarmers often, but not angry.

What I say above, has nothing to do with local adaption. It is smallest problem in my queen rearing.
I can plan what ever good theories, but I cannot control mating.

 

[Finman]

I agree that bees in general, which get less management (I mean less treatment, feeding, re-queening etc.) aren't likely to be healthier.

What rule is that? Says a man who has never nursed a hive.

When the hive is not healthy? My all hives are sick. They have varroa.? It has been so 23 years.

 

[fiat500bee]

What rule is that? Says a man who has never nursed a hive.

What rule do you mean? I don't make any rules...maybe I break a few?

You take that line out of context. I was agreeing with someone that the idea that leaving bees alone will not (necessarily) make them healthier
My fuller statement was, " It depends which way you look at it. I agree that bees in general, which get less management (I mean less treatment, feeding, re-queening etc.) aren't likely to be healthier. But bees which are healthier don't necessarily need as much a management. "

That can be said whether I have nursed a hive or not.

 

[Hachi]

Read that too quickly and it sounds like a load of gobbledegook, but I think it's saying that a low interference regime, working with what you have locally and allowing the bees to make their own choices might lead to healthier bees. That's a philosophy that I like the sound of.

Sadly in this parish, this has led to the local population as I described in my post on Elaine's thread.

 

[Nige.Coll]

Control the drones and you control the mating.
I put tens of thousands in the air every year seems to be working quite well.

 

[Apple]

Control the drones and you control the mating.
I put tens of thousands in the air every year seems to be working quite well.

Select for the best and cull the ones you do not want.... even with the odd uninformed beekeeper bringing in imports, we have found that increase of hive density of bees that have the good genetics we have been selecting for has moved things in the right direction of good quality Native ( and locally adapted) Amm bees.
Chons da

 

[Nige.Coll]

Select for the best and cull the ones you do not want.... even with the odd uninformed beekeeper bringing in imports, we have found that increase of hive density of bees that have the good genetics we have been selecting for has moved things in the right direction of good quality Native ( and locally adapted) Amm bees.
Chons da

Similar but I keep Buckfast.
I've removed all the AMM genetics from my colonies.

 

[North End Bees]

Control the drones and you control the mating.
I put tens of thousands in the air every year seems to be working quite well.

Works well for you but not so much for any beekeepers down the road whose virgins use the same DCAs that your tens of thousands of Buckfast drones are dominating.

Wouldn't think they'd be too happy if they're trying to improve their local Amm populations and find that you've been 'controlling' the area.

Not exactly democratic.

 

[Nige.Coll]

Works well for you but not so much for any beekeepers down the road whose virgins use the same DCAs that your tens of thousands of Buckfast drones are dominating.

Wouldn't think they'd be too happy if they're trying to improve their local Amm populations and find that you've been 'controlling' the area.

Not exactly democratic.

No one cared when I had AMM bees or had spent years getting the mongrels to a reliable outcome.
What in beekeeping is ever democratic or ever will be ?
They'll have to continue to buy their AMM queens from abroad like normal.

 

[North End Bees]

What in beekeeping is ever democratic or ever will be ?

Never will be if people are only concerned with their own interests.

It's not even a question of agreeing to disagree. Making a point of controlling the outcomes of other people takes it to another level.

Where will that get us? Oh yeah, just look around.

 

[Erichalfbee]

Works well for you but not so much for any beekeepers down the road whose virgins use the same DCAs that your tens of thousands of Buckfast drones are dominating.

Wouldn't think they'd be too happy if they're trying to improve their local Amm populations and find that you've been 'controlling' the area.

Not exactly democratic.

But that works the other way round too. Why should beekeepers working with local bees be privileged over beekeepers improving other stock?

 

[madasafish]

You cannot persuade everyone locally to follow your example unless you offer them a carrot: like free queens of your own breeding so their colonies have the same bloodlines.

As a hobby beekeeper I have not the resources to do that even if I knew all the local beekeepers - and I don't. And as Covid proves, some people will not co-operate..

There is absolutely no incentive for hobby beekeepers to co-operate even if queens were available..

If you want people to co-operate, you need to be proactive..

As many of our local beekeepers are not BBKA members - and if they are don't attend meetings...it would require someone with lots of resources and drive to make it happens as part of an organised program.

Where is the organised program country wide? Where are the queen breeders with volumes of queens to give away?

Until they exist, it's all talk and little will be achieved at more than a few localised areas.

 

[Nige.Coll]

I do what's best for me like most people do.
It isn't a hobby for me it's my living.
There are no AMM breeding programs anywhere near me, I'm still connected to the local BIBBA group as I help them out where I can.
The only thing around me is people with terrible quality bees that they cannot keep in a box and you wouldn't want anyway.
You wouldn't be complaining if I flooded the area with AMM drones you would be applauding.

 

[Apple]

Works well for you but not so much for any beekeepers down the road whose virgins use the same DCAs that your tens of thousands of Buckfast drones are dominating.

Wouldn't think they'd be too happy if they're trying to improve their local Amm populations and find that you've been 'controlling' the area.

Not exactly democratic.

http://www.native-queen-bees.com/apiary-vicinity-mating/
Jon Getty comments on Apiary Vicinity mating, and I think this must be so.
Despite historical reports of a DCA above a bluff at the end of an old stone-age hill fort which dominates my Amm breeding deep river valley sites, I have never witnessed one.. Randy Oliver gave a presentation at the IOM BIBBA conference describing his experiences of DCAs and probable locations along a deep valle ... much like mine.
But I have definitely witnessed Apiary Vicinity Mating!

I wonder if the Irish Amm are the same as out Cornish variant?
DNA analyses showed them to be different, with the Irish Amm DNA tested to be closer to the French Amm.

All academic.

My "Buckfast" type bees are in apiary sited far enough away from the Amm not to mingle!

I mark drones in both areas for AI perposes... and have not as yet picked up one of the "other Drones in either of the two areas (OMGHC Posca make a living from me !!)

Chons da

 

[mbc]

But that works the other way round too. Why should beekeepers working with local bees be privileged over beekeepers improving other stock?

It's a recognised fact that a buckfast x buckfast doesn't breed true to buckfast, it's kind of in the definition of buckfast.

 

[mbc]

Similar but I keep Buckfast.
I've removed all the AMM genetics from my colonies.

Doesn't the buckfast bee (certainly as described by Br. Adam) contain a good slice of Amm genetics?!?

 

[North End Bees]

But that works the other way round too. Why should beekeepers working with local bees be privileged over beekeepers improving other stock?

It isn't a question of one strain being privileged over another.

My point was the democratic (or otherwise) action of actively working to dominate an area where other beekeepers may or may not have similar interests.

i.e, controlling the mating of everyone else's stocks.