The Yellow Queen

[JohnyP]

One of my colonies has produced a brand new startlingly yellow queen. Up 'til now, all my queens have mostly been black. And boy is she good... loads of brood and very calm bees.

Is she likely to be the progeny of a southern European import from someone locally, and if so, is she less likely to survive the winter here?

 

[enrico]

What in Somerset!!!
She will be fine, probably produce more offspring and therefore more likely to be an early swarmer but..... Who knows! Best of luck
E

 

[kazmcc]

Ooooo pictures please!! I've only seen blackish queens before. I'd love a butchers at yours

 

[Jimy Dee]

Please PICTURES PICTURES PICTURES

 

[Midland Beek]

I like the yellow ones, they're often gentle. So gentle, in fact, that they don't put much of a fight up against the wasps. Don't say you weren't warned.

 

[Tom Bick]

Until this year I would have said yes yellow queens are not that great and the one that came with the small cast swarm that found one of my bait hives last year as golden as one can be. But they built up and produced honey last year overwintered strong and so far filled six supers and still going strong. So I am rethinking what I think of yellow queens.

 

[Stiffy]

I get a lot of mostly yellow queens from my Buckies and yes they are generally very clam and good layers. Survive the winter, of course they will, the only place I would be worried about any would be in Scotland where they have long nights and cold winters.
S

 

[JohnyP]

Oh, I'm getting my bee genetics wrong then, oops. I thought Buckfasts were mostly Melifera like the black native bees, and the yellows were Ligustica from southern Europe.

 

[TryingToLetThemBee]

Oh, I'm getting my bee genetics wrong then, oops. I thought Buckfasts were mostly Melifera like the black native bees, and the yellows were Ligustica from southern Europe.

There's quite a bit of Italian in Buckies. My first Buckie Q is quite yellow, and fantastic. My HM one, which I think must be "truer" is darker. I'm hoping to see my first Buckie daughter ( from the yellower Q) tomorrow. Excited.

 

[masterBK]

Body colour is just one characterisitic why do beekeepers think it is accompanied by other atributes? Have they not heard of meiosis : independent segregation, cross-over etc producing a wide range of variation in the genome of the eggs and the resultant individual.

 

[rockdoc]

I too have a mix of pale yellow to dark brown queens and there is no definitive trait assigned to colour in my apiary.

 

[Norton]

Tom Bick wrote:

But they built up and produced honey last year overwintered strong and so far filled six supers and still going strong. So I am rethinking what I think of yellow queens.

Oh dear, that is going to upset the AMM propaganda and misinformation agenda.

 

[meidel]

Ooooo pictures please!! I've only seen blackish queens before. I'd love a butchers at yours