VSH Bees. The Future? or a False Dawn?

[SDM]

I was really fortunate to identify a swarm queen in 2004 that was significantly mite resistant. Even more important, I was able to purchase queens from Purvis that were significantly mite resistant and use them to produce drones to mate with queens raised from my mite resistant swarm queen. The combination turned out to be significantly better than either line alone. Also should note that I lost several colonies in the early years before the resistance traits stabilized. Since the early days, I've brought in stock from Carpenter Apiaries and from Beeweaver to maintain genetic diversity and to incorporate some hive beetle resistance. Carpenter's queens turned out to be highly synergistic with my own bees in that colonies with crossbred queens did not develop problems with varroa. This suggests that my bees were already demonstrating significant levels of allogrooming though I have no way at this point to prove it. The reason for bringing in Beeweaver queens as has previously been stated was to incorporate some hive beetle resistance.

So to answer this, I did not so much come up with a breeding programme as to take advantage of the genetics available to me. The first real break was when I found that single queen from a swarm caught in 2004. Without her, I would still be on the treatment bandwagon.

And the blind luck to have apparently crossed bees using probably different methods of resistance( or at least without knowing the means of resistance)and somehow come up with a bee that was better than the original at each method rather than half as good as would be expected.

 

[SDM]

Yes - South Africa does not equal the whole of Southern Africa by a long chalk, most probably the mortalities were concentrated on the larger commercial outfits in South Africa and down to introduced European type strains rather than Scutellata. It was never an issue in Lesotho and doesn't seem to warrant a mention in most places. Resistance didn't develop' overnight as Fusion suggests, it was there in the native bee all the time

You only need to look at the reasons why they have resistance to see these weren't traits that evolved in a couple of years.

 

[Fusion_power]

And the blind luck to have apparently crossed bees using probably different methods of resistance

I'd quote the strong law of small numbers but that would probably get used against me.

I've been asked to participate in a study of mite resistant bees that will be conducted by a local university and evaluated in Europe for genetic variations. They are searching for a genetic trait associated with mite resistance. I'm thinking about letting them sample 10 colonies.

 

[SDM]

I can't imagine why you wouldn't let them sample them.
Universities, government bodies and breeding groups all over the world have been cooperating for decades to achieve what you have got ( comparatively) by accident.

 

[Fusion_power]

It is a matter of timing, not an issue with sampling as such. I have plans made for the month of October including a vacation.

 

[bobba]

I'd quote the strong law of small numbers but that would probably get used against me.

I've been asked to participate in a study of mite resistant bees that will be conducted by a local university and evaluated in Europe for genetic variations. They are searching for a genetic trait associated with mite resistance. I'm thinking about letting them sample 10 colonies.

If they will let you know the results it could potentially be useful.

What does sampling a hive involve?

And have they offered to pay you?

 

[Fusion_power]

I was asked about letting my bees be surveyed 2 nights ago. There is no payment involved. They want a sample of 300 bees for an alcohol wash and a sample of 500 bees for DNA tests. If available, they would also like a pinprick brood removal test to be performed. I won't mess with the pin prick tests, but the alcohol wash and DNA test are viable. Below is most of the information I provided.

Hives to be surveyed should be treatment free for at least 2 years (mine are TF for 15 years) and should not have been split or otherwise manipulated in the current year to reduce varroa counts. Some of the questions asked are a bit ridiculous so I marked them as not relevant. Others such as number of beekeepers withing 10 km were easy to answer as I have a list. There are currently 12 beekeepers within 15 km of my bees one of which is running commercial queens and treats. He is 7 miles or 11 km from my apiaries. Other questions are a bit ambiguous such as how many colonies do I have which is currently at 20 with half a dozen nucs raising queens. The low was about 10 colonies and the high was about 30. They want to know if I migrate with my bees (no), and do I perform any tests on my bees to determine if they will live (no). I do it the simple way, either they live or they die. I lost some colonies in the 2006 to 2010 time frame to varroa with roughly 30% losses per year. From 2010 to today, I have not lost any colonies directly to varroa. I have had the usual problems with queen failure and similar issues that cause colonies to die.

I have kept bees since 1969 first catching swarms that were mostly Apis Mellifera Mellifera and requeening with Italians. After tracheal mites (acarapis woodi) decimated my bees in 1987/1988, I purchased Buckfast queens from Weaver Apiaries in Texas and rebuilt to about 30 colonies in 1993. Varroa decimated my bees in the winter of 1993/1994 leaving me with one survivor. I split the survivor in March 1994 using 3 purchased Italian queens and treated for varroa that fall with Apistan strips. From 1994 until 2004, I kept about a dozen colonies mostly with Buckfast genetics and treating yearly. In 2004, I caught a swarm of bees that showed very low mite levels when I prepared to treat that fall.

The traits of that queen’s colony were heavily influenced by A.M.M. genetics as shown by traits of low temperature foraging, overwintering so light I thought they would surely be dead by spring, aggressive stinging, and extremely rapid spring buildup. They were my strongest and most productive colony in 2005. That queen lasted until 2006 when I purchased queens from Purvis Apiaries and raised drones from them. I raised a dozen or so queens from my mite resistant queen and mated them at my land to the Purvis drones. At that time, there were almost no other bees in this area so the matings were consistent and reliable. Over the next 5 years, I induced my bees to swarm heavily in 2006 and 2008 so that the surrounding area would be saturated with varroa resistant feral colonies. I estimate between 30 and 50 swarms were pushed into the trees. From that point until today I have been able to get very good mite resistance from random mating at my land.

I lost a few colonies to varroa each year from 2006 until 2010. Each year, I split remaining colonies to replace losses. In 2012, I brought in 8 queens from Mike Carpenter (carpenter apiaries) and used them to diversify the genetics of my bees. This cross turned out to be particularly beneficial as I got better honey production and excellent mite resistance with no subsequent losses to varroa. I brought in 3 queens from Beeweaver in 2015 and culled 2 of them based on colony defensiveness. I kept one queen and raised several daughters to mate to drones from my line. Roughly 1/2 of my bees currently are descended from this cross though I have had to select heavily to reduce the stinging tendency. I should note that the reason for bringing in the Beeweaver queens was because I was having a lot of problems with hive beetles. The Beeweaver queens are highly tolerant of hive beetles.

The background genetics of my bees are a mix of Buckfast from 2004, A.M.m. from the 2004 swarm queen, Purvis (primorski), dark Italian from Carpenter, and some Scutellata from the Beeweaver queens. They are an American blend.

I am currently raising queens from a F2 Buckfast queen (mother was purchased from Ferguson Apiaries in Canada) and mating back to drones from my bees. These queens will gradually be integrated into the rest of the mix as soon as I am certain they are mite resistant enough. None of these queens are currently in the colonies that would be sampled.

Perhaps also of interest, I changed from Langstroth equipment to square Dadant in 2016. I had always been interested in trialing the hives used by Brother Adam. I have to say that they exceed any expectations I may have had. The most significant modification I made was to build 32 mm frames which permit 14 frames in each box. My reason for using 14 frames is because it significantly speeds up spring buildup. I currently have about 20 colonies and half a dozen queen nucs. With a bit of work, I expect to get up to 30 colonies in 3 apiaries next year.

 

[Antipodes]

Thanks for sharing this story Fusion_Power.

 

[Erichalfbee]

I was asked about letting my bees be surveyed 2 nights ago. If available, they would also like a pinprick brood removal test to be performed. I won't mess with the pin prick tests,

Can I ask why?
Here you are sitting on a potential breakthrough in the beekeeping world and you won't mess?

 

[Ian123]

Can I ask why?
Here you are sitting on a potential breakthrough in the beekeeping world and you won't mess?

Sorry I don’t see the breakthrough bees with known ahb genetics are surviving with varroa in many countries hygienic queens or at least bees with a certain level of tolerance are being bred in many more, feral hives that swarm often can exist although normally in a poor state and some leave alone beeks replicate this with frequent splits/brood breaks. I am not sure on the rellivance of ahb in regard to the European honey bee though, the introduction of 2 dozen scuttelata queens has led to millions of ahb hives over 2 continents.

 

[Erichalfbee]

Don’t be sorry
Most of this goes over my head
Perhaps my wording was lacking
I was simply curious why Fusion was so reluctant

 

[Fusion_power]

Pin prick tests are inaccurate to start with. They don't actually measure Varroa Sensitive Hygiene, what they measure is dead brood removal which is not quite the same thing. Brood infested with varroa is not actually dead which is why those crawling bees with deformed wings show up in a colony. In addition, they are time consuming to set up and evaluate.

The actual question they are asking is whether or not anyone has bees that successfully keep varroa in check. This question can be answered by the alcohol wash. Then if they want to suss out the details of why they are varroa resistant they can do so at a later date. In other words, if the alcohol wash shows the bees are controlling varroa, the mechanism by which they maintain control is not relevant except in an academic sense and it is a question that can be addressed at a future date.

The study being performed is directed more toward beekeepers who are in the early stages of developing varroa resistant bees rather than toward bees that have lived treatment free for 15 years.

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

Brood infested with varroa is not actually dead which is why those crawling bees with deformed wings show up in a colony.

another inaccurate claim, it is true that varroa is a stressor which can bring on DWV, but to claim it's a direct result of brood infested with varroa is totally erroneous

 

[Finman]

.
I made a disappering test gew years ago.

A hive had really much mites. I saw it from the bottom of the hive.

I made an artificial swarm and I took all brood frames off to another box.
The.broodless swarm I treated with trickling.

I got from brood frames one box full of bees. But after 2 weeks bees were diappered and only a coffee cup of bees was left with queen.

So, the pupae were severely violated by mites and they did not live many days after emerging.

 

[Dodge]

I have a hive about to be treated for Varoa, mite drop onto collection board is about 4 a day. Did an inspection and there was brood that was neglected in a random pattern but isolated cells. Cocktail stick to have a look and everyone had a Varoa mite on the developing bee post grub stage. Quite surprised, will treat now and monitor next year. It will be interesting if they do this trick in the spring and summer. I have not done any breeding for hygiene and the bees are open mated in a urban area with a number of feral colonies near by. The nearest Ferrell colony in about 200 meters away in a roof and is at least 5 years old.

 

[Fusion_power]

another inaccurate claim

I'm not writing a book about Parasitic Mite Syndrome. DWV had been found long before varroa entered the picture, but it was an isolated problem until varroa came along and provided a ready means to spread the virus. You never get rid of the Dane once you pay Danegeld and you don't get rid of DWV until you get rid of the varroa mite that spreads it.

 

[Beersmith]

IMO it's going to take a very long time to get widespread varroa tolerant bees i.e. it's the norm for most beekeepers. Varroa has been around for a long time and if it was easy it would have been cracked by now.e

I very much agree. I was a mathematician involved in the efforts to improve the genetics of the national pig herd during the sixties and seventies, working on the estimation of heritability and the genetic correlations between selection traits.

Using carefully controlled testing good economic improvements were made, but all mating was fully under the control of the stock breeders and the multiplier herds. Also a lot of improvement once achieved could be disseminated nationwide by AI programs.

Finally, it took many, many generations of careful selection. The aim was to improve traits that were not controlled by a single gene but by numerous genes and alleles. In such circumstances it was simply impossible to achieve big changes in just a few generations.

I'd be delighted to be proved wrong, but like you, fear there is a long hard road ahead.