Where did we go wrong?

[simoncav]

Its been a bit tedious reading through the various rants on AMM here, but in recently researching some material for our beginners course I stumbled across the British Pathe Film library containing thousands of digitised newsreel clips.

Just entering "Bees" into their search engine at http://www.britishpathe.com brings up quite a number of newsreels from the 1930's and onwards. What's fascinating is just how docile "average" bees seemed to have been back then. Whether it's schoolgirls in 1937 making hats of bees (H&S would have a blue fit), to Mr Gadge (my fav) showing off his bees in 1942 to a lady dressed to the nines in the middle of a public park, or the chap in 1952 keeping bees on the roof of Waterloo station in central London, you can see how none of them wore beesuits, gloves or even veils.

I don't know or even really care that much if we will ever get back to a true native British Bee (whatever that is), but what I do feel is vital is that we should be trying to breed consistently docile bees that present little threat to the beekeepers and members of the public. We seem generally to have tolerated a lot of unnecessary bad behaviour from our bees by encasing ourselves in bee-proof kit, when we should have simply culled these Queens and bred for docility...

Many beekeepers in parts of Europe seem to be able to work their bees with the minimum of protection - Is that because they take a much stricter line in terms of initial training and breeding from good quality stocks....?

 

[Black Comb]

My guess is that in recent years at least, the demand from new beekeepers has outstripped the supply of UK produced bees and the imported stock, once mixed with the local, is aggressive.

As new beeks we know no better and accept it as the norm.

I suspect queen rearing courses will be popular for the next few years.

 

[madasafish]

My view - from personal experience - is that newcomers are encouraged to buy a full set of armour when very little is needed.. and the BBKA should encourage a policy of eradicating aggressive bees.

 

[oliver90owner]

Money and need for imported queens.

Money - imports again, really. There is always so much pressure to survive as a commercial beek and there are also always plenty of hobbyists who will buy in from anywhere.

Seems like cross-breeding of different strains gives rise to the problem and it is easily perpetuated but not so easily eradicated. The simple way to get better tempered bees, by buying another docile import, simply facilitates the next generation of less well tempered bees. So a vicious circle.

 

[susbees]

I don't know or even really care that much if we will ever get back to a true native British Bee (whatever that is), but what I do feel is vital is that we should be trying to breed consistently docile bees that present little threat to the beekeepers and members of the public. We seem generally to have tolerated a lot of unnecessary bad behaviour from our bees by encasing ourselves in bee-proof kit, when we should have simply culled these Queens and bred for docility...

Many beekeepers in parts of Europe seem to be able to work their bees with the minimum of protection - Is that because they take a much stricter line in terms of initial training and breeding from good quality stocks....?

After IOW disease vastly reduced stocks around the time of WW1, bees began to be imported into the UK to increase numbers. Mistake 1 IMHO. Unadapted to our forage and climate they formed crabby hybrids with native stock which were often of black phenotype(looked native but hybrid genes) hence the claim that Amm were aggressive. The hybrids spread and problems with temper became slowly ingrained. There are still a few beekeepers in this country who wear just a veil (like our President) and ordinary clothes but they are in the minority.

Mistake 2 IMHO. Beekeepers continue to import queens from various sources which continue to affect the genepool of wild recessive genes in our bees. Only isolation (hard) and insemination (costly) can work against this to improve our bees whilst this is the case. Thrift and the ability to work in cooler, damper and windier conditions are a big plus in our very variable climate and Amm-type bees have these traits so are worth breeding for particularly in the west and north.

Breeding "pure" shows much quicker results than adapting mongrels (BA bred Buckfasts from pure lines...many so-called Buckfasts now are nothing of the sort and imported pure queens are often open mated so their offspring are crosses and bad-temper with the next generation is quite likely). The Germans made a national policy of breeding particular strains of Carni bees...to be a breeder you need x stocks and need to follow protocols: if we can't get beekeepers to even join Beebase in the fight against disease then a whole country breed policy won't work will it and free trade ain't helpful.

The options for the UK to increase winter survival and reduce the pouring of sugar water into some hives almost year round are probably Amm-type or Carnies, but Carnies come from an enormous variety of backgrounds hence some have small brood nests, some huge and some are uncontrollably swarmy (unless bred to reduce this) whereas there are still acceptable Amm-type stocks available in the UK and Ireland to breed from with care and a reasonable grasp of genetics.

Not looking to open up a "my bees are best" debate. Just a rambling post for thought. Off to pack up my microscopes for tomorrow .

 

[Little John]

I think it's already been covered - unpredictable British weather combined with commercial pressures results in a continuing trade in imports. When those are crossed with UK stock, nasty bees can result.

One solution would be to over-winter more UK-raised stock - but breeders don't seem to want to embrace that option. Maybe there's no financial incentive to compete with imports ?

LJ

 

[Tom Bick]

I have often wondered this and my conclusion is that they selected hives of very docile bees and beekeepers with the experience to handle them. I bet most beekeepers of the time also had the same thoughts how do they do that its not for me. After all the veil is not a new invention and plenty of illustrations or photographs of earlier and similar times show veils and gloves worn.

 

[DanBee]

This thread does rather teeter on the edge of being another AMM ranty one!

Anyway, my non-ranty perspective is as follows. We have a very mixed gene pool. Beekeepers are notoriously keen to disagree. The AMM message can be presented/interpreted as "You have the wrong bees, we have the right bees. Change your bees." Clearly that fuels disagreement, not only in what the "right" bee is if we suspect we do indeed have the "wrong" one, or in artificially isolating us from neighbours who have different bees to our own.

A much more pragmatic stance would be to say "Breed from the best bees for your environment." 'Best' includes temper, docility, health, winter survival, etc., but excludes perceived pedigree or nativeness - but importing bees is still treated as undesirable. Thus we sidestep the "you have the wrong bees" point of conflict, instead accepting that we should work from the best of what we have already. That way, there is no need to import the "right" bee in order to kick-start the process, nor is there a lengthy (and questionable) process of backtracking to the "right" bee. We simply pick the best-adapted from the local gene pool, and everyone in the area is implicitly included in the breeding programme/activity if they so wish with no barrier to entry.

 

[DanBee]

I have often wondered this and my conclusion is that they selected hives of very docile bees and beekeepers with the experience to handle them.

Indeed, Tom. Remember the 'county show' trick of moving a hive a short distance, with a dummy at the old site, thus flying off the foragers for a very docile demonstration of beekeeping from behind a six foot open-top netting? Does the audience ever get stung?

 

[DanBee]

One solution would be to over-winter more UK-raised stock

Another would be to raise from selected stock sent overseas but for some reason this has never been pursued. Surely that would give 'british' bees at import prices, timings, and availability?

 

[For want of a better word]

susbees.... describes the FACTS nicely !

IMO the foreign importers hate us Brits so much they are taking their revenge by dumping all their scrubb queens on us!

 

[Hivemaker.]

One solution would be to over-winter more UK-raised stock - but breeders don't seem to want to embrace that option.

There seems to be a move towards doing just that, and i believe it to be a good thing, and to be encouraged.

 

[alanf]

After IOW disease vastly reduced stocks around the time of WW1, bees began to be imported into the UK to increase numbers.

This is often found in the general bee books, but importing was frequent long before. I saw a Bee journal only last week (from the archive MM linked to in another thread). There were discussions in the 1870s about how one correspondent claimed his Austrian imports were yielding better than his neighbours' Italian imports. Moving queens around Europe seems to have been taken as normal soon after reliable international post was established.

This was long before bio-security was mentioned. There was a society in New Zealond in the same period to introduce European song birds because they wanted to hear blackbirds in the gardens. Seems bonkers now.

 

[Chris B]

I think the significance of imports before IOW disease was relatively small, compared to afterwards. Back in the 1800's there were skeppists all over and plenty of bees living wild to dilute the influence of imported queens. After IOW there were much greater imports against the backdrop of a much reduced native population.

 

[DanBee]

This is often found in the general bee books, but importing was frequent long before. I saw a Bee journal only last week (from the archive MM linked to in another thread). There were discussions in the 1870s about how one correspondent claimed his Austrian imports were yielding better than his neighbours' Italian imports. Moving queens around Europe seems to have been taken as normal soon after reliable international post was established.

Simmins 'Modern Honey Farm' relays a number of positive experiences with other strains and indeed crosses, and large-scale importations, since the 1870's. Not just his experiences and imports. First published in about 1880, my copy is the 1920's revision. There needs to be a large pinch of salt applied to some of his claims, since he was also a commercial supplier and the book reads like a gushing advert in a number of places, but it corroborates the journals of the time reporting widespread imports and indeed favourable crosses.

 

[alanf]

I think the significance of imports before IOW disease was relatively small, compared to afterwards. Back in the 1800's there were skeppists all over and plenty of bees living wild to dilute the influence of imported queens. After IOW there were much greater imports against the backdrop of a much reduced native population.

In terms of numbers imported perhaps. The significance in genetic terms is that before the IOW disease there were up to 30, maybe 40 generations of open mating speading mixed genes from pockets of imported stocks in much of England. If there were any traits that could provide selection pressure there was plenty of chance for them to establish. While the few letter writers to the journals were busy importing, there were probably thousands of cottage beekeepers informally breeding from their least aggressive stocks.

Point is, we start from where we are and the local genetics has been mixed for 140 years or more for most areas. None of us has much control of the the other 30,000 or so beekeepers that we have as neighbours. Selecting from what we have with a bit of local cooperation seems the most practical way forward.

 

[Chris B]

Selecting from what we have with a bit of local cooperation seems the most practical way forward.

Easier said than done though. What percentage of the local gene pool needs to be under the control of a breeding programme to get results?

 

[Into the lions den]

the imported stock, once mixed with the local, is aggressive.

From our experience of tens of thousands of crosses, this is just not true, and owes much to the writings of Beowulf Cooper, who was not a pragmatist.

I suspect queen rearing courses will be popular for the next few years.

If for the right reasons, and expectations are realistic rather than pie in the sky, thats a good thing.

Other points from the thread..........

The dates of these apparently gentle hives in the features.........post IOW so WILL be either hybrids or imports.

My only direct line back to the old black bee was Bessie Skene, an 'aunt' of mine by marriage, who kept black bees pre IOW at Ballater, from about the 1880's onwards starting as a young child with her father. I knew her as a very old lady in her 90's when I was a boy in the 60s and 70s when she died. She kept over 50 colonies. She always said the old bee was not good, swarmy, and fairly aggressive. She met a few who came to talk toher about the old bees, and her description of them was that their heads were full of romantic nonsense. Some of her descendants went on to become significant beekeepers in British Columbia.

 

[madasafish]

Let's see

BeeBase does not register all colonies as registration is voluntary.

So the chances of changing the UK gene pool significantly depend upon persuading Commercial Keepers to adopt the chosen bee. (They keep the majority of hives)

Where is the evidence they want to?

 

[Finman]

.
The British have brought their Native Black Bees to every continent first to where they moved. No continent uses those bees any more in honey production.

It is very naive to think that the bee did not sting in old good days.
Bee breeding and queen selection was very faint in those good days.

In nature the sting is the most important when bees protect their hives against robbers like other bees, birds, humans and so on.

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http://www.bibba.com/best_bee.php
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