# randy oliver article in january '17 abj



## Vance G

Mr Oliver makes the magazine worth the price. Yes better bees need developed. They are not developed by hobbyists and true belivers letting bees die from mites untreated again and again. I medicate and feed all my livestock but I still encorporate bees from resistent stock into my apiary.


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## clyderoad

The wheels have already been set in motion, concerted effort? no, but an effort none the less.
The reality of the situation as I see it is it's a whole lot more popular for all involved to continuously talk about varroa than to do something about them, a whole lot easier too. Same with resistant bees.


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## Arnie

Agreed; in principle.
The problem is two-fold.

#1. How can "The industry" stop everything and develop the resistant bee? If I were a commercial beekeeper how do I suddenly switch to all resistant bees.....which don't exist yet on that kind of scale? And who pays the bills while we work together to shift the genetics?


> We could make beekeeping so much easier if we, as an industry, worked together to shift the genetics of the North American bee population toward stocks that were able to manage varroa on their own."


 Sounds great, but the devil is in the "how"?

#2. Because of the way queens mate the task of developing the resistant bee is made Herculean. How in the world would 'we, as an industry' saturate the entire country with resistant drones to keep the genetic lines pure enough? Artificial insemination cannot be done on such a scale as of yet.

I love Randy Oliver but this is a head scratcher.


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## squarepeg

Arnie said:


> I love Randy Oliver but this is a head scratcher.


yep, can't wait to see what he comes up with in his forthcoming articles. i'm guessing he'll suggest that more of us get our hands dirty with the selection process and queen rearing.


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## HarryVanderpool

If the "mite resistant" bees that I have experience with are any indication of things to come; no thanks!
Hot tempered, swarmy and small winter clusters.

Many of us worry that queen breeders are taking so much pressure from beekeepers for mite resistance, that all of the good traits that we have developed in apiculture for hundreds of years could get swept away.

For now, I am going to continue to graft from the best hives in our outfit and focus on gentile, productive hives that keep the lights on. 
My opinion is a little different than Randy's.
I think that our main problem with varroa is that WE DON'T KNOW WHAT WE ARE DOING!

The answer to varroa control is around the corner, out of sight, and has not come into view just yet.
And when it does, we will look back at all of our flailing and floundering and just shake our heads.

Will all of the good genetics we need in our bees, all be bred out by then?
We need to weigh things a little more carefully, in my opinion.


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## Honey-4-All

Two items come to mind? Both issued with a note of scepticism mIght I add based on our own attempts at Varroa reduction through breeding. .

1. What quantifiable provable progress has he made in this regards with his own operation if it is actually feasible? 

2. If possible what honest glimmers of hope have we even seen on the scene the past 30 years? Anywhere in the world that is.


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## Arnie

squarepeg said:


> yep, can't wait to see what he comes up with in his forthcoming articles. i'm guessing he'll suggest that more of us get our hands dirty with the selection process and queen rearing.


I'm all on board with that. But I think it will be a long process. 
We tried treatment free here with absolute failure. As soon as the second generation queens go out to mate, there goes the resistance. I don't have the stomach for constant colony death.


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## JSL

Arnie said:


> I don't have the stomach for constant colony death.


These are the exact words I have thought many times. Beekeepers do not have the stomachs for the down and dirty efforts required for actual breeding efforts. It is not pretty and as Harry wrote, production traits need to be balanced against "improvements".


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## loggermike

When SMR came out , I bought breeder queens and brought that into my outfit. When Russians were released I bought breeder queens and brought that into my outfit. I bought Minnesota Hygienics breeders, Purvis queens , and others. Guess what? I am no closer to good mite resistant bees than when I started.
Too much hype and fairy tales in this business.


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## Adrian Quiney WI

I believe the answer lies in a different approach for hobbyists and small sideliners like myself. We are not under the same fiscal pressures as commercial beekeepers, and do not need to have a constant return on investment. 

I have found that by making replacement splits under the Disselkoen method, and raising them in 5 over 5 frame nucs following Michael Palmers principles (as best as I can) has enabled me to replace winter losses with my own stock without resort to chemical treatments. I didn't know that these methods are a subset of *Biotechnical control*. A term which "is now often used to describe non-chemical mite control methods. There are a number of beekeeping management practices that are likely to affect mite populations, but biotechnical control can probably best be defined as beekeeping management techniques specifically designed to reduce mite levels in a colony." If you are interested in Biotechnical mite control strategies there is more to be read in this excellent old pdf from New Zealand. 
http://www.biosecurity.govt.nz/files/pests/varroa/control-of-varroa-guide.pdf Drone brood removal is another type of Biotechnical control.

If, or when, the next badass invasive mite gets here - *Tropilaelaps clareae* - there will be a lot of interest in biotechnical control as Vietnamese beekeepers deal with both Varroa and Tropolaelaps by using biotechnical methods - see 12.6 of the resource for how they do it.
The constant monitoring and treating that scientists and the commercial industry recommends sucks the fun out of beekeeping for hobbyists and does not fit in with their views of "organic/natural/locally grown food" - who wants to run an ICU in their backyard to produce honey? I don't.

I would like to see ABJ and Bee Culture devote more print to biotechnical methods and hope that Randy investigates them. In the meantime I will continue to work on refining Biotechnical methods that work here in Wisconsin and keep incorporating stock that has resistance as I find it or buy it.


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## beepro

"splits under the Disselkoen method, and raising them in 5 over 5 frame nucs following Michael Palmers principles (as best as I can)....I would like to see ABJ and Bee Culture devote more print to biotechnical methods and hope that Randy investigates them....beekeeping management techniques specifically designed to reduce mite levels in a colony."
Like you I have been following Mel's and Mike's method. Then add one of my own now. Removing mite infested cap brood frames into another colony is a way of Biotechnical control. Do it early enough before the Spring build up is on. Taking advantage of the long live winter bees will give you more time to reduced the mite level doing it a few time. It is all down to the timing!


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## HarryVanderpool

And now I read in the Alberta Bee News, an article from Aarhus University's Science Daily that claims that Deformed wing virus can be transferred to queens from infected drones during mating. 
Did you know that?

"The results showed that queens that had mated with drones infected with deformed wing virus also often became infected with the disease. Virus was found in both the sexual organs and other body parts of the queens."

We are attempting to solve a problem that we poorly understand. 
Usually, the first step in problem solving is clearly understanding the problem.

WE DO NOT KNOW WHAT WE ARE TALKING ABOUT!!

Although I probably do not know anything more than you, here is my prediction:

The final solution to varroa will have nothing at all to do with our queens or genetics.
It will probably have nothing to do with bees.

The solution will come from better understanding mites and their natural enemies and predators. 
At this point we are shooting in the dark without a clue.

Let's start thinking out of the box and start turning on our brains.
We can do it!!


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## texanbelchers

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2016/10/161004104622.htm

I was wondering how they tested and it appears they used open mating. I'm not sure how they implemented the control; it seems that it would be difficult.


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## beepro

I have on many occasion! Attack the problem from multiple angles like oav and oacs, took out the cap brood
frames, cut the mites in half with a small sharp razor. Been thinking about applying the grind up oa powder to
a fine dust for dusting the bees. Or sprinkle the fine dust on the glycerine strips to put inside the brood nest all
winter long. Once I decided to go treatment again then the oacs making machine will be turn on again. In the mean
time my mite level is manageable. Let's see how they do on the early Spring build up.


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## Eduardo Gomes

Adrian Quiney WI said:


> If you are interested in Biotechnical mite control strategies there is more to be read in this excellent old pdf from New Zealand.
> http://www.biosecurity.govt.nz/files/pests/varroa/control-of-varroa-guide.pdf


One of the best guides I've found so far. Thank you very much!


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## wildbranch2007

texanbelchers said:


> https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2016/10/161004104622.htm
> 
> I was wondering how they tested and it appears they used open mating. I'm not sure how they implemented the control; it seems that it would be difficult.





> When a queen has sex with many different partners, it can increase her risk of infection with venereal disease. It can also lead to the collapse of her colony. This might read like ingredients for a juicy novel, but for bees it is reality.


sure and that must be why they pulled all the antibiotics effective Jan 1, 2017:lpf:


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## WesternWilson

I am with Harry, I think the answer we need will be found via Varroa research. Dr. Cameron Jack in Florida has finally come up with some methods for culturing Varroa in the lab...the lack of this technique has so far made it very hard to study these little pests. Now we can start moving forward, and should see some research money flowing into Varroa research rather than bee genome research.

There is nothing wrong with the bee genome, but I don't think it lends itself to tinkering such that it can ever become Varroa proof. And proof it must be as even small Varroa loads bring big impacts. There is some promise that we can at least make sure the Varroa we host are carrying benign viruses, but that is a daunting challenge as well, infected all Varroa world-wide with benign viral loads.

Bee mating and gene transfer is one big obstacle, and the relative rapidity with which Varroa can evolve in response to selective pressure is the other. The third obstacle is that we have to believe we can actually get rid of Varroa if we put our minds to it. We seem to be able to extinguish species effectively, by accident. Let's make Varroa the first one we eradicate by design.


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## Davers

Thinking Star Wars technology, a device that uses some type of wave link that would kill only the varrora mite off the bee as it enters the hive. It would replace the entrance reducer that we use today. This way all bee keepers would use it and not lose any income or bees to varroa. Probably wishful thinking.


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## clyderoad

Re varroa research: below is a copy of a letter I sent to my colleagues at the ESHPA in NY outlining a talk I attended by Samuel Ramsey in Nov '16. He and the vanEngelsdorp lab seem to be on the right track: 


I attended the monthly meeting of the LI Bee Club this weekend. The guest speaker was Samuel Ramsey a entomologist in vanEngelsdorp's lab at the U of Maryland.
The topic was Varroa destructor.
Maybe you will find his research interesting:

Samuel Ramsey, entomologist U of Maryland vanEngelsdorp lab.

Varroa destructor current research.


> Nearly all feral bees wiped out by varroa

> VM feed on something more than hemolymph. Mite frass is 95% amino acids with very little water content. Less amino acids and more water content would be expected with hemolymph feeding. Further, the ratio of egg size to mother mite size appears to be one of the largest known, and eggs are laid every 30 hrs. Nutrition from something other than hemolymph is required to explain these points.

>VM are observed feeding on the abdomen of bees, contrary to many photos showing them located on the thorax.

>Biostains were used to determine the source of the VM food. Hemolymph and the Fat Body of the bee were stained different colors by feeding live bees in the lab. Lab raised live VM were introduced to the bees, observed feeding on the bees, removed and dissected. The VM had 80% more Fat Body stain color than hemolymph stain color.

>Fat Body tissue found in the abdomen of the honey bee is responsible for growth and development, metamorphosis, nutrient storage, mobilization, metabolic activity, water loss and osmoregulation, temperature regulation, protein synthesis, vitellogenisis and immune function of the bee. Depleted or damaged Fat Body severely effects the function of the tissue and ultimately the health of the bee.

>Vitellogen consumed by the VM when feeding on the Fat Body of the honey bee is utilized directly by the VM for reproductive egg formation without alteration.


There are potential practical applications of this research by creating a miticide delivery mechanism via vitellogen. Monsanto has shown keen interest in this soon to be published research and has contacted the lab regarding the research.


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## johno

I guess Harry has hit the nail square on the head, We are running around like a chicken with its head cut off. We have no idea what we are trying to achieve. Varoa resistant queens are in the eye of the beholder, or should I say in the words of the seller. In the first place are varoa killing our bees last time I looked it was viruses doing the killing so somehow our bees need to be immunized against the viruses responsible, that I think needs to be the thrust of the research dollars. Until that time comes I have to keep my bees alive any which way I can, and that would still mean varoa counts and treatment where required. If by some obscure chance I find a colony consistently without mites you will all hear me screaming Eureka, but don't hold your breath.
Johno


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## lharder

I think there is a clear direction to go but beekeepers aren't willing go there. They have created system instability, the factors that have created it (mostly interregional bee movement, remember that is how varroa got here) are well known but nobody is willing to address it. With bees mixing from all over, the adaptive environment is too dynamic and one would expect failure. Treatment only delays the inevitable failure. That is what instable systems do. 

The beekeeping industry is like the coach potato patient that doesn't exercise, eats junk food washed down with pop, has erratic sleep habits, then expects the medical community to prop up an unhealthy lifestyle. It isn't going to work in the long run. Expect a shortened life span.

There is opportunity for the bee keeping community to create a more stable adaptive environment at the edges, become more regionally self sufficient in bees, and regulate and eventually eliminate migratory movement. The farming community, the types and sequence of crops will also have to be modified. This would create a more diverse landscape, a good thing in my opinion and would improve bee health.


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## squarepeg

johno said:


> If by some obscure chance I find a colony consistently without mites you will all hear me screaming Eureka, but don't hold your breath.


there's a decent chance that if you look you will find some colonies that do much better than others with respect to controlling mites. 

if those colonies happen to also be productive and have acceptable temperament, and after screaming eureka, why not make as many queens from them as you have time to make and drop a drone frame or two in those hives?

i believe from what i have seen in previous comments by randy, that this will be the thrust of how he would like to see more of us getting involved. i doubt it will mean abandoning treatments to start with, but rather moving the ball forward with respect to mite resistance.

in the same way that beekeeper selection for productivity and gentleness has been successful in the past, it's looking like it the same can be accomplished for mite resistance. fortunately there are enough examples that demonstrate productivity and gentleness don't have to be sacrificed for mite resistance.

there is strength in numbers, and compared to just a lab or two plus a commercial breeder here and there, if many more of us could get busy looking for the best of our best and propagate from them it's reasonable that doing so would bode better for our futures.

i don't mean this in a judgemental way but our current practices are somewhat responsible for the state of affairs we find ourselves in with respect to varroa. i don't see anything wrong with randy or anyone else asking us to roll up our sleeves, step away from the easier path which may not be sustainable anyway, and do what we can as individuals to improve the quality of our stock.


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## Richard Cryberg

johno said:


> I guess Harry has hit the nail square on the head, We are running around like a chicken with its head cut off. We have no idea what we are trying to achieve. Varoa resistant queens are in the eye of the beholder, or should I say in the words of the seller. In the first place are varoa killing our bees last time I looked it was viruses doing the killing so somehow our bees need to be immunized against the viruses responsible, that I think needs to be the thrust of the research dollars. Until that time comes I have to keep my bees alive any which way I can, and that would still mean varoa counts and treatment where required. If by some obscure chance I find a colony consistently without mites you will all hear me screaming Eureka, but don't hold your breath.
> Johno


This is an excellent summation. I happen to think that the solution will ultimately be at least in large part genetic. Back yard TF bee keepers will contribute absolutely nothing at all to this ultimate solution, nor will commercial queen breeders. The solution will come out of labs doing DNA sequencing stuff, not breeding operations. The genetic solution may well not even be the genetics of honey bees. There are lots of reasonable options. This solution is likely at least 25 years off, if not more, as the cost of doing sequencing stuff needs to drop far enough that a very minor industry like bee keeping can afford to do the needed work.

It is easy enough to keep honey bees treatment free today. All you need to do is make up your mind you can live without enough bees in the box to get pollination jobs or make a honey harvest. I tried that and was not impressed. My hive winter deaths were only about 30% the years I was doing the TF stuff. That is easy to live with. But, I sure do prefer under 10% winter hive deaths and hives six boxes tall stuffed with bees right up to the lid.


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## Eduardo Gomes

Stimulating conversation. In these days these two ways advance independently.

One route seeks to make bees more resilient. The other route seeks to find ways to modify the genetics of varroas to turn the war in favor of the bees.

My view is that it is better to have both ways and not just one because none of them have so far proven anything of importance on a global scale.


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## clyderoad

squarepeg speaks as if no one is working with their bees to select those that may have some promise in handling mites and related problems. This is not the case. Many beekeepers are selecting from their best bees, big shops and small ones alike.
It does not appear that these efforts will result in a mite resistant bee any time soon and looks to be a very different challenge than selecting for gentleness or productivity.


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## beemandan

squarepeg said:


> i don't mean this in a judgemental way but our current practices are somewhat responsible for the state of affairs we find ourselves in with respect to varroa.


I'm less certain of this. The presumption is that there are existing genetics that will somehow overcome varroa. I haven't seen evidence of this. There are those, such as yourself, who have had success but those successes haven't been exportable to the larger population of beekeepers. We don't actually know the reasons for you success.
The professional beekeeping community and entomologists have been searching for the right mix for decades and have yet to find it. 
I think that we've selected the best group of traits from the existing pool...and this is as good as our bees are going to be with regard to varroa.

At the end of the day....it is only our opinions. Neither of us...or actually none of us have 'the facts'. But....it will be interesting to see what Randy Oliver's opinion might be.


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## Nordak

beemandan said:


> The presumption is that there are existing genetics that will somehow overcome varroa.


The genetic aspect of the equation has been proven in isolated/semi-isolated environments. The question involves whether we can find genetics that can stand up to an industry that is trying to keep bees in ways that doesn't allow for these types of adaptive measures to take hold. Lharder touched on a lot of the problems with the idea that genetics alone can overcome what ails the industry. I don't think there is a bee that can fix that. Though it's been said many times that the backyard beek (meaning non-commercial) can not select for and propagate a line of mite resistant bees, it sure seems they are having greater success at it. My guess, and my own (albeit limited) experience, tells me there are a lot more mite resistant bees removed from the industry than part of it. All beekeeping is local. My guess? Most "resistance" is local. I don't think most folks (myself included) are lying about having resistant bees, I think most (myself included) are probably unaware of exactly how closely related these mite/bee/viral/environment issues are tied in with our success, and how when removed from these areas to less stable environments, these bees often don't live up to expectation.


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## msl

beemandan said:


> I'm less certain of this. The presumption is that there are existing genetics that will somehow overcome varroa. I haven't seen evidence of this. There are those, such as yourself, who have had success but those successes haven't been exportable to the larger population of beekeepers. .


The genticits are out there, plenty of keepers and ferals say its out there no if they come in a package we want at the moment is the question.. lower yealds, slower build up, agresiveness.... there is likly a traide off We have been selection for lot of traites, some may not be the best for the bees.. maby calm bees fight mites worce, maby bees they bring in huge crops spend more time foraging and less grooming
As an example aside form being "hot" and not so cold tolerant, AHB deal with mites just fine, pull more pollen to suply there faster brood up and can be split 3x more a year and are more productive..... but that hot bit....lol

That being said I don't see ANY sort of industrial agriculture going TF... be it bees, chickens or cows... it realy easy to keep a 1/2 dozen chickens in the yard TF.... a 30k bird commercial chicken house is a far different situation


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## WesternWilson

News of this research came to me from a gardening friend...she often sends me nice fresh bee news! That said, while it is gob-smacking that Varroa feed on vitellogenin/bee fat, we are still back to the challenge of killing a bug on a bug. How to make the vitellogenin toxic without also killing the bee will be a delicate dance. I am hoping the masses of brainpower brought to bear on this new finding will turn up a key to ridding ourselves of Varroa.

Meanwhile, this really points up the fact that even light loads of Varroa have profound impacts on bees.


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## Nordak

WesternWilson said:


> Meanwhile, this really points up the fact that even light loads of Varroa have profound impacts on bees.


With all due respect, I'd say this really points up the fact even light loads of Varroa have profound impacts on _some_ bees. Going into winter with 10 hives and 2 nucs, all with light loads (heavy by some accounts) of varroa, and I guarantee you I'll have to be watching them closely for swarm cells come March. I don't know what profound means, but to me it isn't having a profound impact on my bees.


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## HarryVanderpool

The best example of how totally lost we are is our methods of assessing mite loads in a hive.
We go to a hive, scoop up an estimated amount of bees, remove the mites and declare a proportional amount for the hive.

What? Did we all flunk 7th grade math?!!

We are using AN INCOMPLETE EQUATION!
Mite load assessment requires AT LEAST a two part equation.

If I ask you, "How long is a string?" you cannot give an accurate answer because I have asked you to solve an incomplete equation.

The alcohol, or powdered sugar test is PART of the equation, the hive population and square inches of brood in the hive are the other half.

Every year about 20,000 hives go to the desert here in Oregon to pollinate hybrid seed crops and every year I hear the same words from the beekeepers bringing the bees back home, "The mite populations really spiked!!!"
Every year they say that.
But the mite populations in their hives DID NOT spike. In fact, their mite loads are on the decrease when they say that. 
Why? Because the hives are almost completely broodless when coming out of the desert.
The beekeepers know that, but there they are with the pint jar and the bottle of alcohol looking at only one half of the equation.
Is it any surprise to anyone that a large population in a hive that has gone broodless will have a higher phoretic load??

We need to wake up!


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## beemandan

msl said:


> The genticits are out there, plenty of keepers and ferals say its out there


I believe that those keepers believe it....yet to my knowledge hasn't been successfully translated into the general population. Nor do those keepers know what makes those bees survive when others fail.


Nordak said:


> The genetic aspect of the equation has been proven in isolated/semi-isolated environments..... I think most (myself included) are probably unaware of exactly how closely related these mite/bee/viral/environment issues are tied in with our success, and how when removed from these areas to less stable environments, these bees often don't live up to expectation.


This is the issue, in my opinion. Nordak says that it has been 'proven'. And then goes on to state that he doesn't understand the relationship between his 'success' and all of the various outside influences are tied to his success.

My point....most 'successful' treatment free beekeepers that I've read reporting here and other places don't have any objective scientific understanding for their success. To claim that the genetic aspect has been proven by anecdote, yet watching those bees fail in another environment hardly qualifies as proof. 

Once again...our opinions differ. In my opinion, it is essential that we understand what qualifies as proof and seek to understand the difference between proof and opinion. 

We can go around and around. You won't change my opinion without some objective science...and I won't change yours. My main point is that not everyone agrees on the 'facts'.


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## beemandan

HarryVanderpool said:


> What? Did we all flunk 7th grade math?!!
> 
> The alcohol, or powdered sugar test is PART of the equation, the hive population and square inches of brood in the hive are the other half.


I disagree with this. An alcohol wash, properly done, will determine the percentage of nurse bees carrying varroa. The higher the percentage the more serious the infestation....regardless of the population of the hive or square inches of brood. 

Now...a mite drop test onto a sticky sheet is another matter. If there are 30 mites dropped in 48 hours and.....the population of the hive is 1000 then the infestation is 50 times higher than if the population was 50,000 for the same drop. With a mite drop test you must have some additional data beyond the number dropped.


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## Nordak

beemandan said:


> This is the issue, in my opinion. Nordak says that it has been 'proven'....
> To claim that the genetic aspect has been proven by anecdote.


I'm not going to bother you with studies. You've seen them before. If that isn't proof, I can't make you see something you don't want to. By self admission, my own experience regarding resistance is anecdotal. Something is happening to keep mite levels from absolutely booming in the hives. This much is clear to me. How it is happening, what factors are involved...even the most brilliant of minds involved in the discussion so far haven't sorted it. I think perhaps they are getting closer.

My post probably more closely resembles your thoughts on the matter than you'd care to admit. We are in agreement that I don't believe there is a resistant bee for the commercial industry that will magically change things.


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## beemandan

Nordak said:


> My post probably more closely resembles your thoughts on the matter than you'd care to admit. We are in agreement that I don't believe there is a resistant bee for the commercial industry that will magically change things.


I'm not sure why you would choose to word it this way. 
There is a thought process among some that varroa resistance will appear much like tracheal mite resistance did. In that case...resistant stock became the norm in short order. There, evidently was some genetic resistance to tracheal mites already in the gene pool. After decades of research and selection no such resistance has appeared for varroa. Which causes me to doubt if such resistance exists in the present gene pool. 
And none of the treatment free 'studies' I've read indicated that those bees could be placed into the general beekeeping world and demonstrate the same success. 
Not looking for an argument, I am only saying that I don't think our present methods of beekeeping are 'responsible for this state of affairs'. 
And as I've said.....this is just my opinion. It's ok if we don't agree. In fact, it is normal.


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## Nordak

beemandan said:


> I'm not sure why you would choose to word it this way.
> There is a thought process among some that varroa resistance will appear much like tracheal mite resistance did. In that case...resistant stock became the norm in short order. There, evidently was some genetic resistance to tracheal mites already in the gene pool. After decades of research and selection no such resistance has appeared for varroa. Which causes me to doubt if such resistance exists in the present gene pool.
> And none of the treatment free 'studies' I've read indicated that those bees could be placed into the general beekeeping world and demonstrate the same success.
> Not looking for an argument, I am only saying that I don't think our present methods of beekeeping are 'responsible for this state of affairs'.
> And as I've said.....this is just my opinion. It's ok if we don't agree. In fact, it is normal.


Reistance has kind of become a "catch-all" term meaning toward varroa and related viruses. Then there is tolerance, another gray term. VSH, Mite biting. Those are physical resistant traits. Both well documented. I don't want an argument either, but I don't understand how you can deny the fact some bees have shown, by scientific documentation, resistant level traits.


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## HarryVanderpool

beemandan said:


> I disagree with this. An alcohol wash, properly done, will determine the percentage of nurse bees carrying varroa. The higher the percentage the more serious the infestation....regardless of the population of the hive or square inches of brood.


Dan, if you tested a hive of 40,000 bees that had gone broodless and then tested a hive of 40,000 bees with wall to wall brood, and lets say the mite numbers were exactly the same in both hives, you believe the test would render the same numbers for both hives? Is that your position?
In one hive over 80% of the mites are in the brood and you will get a proportion of bees to the 20% phoretic load.
In the broodless hive 100% of the mites are in the phoretic stage and will be counted.
You don't see any measurement error between the two hives if the other factors are ignored?


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## beemandan

HarryVanderpool said:


> You don't see any measurement error between the two hives if the other factors are ignored?


You were referring to commercial, migratory beekeepers...right? If they know enough to take a proper wash but don't have enough sense to evaluate the hives...it is a total misapplication of the data.
If they go into the brood nest looking for nurse bees and don't find any brood....how can they get any nurse bees? 
This, in my opinion has nothing to do with math.


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## beemandan

Nordak said:


> I don't understand how you can deny the fact some bees have shown, by scientific documentation, resistant level traits.


This isn't what I said at all.




beemandan said:


> The professional beekeeping community and entomologists have been searching for the right mix for decades and have yet to find it.
> I think that we've selected the best group of traits from the existing pool...and this is as good as our bees are going to be with regard to varroa.


In essence, what I said is that from decades of research and selection professionals have identified the traits you listed...and probably others but...I think this is as far as we are going with bee selection. 

And...to my experience and in my opinion...each of these has probably reduced infestation levels to a degree...but none...not any that I am aware of will survive long term without some sort of varroa intervention.

At the risk of repeating myself....in my opinion none of this points to our present methods of beekeeping being 'responsible for this state of affairs'.


----------



## Nordak

beemandan said:


> This isn't what I said at all.


No you didn't say that. Apologies. 






> not any that I am aware of will survive long term without some sort of varroa intervention.


Fair enough, we are all products of our experiences.



> At the risk of repeating myself....in my opinion none of this points to our present methods of beekeeping being 'responsible for this state of affairs'.


Commercial beekeepers should not be bearing the brunt of the blame for failure. In my opinion, the model for which beekeeping methods are applied in the agricultural industry has more to do with it.


----------



## beemandan

Sometime in the late 1980s some **** fool beekeeper snuck a queen or so past customs from a place that had varroa and brought the parasite with them. Whoever that was...commercial or hobbyist....that is who I blame for the mess.


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## Nordak

beemandan said:


> Sometime in the late 1980s some **** fool beekeeper snuck a queen or so past customs from a place that had varroa and brought the parasite with them. Whoever that was...commercial or hobbyist....that is who I blame for the mess.


Lol. Can't argue with that.


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## Dave Burrup

beemandan said:


> Sometime in the late 1980s some **** fool beekeeper snuck a queen or so past customs from a place that had varroa and brought the parasite with them. Whoever that was...commercial or hobbyist....that is who I blame for the mess.


I have cursed the same scenario many times, but it could have been a swarm on a ship or in a container on that ship.


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## Dan the bee guy

Dave Burrup said:


> I have cursed the same scenario many times, but it could have been a swarm on a ship or in a container on that ship.


:thumbsup: all because we want cheep stuff


----------



## johno

Don't forget the load of cut flowers from Europe somewhere where a veroa mite was found on a flower, how many have come in this way and not been seen. So it is not a question of how they got here but what we are doing now that they are here. Yes we all know that we should be breeding from those that have minimum mites but in 30 odd years we have not progressed very far. Those who claim that their bees survive treatment free do not know why they are surviving so that does not help at all. so until we can answer some of these mysteries we are still stuck up the creek without a paddle. It is no good telling stories about these bees survived for so long in some area without facts and figures and the data has to hold true to any area those bees are taken to. This is a world wide problem so a few hives possibly surviving in backwoods Alabama does not help unless we can ascertain why and document such a claim with scientific evidence.
Johno


----------



## Nordak

johno said:


> This is a world wide problem so a few hives possibly surviving in backwoods Alabama does not help unless we can ascertain why and document such a claim with scientific evidence.
> Johno


When you use terms like "possibly" and "claim" it severely devalues your statement in my opinion. Why would one assume that someone is being less than honest about their experience? What do they have to gain? Your example is pretty regionally specific. Hopefully it wasn't intended in the manner it came across. I for one appreciate all of the information members hand me, regardless of their feelings on the matters of how to control varroa. Information can be gleaned often from the least likely of sources. Try to keep an open mind. You'll be amazed at what might be possible.


----------



## squarepeg

squarepeg said:


> i don't mean this in a judgemental way but our current practices are somewhat responsible for the state of affairs we find ourselves in with respect to varroa.


dan, i must admit that my exposure to the universe of beekeeping is pretty limited from what i see happening around here along with what i can glean from reading internet forums, so i may not have it all right. by nonjudgemental i meant to not impune the motives or skills of any beekeepers per se, but rather the nature of the business which drives the practices which of course is driven by economics, and economics is not a bad word as far as i'm concerned.

the practices that i was thinking about when i wrote that have to do for example locating hives by the hundreds and thousands in holding yards where they are prepped for pollination. again nothing wrong with that or those that are doing that, but there's no way around the problem of horizontal transmission of diseases and pests which in turn promotes higher virulence.

clyde, again i can only speak to what i have first hand knowledge of with respect to what beekeepers are doing in my neck of the woods. we have roughly 50 members in our county organization, and there is only one other member other than myself who is rearing queens.

all of the rest of the beekeepers in the club are purchasing commercially produced packages and queens, all of which are produced by out of state 'puppy mills' and then shipped in here to get distributed by one or two retail suppliers.

i could be wrong but my sense is that beekeepers who are actually selecting from the best of their stock and rearing their own queens represent the minority. am i wrong for assuming that most folks find it easier and cost effective to buy commercially produced bees?

i believe this is where randy is coming from, and it appears what he is up against isn't so much that progress can't be made with respect to breeding more mite resistant bees as it is that for most beekeepers it's just a whole lot easier to kill the mites and not worry about it.


----------



## jim lyon

squarepeg said:


> i could be wrong but my sense is that beekeepers who are actually selecting from the best of their stock and rearing their own queens represent the minority. am i wrong for assuming that most folks find it easier and cost effective to buy commercially produced bees?


I dont have any data on this other than to say there are many, many different business models among commercial operations. For some the requeening/rebuilding phase is squeezed in between pollination or honey production gigs. For others the nucing phase of their operation might be done very early in the calendar year when there are only a few options for mated queens. For those who are just doing an almond pollination followed by a northern honey flow there is barely enough time for a queen rearing operation.


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## clyderoad

Nordak said:


> When you use terms like "possibly" and "claim" it severely devalues your statement in my opinion. Why would one assume that someone is being less than honest about their experience? What do they have to gain? Your example is pretty regionally specific. Hopefully it wasn't intended in the manner it came across. I for one appreciate all of the information members hand me, regardless of their feelings on the matters of how to control varroa. Information can be gleaned often from the least likely of sources. Try to keep an open mind. You'll be amazed at what might be possible.


Honey bee tales have been told for a long long time. Honey production, methods, the wonder queen bee, it goes on and on. 
Ask the old guys, they'll have quite a story to tell you.
To be suspect in this arena is healthy not a handicap. This isn't a thing of the past either, it happens every day even now, maybe more so now than in the past.
What do they have to gain? who knows. Could be as simple as ego or money.

Johno makes a lot of sense, in my opinion.


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## squarepeg

understood jim and i appreciate your reply. in a perfect world every beekeeper would be a brother adam and have the motivation and opportunity to breed the perfect bee. in the real world and for a myriad of reasons including those you just shared that can't happen.

the one other beekeeper in our club i mentioned who is rearing queens is also one of the handful who is having success with treatment free here, and he just so happens to be the 2017 president elect of our club. i've shied away from getting involved with the organization due to my squarepeg nature and such...

but i've been talking with him about seeing how the membership would feel about doing something county wide with respect to moving everyone to resistant stock. we believe it's pretty doable here given that a number of us are already having success.

it's not much, but perhaps a start.


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## HarryVanderpool

We, beekeepers, bee researchers, and scientists all have a bucket over our heads at this time in regards to varroa.
No matter which way we turn our heads, all we can read is the same old writing on the inside of the bucket.
Nothing good is going to happen until we pull our head's out and start thinking outside of the bucket (box).

Please start a new thread the next time you hear of something new, exciting, and unexpected in regards to varroa control.
Otherwise, we are all stuck in the same mud like we have been for years. Hashing and rehashing the same dribble about obsessions over incomplete mite count results and treatments.

Sorry to sound like Debbie Downer, but that is my summation of our current situation.
Just my opinion.


----------



## Nordak

clyderoad said:


> Honey bee tales have been told for a long long time. Honey production, methods, the wonder queen bee, it goes on and on.
> Ask the old guys, they'll have quite a story to tell you.
> To be suspect in this arena is healthy not a handicap. This isn't a thing of the past either, it happens every day even now, maybe more so now than in the past.
> What do they have to gain? who knows. Could be as simple as ego or money.
> 
> Johno makes a lot of sense, in my opinion.


I agree that a certain amount of skepticism is healthy. Again, we are all products of our collective experiences. Seeing is believing and all that. Most of the successful TF guys I've talked to aren't claiming they have super bees that are 3 deeps brood under 8 supers. I can't do that with my bees. I can keep them treatment free, though, and I'm not trying to pull anyone's leg. I'm sure most folks wouldn't be happy with my bees in a commercial setting. They probably wouldn't do well for numerous reasons, namely honey production. I get some honey off of them on occasion, but nowhere near what someone looking to make a living from them would be happy with. Me, I love my bees. They compliment my style of beekeeping. That's the truth.


----------



## clyderoad

Nordak said:


> I agree that a certain amount of skepticism is healthy. Again, we are all products of our collective experiences. Seeing is believing and all that. Most of the successful TF guys I've talked to aren't claiming they have super bees that are 3 deeps brood under 8 supers. I can't do that with my bees. I can keep them treatment free, though, and I'm not trying to pull anyone's leg. I'm sure most folks wouldn't be happy with my bees in a commercial setting. They probably wouldn't do well for numerous reasons, namely honey production. I get some honey off of them on occasion, but nowhere near what someone looking to make a living from them would be happy with. Me, I love my bees. They compliment my style of beekeeping. That's the truth.


what I am suggesting is learning from the experiences of others as well, no need to see it for yourself every time.
in the end I guess it's each to their own.


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## squarepeg

HarryVanderpool said:


> Otherwise, we are all stuck in the same mud like we have been for years.


almost 30 years to be exact harry. i've no idea what randy will be proposing to get us unstuck, but i think it's the exactly the sentiment you just expressed that has him thinking seriously about it.

by the way, i appreciated your comments with respect to interpreting mite counts in light of how much capped brood is present. perhaps this is one of the reasons for why we see so much variability in terms of infestation rates and their impacts or lack thereof getting reported.


----------



## Nordak

clyderoad said:


> what I am suggesting is learning from the experiences of others as well, no need to see it for yourself every time.
> in the end I guess it's each to their own.


:thumbsup:


----------



## Fusion_power

Wow, the diversity of thoughts in this thread! I barely know where to start.

I agree with Randy Oliver. We can breed varroa resistant bees and we can do it today. We don't have to wait for Harry V's pie in the sky it hasn't been invented yet solution. BWeaver did it. Any queen breeder dedicated enough can do it. Any beekeeper dedicated enough can do it.

Beemandan, Harry is correct. Knowing the percentage of phoretic mites is not the same thing as knowing the colony mite load. When you measure the phoretic mite load, you only measured one bucket. The other bucket is the sealed brood in the hive.

What about the pie in the sky solution? What if we could use genetic engineering to program varroa mites into extinction? There is a very good chance this could be done and high potential it will be feasible within the next 10 years. We very much should be investigating this possibility and others that are similar.

Does it make sense to throw away all the breeding progress that has been made over the last 100 or more years? Absolutely NOT! We need the genetics to produce bees for pollination in February, bees to make honey after 9 weeks of spring buildup, and bees that don't make a honey crop until fall. All have a place in the genetics we need. There is no perfect bee, just a bee better adapted to local conditions.

What can we as beekeepers do? Start by measuring the varroa load in your colonies prior to any treatment and flag any low count colonies for separation and evaluation. In just 3 generations we can start to see bees that need less treatment because they do a better job controlling varroa.

What about those of us who already have highly resistant colonies? We need the opposite! Bring in production genetics and start breeding a more productive bee that incorporates varroa resistance. This is what I am doing by bringing in Buckfast queens from Ferguson.

Can we get entire areas onto treatment free beekeeping as mentioned by SquarePeg? We certainly can do that, but only if the beekeepers involved have the commitment and are willing to make the changes required in their operations. North Alabama is an excellent candidate to do so given that we have a relatively large population of ******* hick stubborn beekeepers (good folks who don't listen to Harry) who are already treatment free. What we need most is more breeders producing queens that have proven mite resistance. We have a huge gap because there are maybe a dozen treatment free queen suppliers in the country. Yes, I know we can argue over the number, but, Bweaver, Carpenter, Comfort, VP, BrokeT and a few others are totally overwhelmed by the several hundred queen breeders still producing susceptible queens.


Here are some steps I see to get from where we are to where we want to be:

1. Devise reliable methods to determine mite load per colony.
2. Set up specialized queen breeders whose sole purpose is to collect colonies with low loads and do further evaluation to prove if the resistance is genetic and repeatable.
3. Establish queen mating locations where susceptible stock can be reliably mated to drones carrying resistance traits.
4. Get more queen producers on the wagon to produce resistant stock and by that I mean ONLY resistant stock.
5. Motivate beekeepers, it is time to stop talking and do something about the problem.... otherwise, we ARE the problem.
6. Recognize that livelihoods are at stake. We need enough commercial beekeepers to make the transition to prove that varroa can be brought to bay without losing your house along with your pet donkey.
7. Get "puppy mill" queen breeders to start breeding wolf puppies that chew mites.
8. Recognize just how serious a problem horizontal transfer of mites is in the beekeeping world. The best mite resistance I have can still be overwhelmed if there is enough horizontal transfer. We have to get entire operations and entire regions to resistant genetics for this to work for all of us.
9. Work with the Harry Vanderpool and Beemandan beekeepers and others who are convinced it can't be done. We have to be able to prove that resistance is not a pie in the sky. It is real and it works.

Read my tagline.


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## beepro

I like your idea of thinking outside the bee hive box.
Since beekeeping is local after all, it is hard to do it without
forming an official Bee Source sub-club with elected officers, treasurer and all. Then we can involve everybody here to chip in to get the proven good resistant stocks to propagate our local apiary. Club members can also exchange bee materials and information as well as any support necessary to get their apiary set up. We can buy bee equipment in bulks too. This reminds me of the elementary baked sales to raise money for the Great America field trip at the end of the year for the whole school.


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## HarryVanderpool

Fusion_power said:


> 9. Work with the Harry Vanderpool and Beemandan beekeepers and others who are convinced it can't be done.


Fusion Power, thank you for your kind words along the way and your extremely thoughtful posts.

However, "It can't be done" is a phrase that has never, and will never leave my lips. 
I despise that phrase and have never uttered it here or elsewhere.


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## Juhani Lunden

squarepeg said:


> i"I feel that the time has come to present the argument that we should finally *get serious about dealing with varroa*. For thirty years we’ve been managing The Varroa Problem with flyswatters and Band-Aids. We could make beekeeping so much easier if we, as an industry, worked together to shift the genetics of the North American bee population toward stocks that were able to manage varroa on their own."
> 
> randy oliver, american bee journal, january 2017


The European answer.
https://aristabeeresearch.org/


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## Fusion_power

> The European answer.


 While I agree that Arista is a move in the right direction, they are far behind the curve and will be at least 10 years if not more getting to the point where some U.S. beekeepers are already at today. Note that if you read the details from Arista, there are several U.S. beekeepers involved in the program. Bob Danka is one.

Harry, I agree. You never said never. The problem succinctly stated is that varroa resistance so far is not compatible with spring pollination requirements. Bees that maintain large winter populations and can be triggered to pop in early spring will take time to develop. Dedicated long term beekeepers who are willing to do mite checks and find the small numbers of resistant queens are needed. BWeaver found 5 percent of their bees had what it takes. How would you feel if you found that 5 percent of your colonies were able to make it without treatments?


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## Juhani Lunden

Fusion_power said:


> While I agree that Arista is a move in the right direction, they are far behind the curve and will be at least 10 years if not more getting to the point where some U.S. beekeepers are already at today.


Lets make it a race!

http://www.beesource.com/forums/sho...reeding-bees-suitable-for-commrcial-operation


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## Rusty Hills Farm

Nordak said:


> I agree that a certain amount of skepticism is healthy. Again, we are all products of our collective experiences. Seeing is believing and all that. Most of the successful TF guys I've talked to aren't claiming they have super bees that are 3 deeps brood under 8 supers. I can't do that with my bees. I can keep them treatment free, though, and I'm not trying to pull anyone's leg. I'm sure most folks wouldn't be happy with my bees in a commercial setting. They probably wouldn't do well for numerous reasons, namely honey production. I get some honey off of them on occasion, but nowhere near what someone looking to make a living from them would be happy with. Me, I love my bees. They compliment my style of beekeeping. That's the truth.



This has been/still is my problem with tf/VSH/etc. I tried it. I went from honey yields of 75-100# per hive to 2 PINTS per hive. Personally I am not altruistic here. I keep bees for honey. On my budget I cannot afford bees who don't even support themselves let alone me. I could not make resistant stock work in a self-supporting apiary. There has to be another answer. But I know I am not gonna be the one to find it--not in my tiny yard--so I stopped looking for pie in the sky and went back to making honey. 

JMO

Rusty


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## WesternWilson

squarepeg said:


> i believe this is where randy is coming from, and it appears what he is up against isn't so much that progress can't be made with respect to breeding more mite resistant bees as it is that for most beekeepers it's just a whole lot easier to kill the mites and not worry about it.



Speaking as a lowly sideliner, and teacher of new beekeepers, what I see on the front lines is access neither to superior bees nor effective mite treatment. 

Our club on the border has Canadian members...who can pretty much only source New Zealand Carniolans, which have demostrated abysmal Varroa tolerance...and USA members, whose packages last year were a horror show. Most of our mentoring calls are to beekeepers whose bees are being eaten alive by mites.

Because the TF flypaper is very successful in trapping new-bees, who suffer through a few earnest years of raising mite bombs then give up or refine their technique to reflect our very bee-dense locale, we have huge mite issues. Those are exacerbated by the annual influx of mobile pollination bees to local blueberry fields.

Whenever I teach or give a talk, there are attendees who just do not believe that at least in our area, TF at best is a master level enterprise with very different outcomes (I know of no TF beekeepers in my area who has bees that are productive in the traditional sense...producing a good honey crop and abundant population).

Entirely by coincidence we are working on a bee breeding program to launch this year, 2017 (Dr. Oliver and Michael Palmer have been kindly advisors).

There is a deep hunger out there for not just better bees, but bees that will actually thrive and behave as bees should. We already know we can breed better queens than we can buy...probably just a function of superior larval nutrition. We want to make better queens available to all our area beekeepers, thereby improving our DCA contingent, which presently is largely those NZ Carniolans. Because we are somewhat isolated from surrounding pools of bees, we think we have a decent chance of impacting our local gene pool.

Meanwhile we treat as much as we have to and as little as possible, depending heavily on OA and FA. 

In the end, I think the answer will be found in Varroa research. We all need to lobby for more funding for Varroa research.


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## mbevanz

I am excited about resistant stock. I am equally interested in his research on oxalic dissolved in glycerin that he describes in his other article in the January issue.


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## beemandan

*Harry Vanderpool and Beemandan beekeepers and others who are convinced it can't be done.*

Nor has or would anyone ever hear me say it can't be done. I said that I believe, after thirty years of effort, we've teased all of the mite control possible from the existing honey bee gene pool. And, in my opinion, the result is not ready for prime time. Maybe I'm a bit like Harry in that regard. We need to look somewhere else for the solution i.e. thinking outside the box.


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## lharder

Still the problem is deeper. I predict almost 0 success with migratory operations and operations with exposure to migratory operations. Without some ecological system stability, there will be challenge after challenge, big bee kill after big bee kill. If its not one thing, it will be another. Beekeepers are fighting ecological gravity with this industrial model.


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## beemandan

lharder said:


> Beekeepers are fighting ecological gravity with this industrial model.


Pretty much true for humanity. People crowded elbow to elbow throughout urban settings worldwide. On buses, autos, airplanes and trains people are migratory. Lumped together in school classrooms, offices and stores. Not much ecological stability anywhere today.

All we can do is make the most of what we have...as beekeepers or ordinary humans....in my opinion.


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## squarepeg

sounds like lharder is the one who is convinced 'it can't be done'. i forget the statistic, but i believe that it is somewhere upwards of 95% of all bee colonies in the u.s. are produced and managed for commercial migratory operations. 

those folks work hard to make their living and deserve just as much opportunity to do so as any the rest of us. i would be the last in line in terms of making demands on them for the sake of my little 20 hive operation.

but in the longer run, it is just as much if not more so in the interest of the big outfits to see some progress made with respect to bees getting better at dealing with mites, and with all due respect i think most of them realize that.

we'll have to see what randy has in mind about getting "serious about dealing with varroa", and to what degree the industry is motivated to engage in a renewed effort. there's no doubt it's a tough nut to crack, hopefully open minds and a willingness to work toward making some progress will prevail.


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## crofter

This is looking a bit like a circular firing squad!

I think the problem is not with the bee, but most of the noble effort is being exerted on changing the bee! That, at least here on this forum, is the focus. If I had unlimited funds to allocate to solving the root problem I would be redirecting research towards messing up the mites game! He is the bad guy that rode into town.


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## costigaj

Lets hope that whatever happens does not follow the whole Monsanto GMO model. Sort of goes like this....Where one company would patent the genes of the new mite resistant drone or queen and the offspring are genetically incapable of making queen cells. So you end up needing to buy a new mite resistant queen from the company with the patent, to replace one that died or swarmed. Guaranteed revenue for the patent holder, bad news for queen breeders. Within a few generations the mite resistant drones will be spreading around their designer genes to the general population. Competition eliminated. Apis Monopoly.


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## Arnie

Rusty Hills Farm said:


> This has been/still is my problem with tf/VSH/etc. I tried it. I went from honey yields of 75-100# per hive to 2 PINTS per hive. Personally I am not altruistic here. I keep bees for honey. On my budget I cannot afford bees who don't even support themselves let alone me. I could not make resistant stock work in a self-supporting apiary. There has to be another answer. But I know I am not gonna be the one to find it--not in my tiny yard--so I stopped looking for pie in the sky and went back to making honey.
> 
> JMO
> 
> Rusty


This is the challenge. The beekeeping community/industry cannot just stop everything while we find a resistant bee. We must work within the system to find an answer, while simultaneously continuing to produce honey and pollinate and produce more bees. 
It's a long road but it can be done.

But this thread makes me think back.......when the mites first hit us here they caused astounding devastation. 100% losses, 95% losses. Bee yards I had driven by for years, Gone. It was like Armageddon.
And it was that way for awhile. A bee yard would appear only to disappear a couple years later.

Now I see bee yards popping up all around.... and remaining. My immediate neighborhood has at least 4 of us keeping bees.
There is a fellow I know who is working to develop his own line of "survivors". 

Overall things are getting better. We are making slow progress. Agonizingly slow for those of us who will likely not live to see the end solution, but hey, progress is progress. 

Long term things look really positive to me. Cheer up everybody!


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## Lburou

I love to keep honey bees in my backyard. And I won't let this issue ruin it for me. Seems like this thread is winding down, so I wanted to contribute before it is completely dead.

Killing or managing a bug living on a honey bee is no small problem. The Russians, (a culture of very smart scientists), capable European Scientists, and Scientists around the world have been working on this for generations. 

It was one study, covering old ground in a new way, that revealed the diet of the mite. Other scientists, (and scientists in training), are going to replicate old studies and approach established knowledge from fresh, new angles...They will find something new eventually. We have discarded many treatment fads along the way. New methods to treat are always in the pipeline.

In my small backyard bee yard, and using Integrated Pest Management practices, I've tried Carpenter's queens, Pol-Line queens, a VP breeder, various VSH suppliers and BeeWeaver queens. Still grafting from the last line of VP queens, Carpenter's excellent producing hives died out after three years, hives headed by BeeWeaver queens seem to lose their mojo after three years as well. So, I'm just buying the best queens I can get and grafting from the best producers while keeping high populations of drones in the hive with drone frames, (attempting to influence feral hives in the neighborhood), and giving queens to beekeepers within three miles.

I'm treatment free at heart, but don't hesitate to use OAV and want to get smart about FA. I'm open to new ideas.

I'm happy with that. I will do what I can here in my world and hope that more breakthroughs are coming in the mite wars. 

Maybe I'll drive by Squarepeg's house one day and bring home a few queens. 

P.S. I wish beekeepers would remove from youtube those videos of old and unproductive, (read misleading), videos of ineffective mite treatments. The misinformation on youtube and online forums increases unnecessary difficulty & failure for new folks to the hobby.

JMO


----------



## jim lyon

Arnie, couldn't agree more. Despite all the negativity, the industry marches on and no crop has suffered because of a lack of available pollination.


----------



## crofter

Lburou said:


> j<Snip>
> 
> P.S. I wish beekeepers would remove from youtube those videos of old and unproductive, (read misleading), videos of ineffective mite treatments. The misinformation on youtube and online forums increases unnecessary difficulty & failure for new folks to the hobby.
> 
> JMO


For some reason some people are drawn to the most "far out" and mystical promises! It is hard to help them.


----------



## squarepeg

this has been an excellent thread folks, and i very much appreciate all of the replies. 

i mentioned in the op having purchased the online version of the american bee journal. i've no regrets, and for those of you who enjoy looking at diverse points of view on this and other topics subscribing would be worth considering.

i'm now going through the back issues, and just finished reading an article written by m.e.a. mcneil entitled "bomb vs. bond, treatment/nontreatment: the twain do meet, and let us count the ways - part 1"

the author quotes many of the industries leading researchers and provides a good editorial. i saw many of the views expressed in this thread represented there.


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## Riskybizz

"BWeaver found 5 percent of their bees had what it takes. How would you feel if you found that 5 percent of your colonies were able to make it without treatments?"

Fusion, I'm always somewhat uncomfortable when I read comments such as the one above. Would you mind expanding upon that statement and share with us your first hand insight into bee breeding operations such as those currently practiced by Danny Weaver. I always thought that I was fairly well read when it comes to queen breeders adept at overcoming varroa complications. Do you mind sharing with us exactly how BWeaver has found the goose that lay's the golden eggs? Would you happen to know what percentage of colonies they lose every year that could be attributed to mites. Do they still run a few thousand colonies? Thanks for sharing.


----------



## clyderoad

crofter said:


> This is looking a bit like a circular firing squad!
> 
> I think the problem is not with the bee, but most of the noble effort is being exerted on changing the bee! That, at least here on this forum, is the focus. If I had unlimited funds to allocate to solving the root problem I would be redirecting research towards messing up the mites game! He is the bad guy that rode into town.


Yup.
Keep an eye on the vanEngelsdorp lab then as they have members focusing on the root of the problem. Studying the parasite is no easy task and certainly not in the realm of amateur biologists, which is why so much of the talk is about how to empower the host.


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## Michael Palmer

crofter said:


> If I had unlimited funds to allocate to solving the root problem I would be redirecting research towards messing up the mites game!


Isn't that what the RNAi project is trying to do?


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## JRG13

I've been interested in this thread but stayed out because of Christmas. It looks like some have taken a similar approach as I have, bringing in lots of genetics and see how they pan out. I will post later as it's picture day and maybe see if I can start a sticky on how I'm approaching looking for resistance and how it's coming along. I've pretty much committed to taking up II to help establish the genetics better if the potential is there, but like most things these days I'm thinking a hybrid approach may be best. I really think you need to develop at least two traits in separate lines and then combine them to have a chance in areas of high density bee populations. The problem will still always come down to how to maintain these traits in daughter queens but perhaps if you can establish and maintain some tolerance or resistance for a couple years, the mite populations may decrease enough to help alleviate some of the pressure.


----------



## JRG13

Michael Palmer said:


> Isn't that what the RNAi project is trying to do?


I saw a recent Indigo project using ultrasound to disrupt the mites behavior, from a German beekeeper.


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## Ian

Ray Olivarez is nurturing specific lines of the Saskatraz project, he tells me he's warmed up towards a few lines they have helped develop. I'm going to try a few of these queens next season out of pure curiosity sake and provide some feedback


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## Richard Cryberg

crofter said:


> This is looking a bit like a circular firing squad!
> 
> I think the problem is not with the bee, but most of the noble effort is being exerted on changing the bee! That, at least here on this forum, is the focus. If I had unlimited funds to allocate to solving the root problem I would be redirecting research towards messing up the mites game! He is the bad guy that rode into town.


This is a much more likely route to solve the problem than queen breeding efforts. But, you are right, it will be very expensive to do it today.

Mites really are not that big a problem for commercial guys compared to lots of other issues they have to deal with. Mites are a big deal to back yard bee keepers simply because all to often they are not practicing reasonable animal husbandry. Even if mites were not a problem at all the back yard bee keepers will still kill a lot of hives by neglect. There is no genetic cure for neglect.


----------



## clyderoad

Michael Palmer said:


> Isn't that what the RNAi project is trying to do?


from my understanding one of many possible applications being studied.


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## WesternWilson

Richard Cryberg said:


> Mites really are not that big a problem for commercial guys compared to lots of other issues they have to deal with.


Mites are a problem for the commercial guys, but at least some of the mobile pollination operators (and that is the bulk of commercial locally) in our area openly talk about applying meds and pesticide (usually Apivar) 24/7/365.

They do this to lower labour costs, but the price is: driving pest and disease resistance, tolerating suppressed brood disease.


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## jim lyon

Of course mites are a problem for all beekeepers including the commercials but its a problem shared equally by everyone so the net effect is positive for those who have a good mite control program. 
Year around med and pesticide applications? I suppose its done by a few but if honey production is part of your income then I think it would be pretty risky as all the major packers I deal with have a pretty extensive testing program.


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## Daniel Y

One of the early post. First page. Commented on how one beekeeper does not like how a resistant colony looks. yet prefers the better to them looking colony that is susceptible to Varroa. Basically choose the bad choice because it looks better. Which brought me to the thought that for decades if not centuries bees have been handled to "Look Better". I suspect with little knowledge of what "Is Better". Not the same thing. And with evidence that you can look right at something make it impossible to deny that it is anything but better but then still say. "I'll take the crappy bees that die". you have your work cut out for you.


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## Nordak

squarepeg said:


> sounds like lharder is the one who is convinced 'it can't be done'. i forget the statistic, but i believe that it is somewhere upwards of 95% of all bee colonies in the u.s. are produced and managed for commercial migratory operations.


This statistic points to part of the problem in my opinion. I think lharder's concern is legitimate in regard to the question can it work. In regard to deserving of keeping jobs, of course the beekeepers deserve it. Steel workers deserved to keep their jobs. Auto workers....so many people who learned specific skill sets are no longer working those type jobs. Unfortunately, that is the nature of business, and that is what commercial beekeeping is. A business. It appears to be failing to some degree. My sincere hope is that bees and the business can get back to being healthy. That might take adaptation from both bee and beekeeper.


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## beemandan

Nordak said:


> It appears to be failing to some degree.


And there I was thinking that there were more hives in the US today than in recent history. More hives in almonds....or so I thought.
Goes to show you how little I know.


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## Nordak

beemandan said:


> And there I was thinking that there were more hives in the US today than in recent history. More hives in almonds....or so I thought.
> Goes to show you how little I know.


Why are we even having this discussion then? Carry on. Nothing to see here.


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## squarepeg

Nordak said:


> This statistic points to part of the problem in my opinion...


i didn't mean to imply that the concern wasn't legimate. i believe it's fair to say that no other group among us has more at stake with respect to making progress on varroa control than the commercials for all sorts of reasons.

i'll refer you to jim's post #74 for confirmation that the industry is far from 'failing'. rather than varroa, the biggest threat appears to a market flooded with fake honey imported from china.


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## Nordak

I didn't say it was utterly failing. I said it was failing to some degree. That is the sense I get from some reports. I'm not in the field, admittedly. Perhaps we are creating problems where none exist. 

Regarding import, we all know that's what's killed most industry. I can empathize with that struggle.


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## lharder

squarepeg said:


> sounds like lharder is the one who is convinced 'it can't be done'. i forget the statistic, but i believe that it is somewhere upwards of 95% of all bee colonies in the u.s. are produced and managed for commercial migratory operations.
> 
> those folks work hard to make their living and deserve just as much opportunity to do so as any the rest of us. i would be the last in line in terms of making demands on them for the sake of my little 20 hive operation.
> 
> but in the longer run, it is just as much if not more so in the interest of the big outfits to see some progress made with respect to bees getting better at dealing with mites, and with all due respect i think most of them realize that.
> 
> we'll have to see what randy has in mind about getting "serious about dealing with varroa", and to what degree the industry is motivated to engage in a renewed effort. there's no doubt it's a tough nut to crack, hopefully open minds and a willingness to work toward making some progress will prevail.


A model changing, doesn't preclude business and work. If ecological principles were followed, it would change the agricultural landscape, but not the existence of agriculture itself. In fact I mourn the countless economic opportunities lost because of carelessness. Case study upon case study. Following some ecological principles is a case for economic gain, and maintaining competitive advantages. These things are not to be frittered away for short term gain. I'm sure migratory beekeepers, because they bright practical people, would have found an excellent alternative paths in a different beekeeping environment. But if we want some stability, a new path has to be imagined.


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## squarepeg

Nordak said:


> I didn't say it was utterly failing. I said it was failing to some degree. That is the sense I get from some reports.


understood. we haven't hashed it out here on the forum in a while, (thank goodness), but there's no doubt that the 'demise' of the bees has been hyped in the media typically by agenda driven groups utilizing the bees as their poster child. the ground truth (see randy oliver's articles for example) is very different.

but what we are discussing here is the fact that varroa has been with us for almost 30 years and the best we have been able to achieve is a stalemate. the question is: are the mites really that much smarter than we are?

randy and others are suggesting that it's the industry's fault for not being more proactive. i have suggested in my posts above that the 'band aids' are more convenient and cost effective for most. a concern for us all is the possibility that we may run out of band aids.

we have documentation that bee populations can become resistant/tolerant to varroa. we humans are pretty smart when we want to be. hopefully someone much more expertise than me will come up with a doable way forward. right now it looks like randy is taking the lead in that regard.


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## squarepeg

lharder said:


> But if we want some stability, a new path has to be imagined.


yes, and i would add not only be imagined but made palatable.


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## lharder

I think it could be done in a stepped gradual fashion with ecologists, virologists, and epidemiologists involved to document impacts on bee populations from those relatively isolated to those in the main current of bee movement. I'm guessing there is a sweet spot for the right amount of bee movement. If it was done over the long term, bee health could be gradually improved over wider and wider parts of the continent, allowing very slow adaptation by migratory operations, landowners and bee sellers. Local bee clubs could do a lot simply by aiming for bee self sufficiency within their club members and new members.


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## Nordak

I understand. Clearly bees aren't in danger of going extinct. That's nonsense talk. The issue is just as you put it, from my understanding. I read Randy's articles often, and am amazed by his mind and foresight. An asset to beeks. Failing was a bad term to use. Failing to recognize the potential pitfalls of current practice might be a better way of getting to the heart of what I meant. Apologies I wasn't clearer. I have a tendency sometimes to think and write in shorthand. I know there are many skilled and successful commercial beeks on this forum and they know much more about the reality of the situation than I do looking from the outside.


----------



## Ian

"Looking from the outside "


----------



## johno

Square, about this documentation about some bees developing resistance/tolerance to mites, I do not believe that there is any proof of such resistance only that bees are surviving treatment free. It could be that isolated areas have less virulent pathogens or perhaps those mites have adapted in some way, until some facts turn up as to what the reason of some colonies surviving we are still in the dark. We have been trying to breed better bees for 30 years maybe we should be trying to breed better mites or less virulent pathogens. As an aside I see a new bacteria has been discovered that is killing bees.
Johno


----------



## Nordak

Ian said:


> "Looking from the outside "


Not intended as a caveat. Remove it and re-read if you wish. I'm pretty far removed from commercial beekeeping in terms of geography. That's all I meant by the statement.


----------



## Richard Cryberg

Nordak said:


> I know there are many skilled and successful commercial beeks on this forum and they know much more about the reality of the situation than I do looking from the outside.


I talk to commercial bee keepers most days. I spent two days sitting in a room with 50 commercial guys and gals listening to commercial guys and gals talk about their business a couple of months ago. A great many will tell you they have never before made so much money as they make now. The last several years honey prices have been good in the US. Admittedly our friends to the north are getting killed on honey prices the last two years. Could happen in the US also. Pollination prices keep going up every year at significantly greater than the rate of inflation. There is an endless demand for package bees and nucs so the commercial guys shake a lot of bees and sell them as swarm control, particularly after almonds. The price of packages and nucs is also going up faster than inflation the last decade. Some do not even waste resources and labor wintering them. Sell them off in the fall by the pound and buy new ones in the spring from the almond guys. If that is your business model you can harvest a lot more honey as you do not need winter stores and you can save the cost of migrating south for the winter.

If you ask these guys to list, in order of impact, the problems they face in the business varroa comes in well down the list at tenth place more or less. Why? Because they have effective ways to deal with varroa and use those ways. I estimate I spend about 15 minutes per hive per year dealing with varroa. Half of that time is spent doing mite counts. I spend way more time walking out to my bee yard just to take a look over the course of a year than it takes me to deal with varroa. It costs me $3 a hive/year to deal with varroa. I spend way more time and money feeding bees than varroa costs me.

The big fear is while we have highly effective ways to deal with varroa those ways may start to fail and if they fail the industry may be in major trouble. If commercial guys have to use the queens I use to minimize my varroa problems prices need to go higher than they are today. Particularly honey prices. With the new fast Oxalic vapor techniques the fear of loss of effective control methods is less than it was 24 months ago.


----------



## Nordak

Richard Cryberg said:


> I talk to commercial bee keepers most days. I spent two days sitting in a room with 50 commercial guys and gals listening to commercial guys and gals talk about their business a couple of months ago. A great many will tell you they have never before made so much money as they make now. The last several years honey prices have been good in the US. Admittedly our friends to the north are getting killed on honey prices the last two years. Could happen in the US also. Pollination prices keep going up every year at significantly greater than the rate of inflation. There is an endless demand for package bees and nucs so the commercial guys shake a lot of bees and sell them as swarm control, particularly after almonds. The price of packages and nucs is also going up faster than inflation the last decade. Some do not even waste resources and labor wintering them. Sell them off in the fall by the pound and buy new ones in the spring from the almond guys. If that is your business model you can harvest a lot more honey as you do not need winter stores and you can save the cost of migrating south for the winter.
> 
> If you ask these guys to list, in order of impact, the problems they face in the business varroa comes in well down the list at tenth place more or less. Why? Because they have effective ways to deal with varroa and use those ways. I estimate I spend about 15 minutes per hive per year dealing with varroa. Half of that time is spent doing mite counts. I spend way more time walking out to my bee yard just to take a look over the course of a year than it takes me to deal with varroa. It costs me $3 a hive/year to deal with varroa. I spend way more time and money feeding bees than varroa costs me.
> 
> The big fear is while we have highly effective ways to deal with varroa those ways may start to fail and if they fail the industry may be in major trouble. If commercial guys have to use the queens I use to minimize my varroa problems prices need to go higher than they are today. Particularly honey prices. With the new fast Oxalic vapor techniques the fear of loss of effective control methods is less than it was 24 months ago.


Sounds like business is booming for certain. Thanks for sharing that, Richard. I completely understand why beeks in the industry would be worried regarding potential failure, from whatever system is put forth to deal with varroa. We're talking about people's livelihoods. I can completely relate and understand that. People do what they must to survive, that's the reality, and that sense of preservation outweighs a lot of conjecture that's been thrown around about "how" to make it sustainable. It's been a good conversation, and I always learn a lot from these types of posts. Thanks to all who contributed. Never a dull moment.


----------



## squarepeg

johno said:


> I do not believe that there is any proof of such resistance only that bees are surviving treatment free.


i'm not sure i understand the distinction you are making here johno. am i incorrect in thinking that the generally held view is those populations surviving treatment free, regardless of the mechansim, are by definition resistant? 

at the very least they are resisting getting decimated by varroa. these recognized populations stand out in contrast to bees produced commercially that don't fare as well off treatments. 

i agree that understanding the mechansims is important and elucidating them should help us forward, but by whatever traits or mechansims should we not be trying to incorporate some of that survival into our stock? 



johno said:


> We have been trying to breed better bees for 30 years maybe we should be trying to breed better mites or less virulent pathogens.


agreed, and who knows, maybe it's a nutritional thing, or even something in the propolis. 

randy has made the point in earlier articles that 'we' have been relying on too small of a pool of breeders, and that a more powerful approach might be if selection and propagation becomes as commonplace among average beekeepers as is adding honey supers before a flow. 

breeding for a better bee has been the time honored approach and it seems likely that this will continue. if you are making the point that there is more to it than just genetics than we are in agreement.


----------



## beemandan

squarepeg said:


> am i incorrect in thinking that the generally held view is those populations surviving treatment free, regardless of the mechansim, are by definition resistant?


I can't speak to the 'general' view but in my opinion, they are not, by definition resistant. 

When we have a population of bees that survive without treatment but we have no idea how they are doing so, I think it is a stretch to claim that they are 'resistant'. It could just as easily be a less virulent mite...maybe lower viral loads or possibly something we don't recognize, totally unrelated to the bees' behavior or genetics. 
I refer to this an anecdotal resistance.


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## squarepeg

i get that. it's ok with me if we want to refer to them as 'survivor stock' instead of 'resistant stock'. *be*es *su*ccessfully *co*existing *wi*th *va*rroa - besucowiva's perhaps?


----------



## johno

Square, I have been bringing in resistant queens for about 5 years now, and have been breeding from them and spreading their genetics all around me, and still if I do not treat my bees will die. I am rapidly reaching the opinion that if I had no varoa here at my location most of my bees would starve to death every year anyhow. I seem to be feeding more sugar this year than honey harvested.
Johno


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## squarepeg

johno said:


> Square, I have been bringing in resistant queens for about 5 years now, and have been breeding from them and spreading their genetics all around me, and still if I do not treat my bees will die. I am rapidly reaching the opinion that if I had no varoa here at my location most of my bees would starve to death every year anyhow. I seem to be feeding more sugar this year than honey harvested.
> Johno


understood johno, and i respect that is your reality and what you have to base your point of view on. it's clear that those 'resistant' queens aren't bringing anything special to your apiary.

just curious, are you aware of any unmanaged colonies at all surviving in your area say in the woods or old barn for example?


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## JRG13

In my limited experience I've tested quite a few 'lines' of bees from various sources. I haven't seen anything I would call resistant yet in the classical sense of the word, although some never claim to be. I have witnessed a probable variation in tolerance though and it seems to have gotten better this last year to some extent, but I believe part of that was hive growth this year in my main yards was very limited due to lack of forage in late spring and again in late summer. What I've seen trending since I started in 2012 is that the critical point of PMS setting in seems to keep pushing back earlier in the year as either mites have been able to breed faster or become more virulent. I guess my point of contention is that you must consider the mites are still adapting as well, what worked TF or not last year or heck, even last month may not be working now. The mites have the lifecycle advantage as they go through about 8-12 generations a year while the bees are 1-2 depending on if they swarm or not or supercede the queen.


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## johno

Square, I have been at this location for about 14 years before I started keeping bees maybe 6 or 7 years ago I could not find a honey bee around here at all. Now we get a call from time to time about bees here or there in hollow trees and maybe some abandoned building but whenever I see them you cannot mistake the Carniolan in them. I guess some swarms have got away from some of my outyards, actually I know they have. But as I mentioned its tough going for bees in my area.
Johno


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## jim lyon

Richard Cryberg said:


> I talk to commercial bee keepers most days. I spent two days sitting in a room with 50 commercial guys and gals listening to commercial guys and gals talk about their business a couple of months ago. A great many will tell you they have never before made so much money as they make now. The last several years honey prices have been good in the US. Admittedly our friends to the north are getting killed on honey prices the last two years. Could happen in the US also. Pollination prices keep going up every year at significantly greater than the rate of inflation. There is an endless demand for package bees and nucs so the commercial guys shake a lot of bees and sell them as swarm control, particularly after almonds. The price of packages and nucs is also going up faster than inflation the last decade. Some do not even waste resources and labor wintering them. Sell them off in the fall by the pound and buy new ones in the spring from the almond guys. If that is your business model you can harvest a lot more honey as you do not need winter stores and you can save the cost of migrating south for the winter.
> 
> If you ask these guys to list, in order of impact, the problems they face in the business varroa comes in well down the list at tenth place more or less. Why? Because they have effective ways to deal with varroa and use those ways. I estimate I spend about 15 minutes per hive per year dealing with varroa. Half of that time is spent doing mite counts. I spend way more time walking out to my bee yard just to take a look over the course of a year than it takes me to deal with varroa. It costs me $3 a hive/year to deal with varroa. I spend way more time and money feeding bees than varroa costs me.
> 
> The big fear is while we have highly effective ways to deal with varroa those ways may start to fail and if they fail the industry may be in major trouble. If commercial guys have to use the queens I use to minimize my varroa problems prices need to go higher than they are today. Particularly honey prices. With the new fast Oxalic vapor techniques the fear of loss of effective control methods is less than it was 24 months ago.


Richard pretty much nails it here though I would move varroa concerns up to the top 5 on my list of concerns. 15 minutes per hive on varroa control? You spend that much time?


----------



## squarepeg

jim, would you guess that most commercials list varroa control among their top 5 concerns and,

i believe you have taken control of your own queen rearing; with respect to varroa control what metrics are you looking at and are you seeing progress made?


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## JWChesnut

VSH and Pol-Line doesn't stop mite kill in California. Anyone who tells you otherwise is a first-year novice, long on you-tube videos, short on experience.


----------



## HarryVanderpool

I would be very surprised to hear that anyone with any experience in beekeeping would not rate varroa and queen issues as the top two problems these days in our operations.
Even if an operation has varroa 100% in control, that does not diminish it as the #1 problem that they face.
Having problems well in hand does not diminish them as major problems.
Unless something much worse comes along of course!


----------



## jim lyon

squarepeg said:


> jim, would you guess that most commercials list varroa control among their top 5 concerns and,
> 
> i believe you have taken control of your own queen rearing; with respect to varroa control what metrics are you looking at and are you seeing progress made?


There have certainly been improvements from the early days when we were first impacted by varroa but my sense is that in recent years any improvements in breeding stock are incremental and have been offset by viruses.


----------



## squarepeg

understood and many thanks jim, and to you too harry for confirming my suspicions queried in the first part of the question.


----------



## Riverderwent

JRG13 said:


> I guess my point of contention is that you must consider the mites are still adapting as well, what worked TF or not last year or heck, even last month may not be working now. The mites have the lifecycle advantage as they go through about 8-12 generations a year while the bees are 1-2 depending on if they swarm or not or supercede the queen.


Varroa mites should adapt only very slowly because they are pseudo-clonal due to adelphogamatic mating and pseudo-arrhenotoky. That pseudo-clonal quality also means that the natural enemies of varroa can adapt more quickly than varroa. This gives increased importance to the point that Harry made above:


HarryVanderpool said:


> The solution will come from better understanding mites and their natural enemies and predators.


Anyway, y'all be y'all. It doesn't matter to me. My unfed, untreated mutts and their feral cousins are rocking along and bending the genetic and methodical curves toward survival in our little bailiwick. I don't have my head in a bucket and, yes, I agreed with about ninety-two percent of what Randy said in his most recent article. What I am not able to agree or disagree with yet is the claimed benefits of the soft Bond approach over the hard Bond approach, at least based on my experience where I keep my bees. And that may be because of the exact points made by Harry and several others in this thread that the solution is not just the genetics of the bees but also the culture of the hive itself and the genetics and epigenetics of a host of interrelated organisms including viruses, and diseases, parasites, and natural enemies of the mites (and if you want to trace it out, the natural enemies of the natural enemies of the natural enemies of the mites).


----------



## JRG13

I dunno, I think the mites adapted pretty quickly to coumaphos and fluvinalate


----------



## Daniel Y

beemandan said:


> And there I was thinking that there were more hives in the US today than in recent history. More hives in almonds....or so I thought.
> Goes to show you how little I know.


I don't think number of hives indicate anything about the health of bees or the success in keeping them. only the ability to replace them. Looking at one factor gives you a narrow inaccurate impression.


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## jim lyon

Yes, there are more hives and yes, one can certainly argue that there are more health issues as well. However, one of the only reasonably accurate benchmarks that we have telling us the relative strength of those hives is how many are of rentable size for almond pollination as almond growers are businessmen that are pretty particular about not throwing away their money. This benchmark, and their growing production in recent years, tells us that the beekeeping industry has been able to continue to supply the growing demand for rentable sized hives at a time of year when hive populations are typically low. My guess is that water will run out in the valley before bee supplies.


----------



## beemandan

Daniel Y said:


> Looking at one factor gives you a narrow inaccurate impression.


It's ok for someone to say, with regard to commercial beekeeping, 'it's failing to some degree' without a spiff of support. Yet if I respond with a clear indication of its success.... I'm guilty of giving a narrow, inaccurate impression?
Got it.


----------



## Richard Cryberg

HarryVanderpool said:


> I would be very surprised to hear that anyone with any experience in beekeeping would not rate varroa and queen issues as the top two problems these days in our operations.


I can sure agree that queen problems are my number one issue. My experience is one out of three queens I raise is really good, one is average and one is pure junk. I see more or less the same ratio in purchased queens, althou I have seen higher rates of supersedure from one supplier on one queen order. The only supersedure I see on queens I raise is if the hive has EFB and I did not treat promptly. The big variation I see is honey production and I can not measure that in a nuc nor by looking at the queen so it makes sorting difficult. Right now 1/4 of my production hives make half my honey crop. Based on work done at the U of Wisc clear back in the 1930s I should be able to make a lot of headway on evening out production in a few more generations. Honey production is very genetic. When I kept local mutts I had impossible swarming issues. Now, swarming is no major problem but not zero either where I would like it to be. I would gladly give back some mite tolerance that I have for more even honey production. Having to treat twice a year versus once in very early spring would not be a big deal in either time or cost. Or, I could be living in a glass house and see all kinds of winter deaths this year unlike the last two years. We were 55 deg F a few days ago and so far zero dead hives. But, I have ten weeks to go before I am safe and have soft maples blooming.


----------



## Fusion_power

I'm not seeing anywhere near the level of queen problems being reported by beekeepers who treat. I average 70% mating success and of the queens that mate, 9 out of 10 are good queens. IMO, queen production methods should be investigated thoroughly if there are 30% rates of junk queens. Keep in mind that virus in the drones the queen mates with can be one cause of queen failure.


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## Nordak

beemandan said:


> It's ok for someone to say, with regard to commercial beekeeping, 'it's failing to some degree' without a spiff of support.


For the record, I admitted my folly. I've been corrected. It's clear that business is doing well. Richard, Jim and Harry gave me some much needed perspective in that area. Thanks again to you all.


----------



## jim lyon

Fusion_power said:


> I'm not seeing anywhere near the level of queen problems being reported by beekeepers who treat. I average 70% mating success and of the queens that mate, 9 out of 10 are good queens. IMO, queen production methods should be investigated thoroughly if there are 30% rates of junk queens. Keep in mind that virus in the drones the queen mates with can be one cause of queen failure.


I certainly don't see anything approaching 30% failure in our mated queens. Of those confirmed laying queens, this past year, we saw about a 15 to 20% attrition from spring to fall. Much of this, in my estimation, attributable to migratory moves and other outside stress factors.


----------



## jean-marc

WesternWilson said:


> Mites are a problem for the commercial guys, but at least some of the mobile pollination operators (and that is the bulk of commercial locally) in our area openly talk about applying meds and pesticide (usually Apivar) 24/7/365.
> 
> They do this to lower labour costs, but the price is: driving pest and disease resistance, tolerating suppressed brood disease.


As one of the "mobile pollination operators", I know of no operators openly talking about applying apivar 24/7/365. There was a big nonsensical kerfufuffle over shb in the Fraser Valley last year. There were a lot inspections done on a lot of hives. Apivar strips would have been noted and the government would have made more noise.

Jean-Marc


----------



## lharder

johno said:


> Square, about this documentation about some bees developing resistance/tolerance to mites, I do not believe that there is any proof of such resistance only that bees are surviving treatment free. It could be that isolated areas have less virulent pathogens or perhaps those mites have adapted in some way, until some facts turn up as to what the reason of some colonies surviving we are still in the dark. We have been trying to breed better bees for 30 years maybe we should be trying to breed better mites or less virulent pathogens. As an aside I see a new bacteria has been discovered that is killing bees.
> Johno


The virulence of pests/pathogens is controlled by system parameters. Any attempt to alter virulence without altering system parameters just gets washed out by system dynamics. Its system parameters that need to be looked at.


----------



## jean-marc

WesternWilson said:


> Speaking as a lowly sideliner, and teacher of new beekeepers, what I see on the front lines is access neither to superior bees nor effective mite treatment.
> 
> Our club on the border has Canadian members...who can pretty much only source New Zealand Carniolans, which have demostrated abysmal Varroa tolerance...and USA members, whose packages last year were a horror show. Most of our mentoring calls are to beekeepers whose bees are being eaten alive by mites.
> 
> Because the TF flypaper is very successful in trapping new-bees, who suffer through a few earnest years of raising mite bombs then give up or refine their technique to reflect our very bee-dense locale, we have huge mite issues. Those are exacerbated by the annual influx of mobile pollination bees to local blueberry fields.
> 
> Whenever I teach or give a talk, there are attendees who just do not believe that at least in our area, TF at best is a master level enterprise with very different outcomes (I know of no TF beekeepers in my area who has bees that are productive in the traditional sense...producing a good honey crop and abundant population).
> 
> Entirely by coincidence we are working on a bee breeding program to launch this year, 2017 (Dr. Oliver and Michael Palmer have been kindly advisors).
> 
> There is a deep hunger out there for not just better bees, but bees that will actually thrive and behave as bees should. We already know we can breed better queens than we can buy...probably just a function of superior larval nutrition. We want to make better queens available to all our area beekeepers, thereby improving our DCA contingent, which presently is largely those NZ Carniolans. Because we are somewhat isolated from surrounding pools of bees, we think we have a decent chance of impacting our local gene pool.
> 
> Meanwhile we treat as much as we have to and as little as possible, depending heavily on OA and FA.
> 
> In the end, I think the answer will be found in Varroa research. We all need to lobby for more funding for Varroa research.



There are other options to purchasing bees other than New Zealand. I sell bees as well as others. New Zealand would have to be the absolute last choice, no other options. Honey would have to be at $2.50-$3.00/lb before even considering it. I might argue that you would be better off without them. There are just too many stories of frustration, high queen losses, high colony losses during the summer, low honey production, high winter losses, to consider them IMHO.

Who is Dr Oliver? I think you mean Randy Oliver? I don't think he has a PhD.

Jean-Marc


----------



## WesternWilson

I should clarify...I have heard two local mobile pollination operators in my area say that Apivar goes on in the fall and stays there till spring (Oct-March), and that they medicate prophylactically for brood disease.

I have sympathy for what it takes to keep up with pollination contracts and demands. 

I have bought queens from local breeders, when they have them. So far none have been as good as what I could raise myself. And again, if you are wild mating, most of this year's drones are from this year's NZ queens.


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## jean-marc

WesternWilson said:


> I should clarify...I have heard two local mobile pollination operators in my area say that Apivar goes on in the fall and stays there till spring (Oct-March), and that they medicate prophylactically for brood disease.
> 
> Ok. I can buy that.
> 
> I have bought queens from local breeders, when they have them. So far none have been as good as what I could raise myself.
> 
> Sounds like you are doing fine on your own. It usually works that way. The extra handling and shipping creates so many quality issues.
> 
> And again, if you are wild mating, most of this year's drones are from this year's NZ queens.


That's unfortunate. I guess it depends where you are, how many hives you have vs how many in the neighborhood and tiing to name a few of the variables.

Jean-Marc

P.S.- Varroa is still a curse that can be managed, low honey prices, that's another ball of wax.


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## Richard Cryberg

jim lyon said:


> I certainly don't see anything approaching 30% failure in our mated queens. Of those confirmed laying queens, this past year, we saw about a 15 to 20% attrition from spring to fall. Much of this, in my estimation, attributable to migratory moves and other outside stress factors.


I did not do a reasonable job of defining junk. I seldom see supersedures from my queens. Seldom as never unless the hive has EFB or the queen is three years old. I never have a hive go queen less unless it swarmed and did not come up with a laying queen. I have had one such hive in the last two years, or roughly 1/4th of those that swarmed. I have not had queens that were not mite tolerant and unable to survive on one early spring treatment a year. I have zero queens that lay a spotty pattern out of the last 50 I raised. I get mating success overall of 75%. Last spring the first round I only got two out of twelve, but all later rounds were fine. The weather was awful for mating that first round. Mostly in the 90% range during June to August. So, by all those measures my queens are quite good. And those measures are all by and large meaningless if she does not produce a colony that did not yield at least 100 pounds of honey last summer. By the honey measurement 1/3 of my own queens are junk with yields under 50 pounds.

The problem is I know of no solid way to judge a queen as to honey potential when she is in a nuc. If I could I would simply kill the non producers and raise another one. It is easy enough to make more queens. I did have a couple of nucs I am over wintering that did catch my eye last summer based on how fast they built up. So, maybe those are going to be good ones? They will go in a production hive this summer and I will know by July.


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## ApricotApiaries

To return to something Harry Vanderpool mentioned 6 pages ago...
It's true, when all we talk about is resistant stock, we are only talking about 50% of the equation at best. The other parts being management situations and cultural context and the mites themselves. 
Now I am in a fairly isolated region and have the resources to put considerable effort into a small breeding program, and plan to dedicate at least one yard to this purpose. Several miles from any other bee-yards in hopes to develop "resistant stock." But, as an almond pollinator, if the bees can't winter a large enough cluster, they aren't suitable to our current system of agriculture. Likewise, if honeybees can survive but can't produce surplus honey, I have some issues with that as well. 
Lastly, I think it's high time to consider strategies to select for less virulent mites and viruses. I don't think anyone has a clue how to do this, but many agree that we have been succeeding at doing the opposite. This is the other big variable in the equation.


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## Fusion_power

> I did not do a reasonable job of defining junk.


 I wonder how Brother Adam would have approached this?


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## Riverderwent

Riverderwent said:


> And that may be because of the exact points made by Harry and several others in this thread that the solution is not just the genetics of the bees but also the culture of the hive itself and the genetics and epigenetics of a host of interrelated organisms including viruses, and diseases, parasites, and natural enemies of the mites (and if you want to trace it out, the natural enemies of the natural enemies of the natural enemies of the mites).


In other words, using the soft Bond method may be a little like trying to make your mother's sour dough bread using someone else's starter.


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## JRG13

I think part of it, is that most average people don't know how to select for traits or potential breeders. Sometimes it's very subtle traits, variation, or lack of variation that get overlooked and potential is lost.


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## johno

Methinks using the hard Bond method is like trying to make sourdough bread by using gunpowder instead of flour.
Johno


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## Riverderwent

johno said:


> Methinks using the hard Bond method is like trying to make sourdough bread by using gunpowder instead of flour.
> Johno


It depends on the bees and the location.


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## Riverderwent

JRG13 said:


> Sometimes it's very subtle traits, variation, or lack of variation that get overlooked and potential is lost.


That is a good point. Such as mite tolerance.


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## JRG13

That's a given River, but more to the point, how do you pick the queen mother's vs the drone mother's within your breeding population? For some populations it may not matter, but if you're trying to introgress your resistance, picking a queen with more stable uniformity in their offspring for the queen mother would be more ideal. If you're trying to mine out combinations, then mother's with more variation or apparent diversity in drone matings might make more sense.


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## johno

I think it was John Kefus in France that came up with the Bond method of breeding, he would pay beekeepers a certain amount for every mite that they found in his colonies. So we would deduce that his bees had few mites and must have had a means of keeping a mite population in check, or perhaps a shortage of mites in his location whatever the cause his bees taken elsewhere went the same way as other mite infested bees in their new location. So is it the bees or the location. Do your bees have mites, do you know, do your bees survive in other locations do you know. If you could guarantee that your bees are mite resistant in any location you could expect a very good price for these bees, I would say you could not keep up with the demand unless of course they produced little honey. So tell us about these bees of yours or about your guarantee or where these bees may be purchased.
Johno


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## Michael Palmer

Fusion_power said:


> I wonder how Brother Adam would have approached this?



Maybe continue to raise his lines, bring in scutellata to make some new crosses, and if he found anything worthy, select out their defensive attitude.


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## Fusion_power

Scutellata is not necessarily the best choice. Monticola or Littorea might make better sense if we knew the traits they would bring to the table.

The one favorable trait I've seen in Scutellata is beetle resistance. IMO, there is quite a bit of potential in BWeaver's bees if the aggression/defensiveness could be toned down.


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## Riverderwent

JRG13 said:


> That's a given River, but more to the point, how do you pick the queen mother's vs the drone mother's within your breeding population? For some populations it may not matter, but if you're trying to introgress your resistance, picking a queen with more stable uniformity in their offspring for the queen mother would be more ideal. If you're trying to mine out combinations, then mother's with more variation or apparent diversity in drone matings might make more sense.


I am not sure if the first part of your comment is rhetorical, or if you are asking me specifically how I do it. If the latter, I'm not that sophisticated. (I'm likely one of those average folks you mentioned in post #134.) I'm not trying to breed bees with specific, isolated traits that promote survival without treatment. (But I appreciate folks that do that.) I'm trying to breed colonies of bees with a mix of qualities to allow them to survive, produce at economically viable levels, and reproduce sustainably in my location without treatments.


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## JRG13

It was a rhetorical question more than anything.


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## BernhardHeuvel

Fusion_power said:


> I wonder how Brother Adam would have approached this?


Artificial insemination. I wonder if his successes were possible without artificial insemination. 

Monticola is a good choice. Erik Österlund brought them to Sweden and crossed it with the original Buckfast bee, which turn out in Elgon bees. I have descendants of those Elgons and they exhibit low mite populations all year round. Significantly lower than other bee strains I tried. 

I wonder if black bees crossed with monticola would produce interesting outcomes. Old World Black bees (Apis mellifera mellifera) have a long life expectancy, longevity. In contrary to most modern bee races. Must have something to do with Vitellogenin levels in those bees. Since varroa feeds on vitellogenin (see: http://community.lsoft.com/scripts/wa-LSOFTDONATIONS.exe?A2=bee-l;ebbfa787.1611), a higher level of it could be beneficial. I am crossing in Elgon+Buckfast to make those bees usable for commercial purposes.

That's what I am going to breed. Black bees with Elgon bees. I want a dark Buckfast.


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## Riverderwent

Fusion_power said:


> I wonder how Brother Adam would have approached this?


By accumulating promising genetic contributions from foreign parts and letting this version of "Acarine disease" run its course.


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## BadBeeKeeper

Rusty Hills Farm said:


> This has been/still is my problem with tf/VSH/etc. I tried it. I went from honey yields of 75-100# per hive to 2 PINTS per hive. *Personally I am not altruistic here. I keep bees for honey.* On my budget I cannot afford bees who don't even support themselves let alone me. I could not make resistant stock work in a self-supporting apiary. *There has to be another answer. But I know I am not gonna be the one to find it--not in my tiny yard--so I stopped looking for pie in the sky and went back to making honey.*


That is kind of my view as well. I recognize that mites are a problem, and I have a solution- I kill them. I use Formic Acid, it's quick, it's easy, and it works, year after year. People want to talk about developing resistance, genetic modifications and all that sort of stuff...well, I'm less interested in that than in making honey. I can deal with the mites directly.

I see this as being sort of like the way some people talk about solving problems with criminals, wanting to 'rehabilitate' them, talking about recidivism rates and 're-education' and 'environment'...well, I don't care much about that either, I have a solution for that, too, and when it affects me I use the immediate solution, problem solved.



> For some reason some people are drawn to the most "far out" and mystical promises! It is hard to help them.


That's why religion is still so prominent, despite all of our advances in scientific knowledge, and related to why so many people will believe the looniest 'conspiracy theories' that come down the pike.


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## Daniel Y

beemandan said:


> It's ok for someone to say, with regard to commercial beekeeping, 'it's failing to some degree' without a spiff of support. Yet if I respond with a clear indication of its success.... I'm guilty of giving a narrow, inaccurate impression?
> Got it.


Because it is not a clear indication of anything. You fail to measure the increase in hive production to achieve that miniscule increase in hives. With hundreds of thousands of hives produced each year. why are there not millions of additional hives? You take no account of losses and that is not only inaccurate measurement. it is outright deceptive or ignorant in light of other common knowledge about bees. The only reason there are any bees is due to extreme production of them in attempts to preserve them. 
You claim fails to take in the millions of hives lost every year. the only reason there are more of them is because they are replaced at an excessive rate. there are more as a hedge against the need for fewer. Such as evidence like comments "If you want 2 hives, keep 5". So if there are 5 million hives in the US that would indicate that only 2 Million are actually productive. Your measurement does not take that into account either. If you want a car to drive to work own three. that is efficient according to you. Come and visit us though. we like people that count like you do. they walk into a casino with $100 dollars and walk out with $99 and think they won $99. Forget about the billions of dollars it costs to maintain any number of hives. none of that matters as long as the numbers are greater, right?


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## jim lyon

My experience, and it hasn't changed much over the past 20 years, is make up an extra 10% to get honey production in the coming summer off a given number of hives. And making up about 1/3rd extra is usually enough to assure you a given number of rentable hives late the following winter. Of course lots of different management techniques out there in lots of different environmental situations. Beekeeping Nirvana is largely a myth, if it ever existed, I was never able to experience it over a 12 month period in my 45 years of commercial management experience.


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## beemandan

Daniel Y said:


> Because it is not a clear indication of anything.


So....I'm held to a rigid standard where I must prove at great length my generalized statement. At the same time the person I'm responding to has no such requirement. Is that because you agree with him and therefore what he says is irrefutable fact?

I understand your egocentric, one sided rules. I don't intend to abide by them.


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## beemandan

In the article cited for this thread Randy Oliver says that he wrote the first draft in 2008 but felt then that the industry was not ready for it. Wouldn't it have been more meaningful if he'd begun to follow his own advice then and by now....8 years later....when the industry is ready for it.....he would have personal proof of the concepts?


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## Richard Cryberg

Daniel Y said:


> Because it is not a clear indication of anything. You fail to measure the increase in hive production to achieve that miniscule increase in hives. With hundreds of thousands of hives produced each year. why are there not millions of additional hives? You take no account of losses and that is not only inaccurate measurement. it is outright deceptive or ignorant in light of other common knowledge about bees. The only reason there are any bees is due to extreme production of them in attempts to preserve them.
> You claim fails to take in the millions of hives lost every year. the only reason there are more of them is because they are replaced at an excessive rate. there are more as a hedge against the need for fewer. Such as evidence like comments "If you want 2 hives, keep 5". So if there are 5 million hives in the US that would indicate that only 2 Million are actually productive. Your measurement does not take that into account either. If you want a car to drive to work own three. that is efficient according to you. Come and visit us though. we like people that count like you do. they walk into a casino with $100 dollars and walk out with $99 and think they won $99. Forget about the billions of dollars it costs to maintain any number of hives. none of that matters as long as the numbers are greater, right?


Records for commercial honey producers show that clear back in the 1800s and early 1900s it was common to have 20%+ hive deaths over winter. It is common today for well managed apiaries to have well less than that rate of deaths. So Daniels tears of distress are pure fiction. So, why are so many hives and nucs and packages sold each year? Mainly because back yard bee keepers are able to kill them at an astonishing rate. That is ok. This situation is making the commercial guys rich. The money is going to where it belongs. I will be the first to admit there are also a small number of commercial guys whose business model is to not over winter hives. This can be an excellent business model and may involve either simply letting the bees die or selling them off in the fall. In either case they buy new packages come spring.


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## Riverderwent

It would be helpful to see a graph showing the average number of packages sold per transaction by package sellers or distributors. I don't buy bees; I sell them. I've never bought or sold a package or heard beekeepers that I know in this area talk about buying or using packages. Our club doesn't get involved in package sales. I don't doubt that it happens. There are a lot of commercial queens and some local nucs that are bought and sold. Maybe it's a location thing.


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## squarepeg

beemandan said:


> In the article cited for this thread Randy Oliver says that he wrote the first draft in 2008 but felt then that the industry was not ready for it. Wouldn't it have been more meaningful if he'd begun to follow his own advice then and by now....8 years later....when the industry is ready for it.....he would have personal proof of the concepts?


good point dan. since randy is an integral part of the 'industry' and his livelihood depends on bees one might surmise by extension that he was also not ready for it.

i suppose we'll have to wait for the next articles to see what if anything has changed from randy's perspective and what if any 'practical applications' are put forth.

a proof of concept may be difficult to generate given that very few beekeeping operations exist in a bubble, i.e. our experiences tend to be influenced to some degree on what those around us are doing. 

that, and the fact that what works here and for these management goals may not work there and for different goals.

my guess is that randy is going to propose a paradigm shift with respect to selecting and breeding for better survivability with less intervention. my prediction is that this will be a hard sell and that most beekeepers will continue to follow the easier tried and true path.

as is evidenced by some of the replies above, it may be asking too much for folks to give up the short term sure thing in lieu of working toward a potentially more sustainable longer term goal, especially when there is so much disagreement on how sustainable or not our current paradigm is.


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## jim lyon

Richard Cryberg said:


> Records for commercial honey producers show that clear back in the 1800s and early 1900s it was common to have 20%+ hive deaths over winter. It is common today for well managed apiaries to have well less than that rate of deaths. So Daniels tears of distress are pure fiction. So, why are so many hives and nucs and packages sold each year? Mainly because back yard bee keepers are able to kill them at an astonishing rate. That is ok. This situation is making the commercial guys rich. The money is going to where it belongs. I will be the first to admit there are also a small number of commercial guys whose business model is to not over winter hives. This can be an excellent business model and may involve either simply letting the bees die or selling them off in the fall. In either case they buy new packages come spring.


I recently came across some of my old bee yard records from the late 1970's when I kept bees in central Minnesota. I was struck by how similar my year to year losses were to what I experience today though, not surprisingly, summer losses were less in those days.


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## squarepeg

jim lyon said:


> I recently came across some of my old bee yard records from the late 1970's when I kept bees in central Minnesota. I was struck by how similar my year to year losses were to what I experience today though, not surprisingly, summer losses were less in those days.


sounds like what has changed for you more than anything are the inputs required to achieve those comparable outputs.

you mentioned in an earlier post that there are many different business models when it comes to commercial beekeeping operations.

as a relatively new kid on the block and a very small timer compared to you jim...

i'll have to say that i think that your model makes the most sense and is the most forward thinking.

what i mean by that is becoming hands on with your selection and queen rearing, being smart about using nucing/brood breaks, and minimizing treatments allows you to get the desired outcomes while at the same time moving the quality of your stock forward.

i think this is what randy is doing as well and a model that i am guessing he will encourage more in the industry to adopt. i notice that ian and others are gravitating in that direction.


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## beemandan

squarepeg said:


> one might surmise by extension that he was also not ready for it.


I suspect that you are right squarepeg. I see that the ABJ is full of articles on how to keep bees without treatments. Randy is probably the only one with the name to get an audience. I do think that before Randy Oliver can get his message heard he's going to have to offer some firsthand proof.


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## squarepeg

yes dan, i was surprised to see treatment free getting as much coverage over the past months as it has. 

still, we who are tf tend to be in a small minority with estimates at 10% or lower in terms of beekeepers and much less than that in terms of number of colonies. 

the encouraging thing is that folks are reporting success in diverse locations although there appear to be rather some notable exceptions.

i'm still thinking that the best way i can contribute is to expand the footprint outwards from here by propagating more from mine, getting them into others' hands, and encouraging them to do the same.


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## johno

Square, did you get anywhere with the scientific community with your offer of giving some of you survivor bees to them for testing.
Johno


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## squarepeg

both baton rouge and beltsville are interested in samples. due to rookie mistakes involving rogue virgins i fell short on what i was shooting for with regard to new queens and nucs last year and didn't have any to spare.

i'm hoping to revisit doing that this year, but my first priority is getting myself and all interested parties around here what we need for ourselves, so we'll have to see how it plays out. as our little cooperative grows and there are more of us propagating from this stock it should get easier to spare some for research.

baton rouge is only about an 8 hour drive and i have family in the area. what i would really like to do is take a couple of nucs down there and let them test the wax, pollen, and propolis in addition to seeing how the colonies overwinter. Plus, they could graft a bunch more from those to play with.


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## lharder

So how would most bees do if they were kept the same way they were in the 70's? Not very well and a truer assessment of bee health than colony count. 

Inputs have increased to stay in the same place with some nasty dips along the way. The long term management goal would be to decrease inputs, not increase them.


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## kilocharlie

Not too surprisingly, Dr. Harry H. Laidlaw said a similar thing many years ago. What America needs is a LOT of small, local bee breeders. I only disagree about the word "small" - we need all sizes of operations!

How I am going about it is to try to: 1) perfect beekeeping and queen rearing practices; 2) improve my crop bloom period overlapping by raising patches of alder, rosemary, red apple aptenia, basswood, goldenrod, eucalyptus, and a lot of other plants with our local almonds, plums, apricots, apples, pluots, nectarines, peaches, avocado, oranges, tangerines, lemons, sage, buckwheat, sumacs, rabbit brush, and mustard; 3) take the classes on instrumental insemination; 4) focus on mite-fighting traits that are non-recessive such as mite mauling, allo-grooming, brood breaks, etc.


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## squarepeg

i discovered yesterday that the february issue of abj is already available and probably has been for a few days given the discussion in the commercial subforum with regard to oxalic and shop towels.

randy starts out this month's installment by making the point that the very traits that the industry desires and is breeding for also happen to be ideally suited for perpetuating a viable varroa population.

"those huge colonies that we are so proud of are also the varroa mites’ dream come true"

he also makes the case again that honey bees can and have been documented as developing natural resistance to mites.

"It’s been clearly demonstrated that natural selection can shift an unmanaged honey bee population to some degree of mite resistance within less than a decade."

and that it's going to take the demand the beekeeping consumers to motivate the producers to pursue breeding more resistant stock.

"the queen producers respond to market demand. When the market demands mite resistance, I have full faith that they will deliver."

the rest of article presents a very thorough review of scientific findings with respect to how a. cerana has reached equilibrium with varroa, and what is known about the development of resistance so far with a. mellifera. several of the references provided are studies we have already discussed here on beesource, plus there are a few that i had not seen yet.

so this is another setting the stage article basically making the case that it's possible and desirable for the beekeeping community at large to get our heads around making this a priority.

for the nuts and bolts of what that looks like in practice we'll have to wait until next month. randy ends with:

"OK, our existing bee population (domestic plus feral) likely con- tains all the tools necessary for varroa resistance. But relax—you don’t need to know how the bees go about doing the job. We just need to select for bees that somehow figure out how to get the job done. next (hopefully): varroa-resistance breeding for dummies."

(all quotes taken from abj, february 2017 vol. 157 no. 2, pp. 147-151)


----------



## wildbranch2007

> "the queen producers respond to market demand. When the market demands mite resistance, I have full faith that they will deliver."


I've seen it happen, first thing they do is change their advertisements. ie ralphs bees now mite resistant:thumbsup:


----------



## 1102009

squarepeg said:


> "those huge colonies that we are so proud of are also the varroa mites’ dream come true"
> 
> "It’s been clearly demonstrated that natural selection can shift an unmanaged honey bee population to some degree of mite resistance within less than a decade."
> 
> and that it's going to take the demand the beekeeping consumers to motivate the producers to pursue breeding more resistant stock.
> 
> "the queen producers respond to market demand. When the market demands mite resistance, I have full faith that they will deliver."
> 
> so this is another setting the stage article basically making the case that it's possible and desirable for the beekeeping community at large to get our heads around making this a priority.
> 
> 
> 
> (all quotes taken from abj, february 2017 vol. 157 no. 2, pp. 147-151)


Oh god! Hope never dies. This will never happen in europe in my lifetime. Huge honey producing colonies... do you know why beekeepers here are interested in tf if they are? 
Because they are able to exploit more the bees, harvesting until fall, and save the costs of treating.
And the consumers... they want to buy cheap!


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## msl

seeley would agree, and so does this study https://naldc.nal.usda.gov/naldc/download.xhtml?id=27253&content=PDF
showing the survival and swarming rates of pre varroa, arrival, and post varroa feral hives.
Shows the feral bees bounce back in 5 years 
it also puts a hole in the ideal of historical natural beekeeping as in the pre Varroa era the ferals only were lasting 14 mounths

the the traits we want in domestic stock are often at odds with its natural survival... ie turkey stocks that have to be II because there breasts are so big they cant mate , so you treat, cause you get what you want/need out of the stock

edit-found the randy oliver qoate I was trying to paraphrase above 
"Domestication of a species typically creates (at the genetic level) a dependency upon human husbandry such that the animal finds it difficult to live in the wild [21]. The reason for this is that when we select for certain characteristics desirable by humans, there is a quid pro quo—something must be given up for something in return (a zero sum game). That something given in return for high honey production, color, or docility may be a reduced ability to survive in the wild
For example, humans have bred the silkworm for thousands of years, developing hundreds of varieties selected for higher silk production (more than tripling that production since the year 1800 [22]). But such improvement came at a considerable cost—the domesticated silkworm is no longer able to survive in the wild."

the question is what the quid pro quo? What is the trade off for mite resistance, and can bees be kept commercial viably with said trade in the currant market conditions.


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## Cloverdale

HarryVanderpool said:


> The best example of how totally lost we are is our methods of assessing mite loads in a hive.
> We go to a hive, scoop up an estimated amount of bees, remove the mites and declare a proportional amount for the hive.
> 
> What? Did we all flunk 7th grade math?!!
> 
> We are using AN INCOMPLETE EQUATION!
> Mite load assessment requires AT LEAST a two part equation.
> 
> If I ask you, "How long is a string?" you cannot give an accurate answer because I have asked you to solve an incomplete equation.
> 
> The alcohol, or powdered sugar test is PART of the equation, the hive population and square inches of brood in the hive are the other half.
> 
> Every year about 20,000 hives go to the desert here in Oregon to pollinate hybrid seed crops and every year I hear the same words from the beekeepers bringing the bees back home, "The mite populations really spiked!!!"
> Every year they say that.
> But the mite populations in their hives DID NOT spike. In fact, their mite loads are on the decrease when they say that.
> Why? Because the hives are almost completely broodless when coming out of the desert.
> The beekeepers know that, but there they are with the pint jar and the bottle of alcohol looking at only one half of the equation.
> Is it any surprise to anyone that a large population in a hive that has gone broodless will have a higher phoretic load??
> 
> We need to wake up!


:thumbsup:


----------



## Roland

Was it Harry that wrote?:

"I would be very surprised to hear that anyone with any experience in beekeeping would not rate varroa and queen issues as the top two problems these days in our operations."

We should meet the experience criteria, having been commercial beekeepers since 1852. Surprise, Surprise, we do NOT rank mites in the top 2 problems. Maybe down past 5 or 6. Mites are something that we CAN control. Queen issues ARE a problem, although not severe, because they are harder to control. It helps to not use any synthetic miticides that build in the wax, but we suspect external chemicals to be the leading culprit.

As for the biggest problem - Summer losses. Dead bees do not make honey. Something has dramatically changed in the last 6 years, and I do not believe it can be directly blamed on mites.

Crazy Roland


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## JRG13

I can agree with Randy somewhat, but ask someone like Tim Ives what he thinks about his colonies and mites.... He says his bees outbreed them. I've yet to see any queens capable of doing this in this area on our modest forage


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## radallo

Very interesting thread! Several point have been raised... don't actually know where to start...

Let's start with the idea that "resistence" is not the appropriate word maybe.. we can try to increase "tolerance" to mites..

Are we far away from the solution? Yes, I think most of our ideas (genetic, chemicals, IPM methods) are actually vanished in their efficacy: until the beekeeping industry will not change their mind on that, most of the effort will be vanished. Anyway, in the meantime, we acquired a lot of more knowledge.

We don't need to stop and restart in a single moment. We need to start thinking and behaving differently. Firts year on 10% of our colonies, second year on 25%.. and so on...

Is "selection" or "IPM" an extra cost? sure it is. We should consider that, as we consider buying equipments or trucks. I personally know some commercial (at least for EU / Italian standards) size operations (around 2000hives) that are runned with no chemicals and make good profit from their job. As I know commercial queen producers that "invest" a share of their time in selection and have a profitable income anyway.

Looking at the mite perspective? (hemolimph bait, odour camouflage at receptive larval stage, mites sex pheromones..) yes, this is another option, but only at research level so far.. we as beekeeper cannot take part in that.

Is RNAi a tool? most against DWV rather than mites itself, but again, not something we as beekeeper can rely on.

Is it a race to who comes first with the best genetic? No, it's not, since the genetic by itself will not be the solution.

Should we wait until some "magic stick" will be delivered either by scientists or privates? No, I don't think so.

I think everybody should start doing his/her own math about costs, and try to start thinking and behaving differently: the last 30 years proved if we, beekeepers, will not change our future will be more chemicals, more colonies needed to have the same income and so on..

Anyway, again, great thread! There are a lot of good beekeepers out there!


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## Riverderwent

squarepeg said:


> "next (hopefully): varroa-resistance breeding for dummies." (all quotes taken from abj, february 2017 vol. 157 no. 2, pp. 147-151)


Randy says, "We can surmount 'em,"
But Harry says, "We still can't count 'em."
Kefuss says, "Just let them die."
Enjambre says, "I don't see why."
Ollie says, "I'll catch your swarm,"
And MP says to keep them warm.
Meanwhile, Kirk's gone off the grid, 
And Acebird's playing with his kids.
Squarepeg, says, "It works for me,"
And others say they'll wait and see.
River says he's raising chickens,
And Barry says, "Just keep on clickin'."


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## squarepeg

:applause: bravo david!


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## squarepeg

expecting randy's next installment any day now.


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## radallo

Riverderwent said:


> Randy says, "We can surmount 'em,"
> But Harry says, "We still can't count 'em."
> Kefuss says, "Just let them die."
> Enjambre says, "I don't see why."
> Ollie says, "I'll catch your swarm,"
> And MP says to keep them warm.
> Meanwhile, Kirk's gone off the grid,
> And Acebird's playing with his kids.
> Squarepeg, says, "It works for me,"
> And others say they'll wait and see.
> River says he's raising chickens,
> And Barry says, "Just keep on clickin'."


great one!!:thumbsup:


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## minz

squarepeg said:


> expecting randy's next installment any day now.


He posted an update this last weekend.
http://scientificbeekeeping.com/oxalic-shop-towel-updates/


----------



## costigaj

With a subscription, can you read prior issues?


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## beemandan

costigaj said:


> With a subscription, can you read prior issues?


Yes


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## squarepeg

just got home to find the march issue is now available. this month's installment by randy is entitled "The Varroa Problem-Part 6a-Bee Breeding for Dummies"

going to dig into it after some lasagna and a michelob light or two.

costigaj, i subscribed in late december and i can see prior issues going back to january 2013.


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## gww

Squarepeg
We used to only get michelob light on pay day. Had to drink bush the rest of the time. Your bees really are doing well.
Cheers
gww


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## Adam Foster Collins

It appears Randy posted another update to his site on Valentine's Day.

http://scientificbeekeeping.com/oxalic-shop-towel-updates/


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## Brad Bee

I'm subscribing to this thread....

I'll preface my comment by saying I'm probably the worst beekeeper on the board, BUT I don't think breeding a mite resistant bee will be the solution to the problem..... I've had the very same bees in my apiary that squarepeg has and I couldn't pull it off. I could pull it off for a little while, but after an outcrossing, it didn't work.

Lets say I had a line of 100% mite proof bees capable of making 150lbs of surplus honey per hive, with every positive trait desireable for commercial beekeepers and I was able to instrumentally inseminate 50,000 queens from my "golden goose" per year, how many years would it be until that line of bees was scattered abroad enough that the population of bees in the US was mite proof? 

I'm looking for a response from the BIG guys here. The commercial folks. If I or someone else had a line of bees that claimed to be what I just wrote, how many queens would you try the first year they were available? I'm guessing 1% of your total volume would be a good number? 

I think the transiition of people moving to a bee that even had documented proof that it was mite PROOF would be so slow that the genes needed to be mite PROOF would get diluted out so quickly that they'd never dominate the landscape.


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## squarepeg

cheers gww!


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## squarepeg

so it looks like those of us with smaller operations are going to have to wait until next month for specific recommendations on how to transition to increasingly more mite resistant stock. this month's installment was geared primarily to the industry's larger producers, i.e. those breeding 100's and 1000's of queens each year.

in a nutshell randy is suggesting that breeders start with a large number of colonies, track mite counts on colonies starting early in the season, gradually isolate the ones with the lowest counts, and treat the ones with the highest counts while removing from the pool.

at the end of the season the remaining ones with the lowest counts are allowed to overwinter untreated and the best of those are used to graft from the following season. the process is then repeated season after season.

this abbreviated synopsis doesn't do justice to the wealth of good information in the article, including references to studies detailing various strategies that have shown success in moving the ball forward with respect to breeding for mite resistance.

it will be interesting to see what randy has in store for us smaller operators next month.


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## squarepeg

brad, my take is that randy is making the case if the breeders who supply your medicating neighbor were appropriately 'incentivized' to take this on then over time we would no longer have to contend with the 'dilution' problem.

it's really the 5% of all beekeepers that manage 95% of all colonies that have the clout to motivate the breeders. i think randy is admonishing the industry as a whole to get serious about it and providing a practical road map as to how that might be accomplished.


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## msl

Brad Bee said:


> how many years would it be until that line of bees was scattered abroad enough that the population of bees in the US was mite proof?
> *smip* I think the transiition of people moving to a bee that even had documented proof that it was mite PROOF would be so slow that the genes needed to be mite PROOF would get diluted out so quickly that they'd never dominate the landscape.


if people stopped treating it would happen very fast 

We have people breeding and selling "buckfast" "Russian" "minnesota hygienic" etc no reason to think BMK (brads mite killers) would just fade off in to the sun set any faster

I really don't thing dilution is the hurdle, it's what it the cost for the traite.. The super bee that has every thing a bee keeper wants will never happen.


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## Riverderwent

There are many feral hives around here. I know where a number are. I got a call about another one today (supposedly been there for 10 years), and I will get calls about many more over the next three or four months. The ones that are varroa resistant and healthy will hold their spot and send out both drones and swarms. The ones that are overrun by varroa will die out and their spots will go through a succession of non-resistant colonies until a resistant colony with staying power moves in. The "steady state" condition is a mite resistant or tolerant hive because the others die off. That resistant colony will begin putting out drones and swarms. These successful varroa resistant feral hives have a disproportionate amount of drone comb compared to managed hives which are managed to have little or no drone come. So the feral colonies have a disproportionate influence on the local gene pool.


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## Brad Bee

msl said:


> no reason to think BMK (brads mite killers) would just fade off in to the sun set any faster


It's not that I think they would fade off into the sunset, it's that I know the majority of people would not pinch their queens and use them. You can't breed for mite "proofness" unless everybody has mite proof bees. That was my point. We won't breed super bees because everybody won't use them. Their genes will get diluted into mite prone bees very quickly. Then you'll just have more debate that "Mite proof" bees don't work.


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## Ian

Maybe we can find those sniffer dog bees which groom and search each other to bite and kill those mites. 
If anyone has one of those bees I want to breed from them


----------



## Daniel Y

Brad Bee said:


> It's not that I think they would fade off into the sunset, it's that I know the majority of people would not pinch their queens and use them. You can't breed for mite "proofness" unless everybody has mite proof bees. That was my point. We won't breed super bees because everybody won't use them. Their genes will get diluted into mite prone bees very quickly. Then you'll just have more debate that "Mite proof" bees don't work.


I thought it was "Survival of the fittest"? Does mite resistance somehow make the bees less fit? Or maybe the whole idea of survival of the fittest is a fallacy. Doesn't seem to be working well for breeders by any means. I personally subscribe to the idea that survival is entirely random and produces a vast variety. But I do find it curious that those very people that attempt to produce a fitter breed do not then believe it will in fact prevail. But they will argue that it will in any other context.


----------



## Ian

Daniel Y said:


> I thought it was "Survival of the fittest"? Does mite resistance somehow make the bees less fit? Or maybe the whole idea of survival of the fittest is a fallacy. Doesn't seem to be working well for breeders by any means. I personally subscribe to the idea that survival is entirely random and produces a vast variety. But I do find it curious that those very people that attempt to produce a fitter breed do not then believe it will in fact prevail. But they will argue that it will in any other context.


X2


----------



## beemandan

msl said:


> if people stopped treating it would happen very fast


 A rather common opinion...stated as a fact..... without any scientific support. It is just as likely...in my opinion..... that there would be widespread collapse and eventually there would remain small pockets of European honey bees struggling for survival, with a few anecdotal reports of thriving colonies. 
What gives your opinion more merit than mine?


----------



## Nordak

> Does mite resistance somehow make the bees less fit?


No.



> I personally subscribe to the idea that survival is entirely random and produces a vast variety.


Not random, selected. By what pressures will determine success regarding mite resistance and the varietal mechanisms exhibited. I suppose there is a sort of randomness by appearance. I believe that's only a part of the whole though. The vast variety you mentioned, I think there's definitely something to that. Bees are only part of that equation. There is a miniature ecosystem at work in a hive. Remove most of the variables and suddenly the bees aren't as resistant. The recent DWV studies come to mind as an example of this. I'm not convinced we can breed a "bee for all" because of the variability of success and our lack of understanding of why it's working when it does. It's not just about the bee, but all of our research is dedicated to that idea. If there were a "bee for all," not everyone is going to want it as mentioned already. JMHO.


----------



## msl

beemandan I think you are misreading me
The context was, if sold, proven, 100% mite proof stock that had "every positive trait desirable for commercial beekeepers " was flooding the market, and people stopped treating their stock, its geneticists would quickly dominate managed bees. It was a joke, but also true.

as for "Survival of the fittest" is natural selection and has no bearing on domestic stock as they are selectected for what the beekeeper wants.


> We won't breed super bees because everybody won't use them. Their genes will get diluted into mite prone bees very quickly


so how do we maintain lines of Buckfast, Carnys, Italians etc ?
if you indeed were to breed a stable race of super bee, why would it not dominate the market? it surely wood, as you say "every positive trait desirable for commercial beekeepers "
Winters on tennis ball sized cluster using almost no stores, explodes up in time for almonds. Mite, Efb, Afb, Nosema, SHB proof. Completely docile and makes a huge surplus and only sees 5% winter losses, etc 

but its just not going to happen... its quid pro quo... and every traite comes at a cost

ie 


> Does mite resistance somehow make the bees less fit?


yes, it appears so. 
Maybe it depend on you definition of "fit" let's rephrase the question
"Dose the traits that create mite resistance make the bee les fit for commercial beekeeping" (at the moment)
That, in almost across the board is a yes, If the answer was not yes, then we would see it being a common place trate in commercial stock
Small clusters, swarmy, and low productivity seems to come hand in hand with mite resistance. I am fine with that as a hobbyist, if my bees are alive and I can make a split and a few gallons of honey I am happy... but in the real world the $$ is king

The stock will not change until the balance of the $ shifts, when its cheaper/more profitable to treat, people will keep treating, even if the margin is just a few dollars a hive, when people run 1K+ hives it adds up fast. 

Say I have some ProVap 110s.. and with labor it runs me $2 a treatment (its likely less then that) if I treat 10x a year and my treated hives make $30 more honey then hives with TF stock, that's $10k more in the bank. Is it sustainable? maybe, maybe not, but if I don't get threw this year, it doesn't matter what 10 years down the road will look like 
its the Tragedy of the commons (sort of)


----------



## lharder

Daniel Y said:


> I thought it was "Survival of the fittest"? Does mite resistance somehow make the bees less fit? Or maybe the whole idea of survival of the fittest is a fallacy. Doesn't seem to be working well for breeders by any means. I personally subscribe to the idea that survival is entirely random and produces a vast variety. But I do find it curious that those very people that attempt to produce a fitter breed do not then believe it will in fact prevail. But they will argue that it will in any other context.


Numerous studies show this is not the case. Survival of the fittest and resultant genetic shift has been shown over and over in all sorts of contexts. If it isn't happening to bees (and in some cases it most certainly is), then we have to examine the factors that prevent it. They are inevitably the result of artificial interventions. My list is

1. removal of selection pressure via treatment.
2. movement of bees and viruses across regions creating adaptive environments that are too dynamic.
3. high hive density that results in disease amplification. 

Now this list doesn't mean that these things should be totally stopped. But there is a continuum of backing off of these things that could/would improve honey bee health.


----------



## beemandan

msl said:


> The context was, if sold, proven, 100% mite proof stock that had "every positive trait desirable for commercial beekeepers " was flooding the market, and people stopped treating their stock, its geneticists would quickly dominate managed bees. It was a joke, but also true.


Sorry....I guess I missed some of that in the earlier post. And I agree with it as described.


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## Riverderwent

"We’ve fought varroa with flyswatters and Band-Aids for over two decades. It’s time to move to a more serious and sustainable solution—handing the job over to the bees themselves. There is abundant evidence that this long-term solution is within our grasp." Randy Oliver. Mr. Oliver cites a lot of evidence in the article that is the subject of this thread to support his opinion. His opinion is consistent with my experience.


----------



## msl

> I've had the very same bees in my apiary that squarepeg has and I couldn't pull it off. I could pull it off for a little while, but after an outcrossing, it didn't work.


Question, are you in the same ecoregion as SP? it looks like there is a chance you may not be
ftp://newftp.epa.gov/EPADataCommons/ORD/Ecoregions/al/alga_front.pdf


----------



## squarepeg

ian, i don't know if you have access to the abj or not, but this month's installment is geared to operators like yourself, i.e. those having fairly sizable operations that are undertaking their own queen rearing in house.

i realize that you are in the early phases of your queen breeding program, but i am wondering if you've made any decisions with regard to how you are going to approach the selecting of breeder queens.

will you be looking to graft from the best of your best, importing breeder queens, or perhaps a combination of both? 

what do you think about randy's concept of tracking mite counts in all of the colonies, treating as needed but holding off on treating the ones with the lowest counts, narrowing those down to a small percentage, overwintering them off treatments, and then potentially breeding from the strongest of those in the following season?


----------



## Ian

squarepeg that is the perfect question, "how you are going to approach the selecting of breeder queens?"
It's a question I've posted and ill stop the comment there...

Yes I'm adopting a selection criteria. Quiet, conservative, instant spring growth, longevity .. all those good things everyone looks for. Those will be selected from within my operation. 
As for mite resistance, yes, I'll be running my own project. I have not read Randy Oliver's approach but I Want to achieve success through a practicality. 
These will be Queens brought in from breeders who employ selection practices far advanced from mine and breeders queens from within my operation after I'm finished grafting from them. I'll challenge them with managing mites and maybe find something. But I don't believe in live and let die...
I'll be watching daughters and watch for similar characteristics. Just the vary nature of mating makes year to year tracking impossible but at least I can track the mother lines

AND HOPEFULLY PULL SOMETHING OUT OF ????

I don't know , anyone got a road map I can follow?


----------



## Ian

I'm looking for sniffer dog bees squarepeg, know of any kicking around ?? You know, the ones which apparently search and distory mites


----------



## squarepeg

Ian said:


> ...anyone got a road map I can follow?


randy's got the start of one but it will cost you $18 u.s. to read it, unless you want to wait a few months and then it will be free access on his website.

the biggest draw back as i see it is doing all those mite counts in the beginning stages.

no sniffers down this way, at least none that i am aware of. 

thanks for the replies ian, looking forward to seeing how things play out for you.


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## Ian

I think you know where I stand on this whole issue squarepeg, I've removed my critical comments from your discussion because my voice wasn't adding anything productive to the conversation. But reading your philosophy on the matter and trying to construct some sence out of the matter is enlightening. 

So some may ask, why venture into a project which potentialy will yield nothing? Well because of all the benefits along the way. 
Monitoring and observing, recording , selecting, culling, challenging, breeding, controlling,... more for everything else rather than finding that silver lined queen. 
It's the process I'm interested in and all these connections along the way including yours. 
Conversation is what I'm after, it gives me the brief chances to pick brains. Annoying as **** but useful to me :thumbsup:


----------



## Ian

I hold Randy Oliver in high esteem. 
Throughout Internet forum discussion not only have I had the opportunity to speak directly to him through message boards but also briefly in private messaging. 
Picking the brain of one of our industries most influential beekeepers, and gleaning tremendous insight from our discussions. 

Where else can that happen? Internet conversation is a powerful thing.


----------



## squarepeg

Ian said:


> ... it gives me the brief chances to pick brains.


please continue to pick away ian, as it gives the rest of a the opportunity to do so vicariously through you. 

i thought about you when i came across this comment in randy's recent article:

"Dr. Bob Danka pointed out at this year’s National Conference, the North American bee population already contains the tools necessary for mite resistance. In fact, if you run a large operation, it’s likely that there’s enough genetic diversity already in your own hives to begin a selection process"

i also predicted in an earlier post to this thread that what randy is going to be up against in his endeavor is complacency with many folks finding it easier and perhaps less resource intensive to carry on with the status quo. 

it seems mites are the single biggest problem facing beekeepers, but not really a big enough problem to motivate folks to make a paradigm shift.

for me i don't really have a dog in this fight because thankfully i'm good to go with my local population being what it is, but like you i enjoy the conversation.


----------



## Ian

""Dr. Bob Danka pointed out at this year’s National Conference, the North American bee population already contains the tools necessary for mite resistance. In fact, if you run a large operation, it’s likely that there’s enough genetic diversity already in your own hives to begin a selection process"

Yea I guess, it's that process and road map that I've been starving for . 

My neighbours ( use to be neighbour) bought out a 1200 hive op, and with his good intentions determined exactly what was quoted above. 
Bankrupt (thank goodness ) in a few years...
Dead bees, debt and overhead killed the project. 
Now let's do this bigger and smarter... like *** ******* smart? And big?? And a well respected and connected Queen breeder. There is hardly anything that would prove as good enough to hang a hat on after some what 15-20 years? 

I doubt my small well intended mite selection would yield any difference to handle the commercial pressures I place on my stock. 

What can I glean from this? build a process which will allow me to recapture traits lost in this whole process., and who know, maybe the strategy will pull through and I'll be ready to take it


----------



## Ian

But that's enough said, I'll back away again.

I am encouraged to hear of your TF results squarepeg, I shoukd buy a queen and toss it into the wolf pack, see where it sorts out
Interest sake


----------



## squarepeg

Ian said:


> Yea I guess, it's that process and road map that I've been starving for.
> 
> I doubt my small well intended mite selection would yield any difference to handle the commercial pressures I place on my stock.


like with many of his other projects randy will beta testing his 'road map' using his own commercial operation. i'm guessing he will have meaningful results in much less than 15 years.

again, i'm not trying to talk anybody into or out of anything here. 

i would be interested in what your thoughts are on the specifics of randy's proposal, perhaps he has a *** ******* better plan than your former neighbor did.

if you pm me your email address i'll gift you a subscription to the abj so we can pick it apart, but if you are tiring of this discussion no worries. have a good one ian.


----------



## Ian

Oh I'm not tired of this conversation, I love it, I just don't want to hang a wet blanket on it 

I have my copy of the ABJ right here , I have not gotten to it yet, till right now ...


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## squarepeg

cool. we want the no holds barred wet blanket review ian.


----------



## Fusion_power

> Beemandan: A rather common opinion...stated as a fact..... without any scientific support. It is just as likely...in my opinion..... that there would be widespread collapse and eventually there would remain small pockets of European honey bees struggling for survival, with a few anecdotal reports of thriving colonies.
> What gives your opinion more merit than mine?


 I object to that "without any scientific support" statement. The evidence out of South Africa is pretty well documented. They did not treat, the bees developed resistance in 3 years. Perhaps you want some guy with "phd" after his name to do something official. I'm willing to accept that bees in South Africa do not need to be treated.


----------



## Ian

I'll have to wait for the March issue to arrive In mail where he speaks of Varroa Resistance Breeding for Dummies
That's the part I'm extremely interested in , his selection process


----------



## jean-marc

squarepeg said:


> please continue to pick away ian, as it gives the rest of a the opportunity to do so vicariously through you.
> 
> i thought about you when i came across this comment in randy's recent article:
> 
> "Dr. Bob Danka pointed out at this year’s National Conference, the North American bee population already contains the tools necessary for mite resistance. In fact, if you run a large operation, it’s likely that there’s enough genetic diversity already in your own hives to begin a selection process"
> 
> "randy is going to be up against in his endeavor is complacency with many folks finding it easier and perhaps less resource intensive to carry on with the status quo."
> 
> It is not perhaps less resource intensive, it simply is less resoure intensive. All commercial beekeepers are for profit businesses. If they thought they would have more profit following Randy's lead, give him a 5 year headstart, they would all be all in. I also don't think it is a complacency thing, beekeeping and complacency don't mix well. There is always another disaster around the corner in this business.
> 
> I don't think I'll be taking the lead on this one. I'll follow and try and not to get in the way.
> 
> Jean-Marc


----------



## jean-marc

"My neighbours ( use to be neighbour) bought out a 1200 hive op, and with his good intentions determined exactly what was quoted above. "

I bet he was smart enough and kind enough to point out what you and all the other misinformed beekeepers were doing.


"Bankrupt (thank goodness ) in a few years...
Dead bees, debt and overhead killed the project."

There was one of those guys in the area a few years back, same story, he went belly up as well.


"Now let's do this bigger and smarter... like *** ******* smart? And big?? And a well respected and connected Queen breeder. There is hardly anything that would prove as good enough to hang a hat on after some what 15-20 years? 

I doubt my small well intended mite selection would yield any difference to handle the commercial pressures I place on my stock. 

What can I glean from this? build a process which will allow me to recapture traits lost in this whole process., and who know, maybe the strategy will pull through and I'll be ready to take it[/QUOTE]


My take on this is simple. Randy is probably right, some effort and resources could lead to a more varroa resistant honey bee. Unfortunately so called chinese honey on the market has put so much financial pressure on outfits that now is likely not a good time to get distracted. I am good with the status quo as far as mites go. Oxalic, formic and thymol are doing the trick for us. $1.20-$1.38/lb canadian just does not do it for us.

Jean-Marc


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## BDT123

Hey all, March issue of ABJ on-line is available. Let's get reading! 
Brian


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## Ian

....,


----------



## 1102009

Ian said:


> I'm looking for sniffer dog bees squarepeg, know of any kicking around ?? You know, the ones which apparently search and distory mites


Why is it that this traits are suppressed often with shifting the queens to another location?

Is it the workers or the queens which show this trait?

Is it perhaps a certain kind of management of the hives which triggers this? 

I do not claim this observations to be confirmed but I know of people who use Alois Wallners mite biting queens and the colonies do no mite biting.
www.voralpenhonig.at/




> in a nutshell randy is suggesting that breeders start with a large number of colonies, track mite counts on colonies starting early in the season, gradually isolate the ones with the lowest counts, and treat the ones with the highest counts while removing from the pool.


That´s what Erik Österlund does who communicates with Oliver. But with less hives. One of his (Eriks) new strategies is to use many different bee yards with different situations. Not isolated from other beekeepers, isolated and so on. No more than +-10 hives in one location.
His mite infestation limit now is 3%, 20 years before it was 15%. He has one location he treats ( with thymol) the susceptibles after detecting the first defect wings bees. In the other locations he uses his infestation limit to decide. He uses the alcohol shaker in spring and summer to decide. He opens brood cells. He started 2014 and 2015 with this projects. The susceptibles he treats in the same bee yards before they drift into the other hives. He breeds from those he treats not.
It´s a strategy to advance slowly to tf with the advantage not to loose too many bees.


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## Daniel Y

SiWolKe said:


> Why is it that this traits are suppressed often with shifting the queens to another location?


Environmental factors have a considerable influence on what genetic traits are expressed. An extreme example. all expression is suppressed in an environment that is lethal. Now you can go from that extreme down a trail to there is no environmental suppression. Such as in Genetic Hackle breeding. the very same blood lines that produce dramatic results quickly can be moved to a different location and all traits are lost. It has been attempted again and again. In regard to this conversation. it is claimed that bees likely have all the genetics required for Varroa resistance. this may very well be true. Environmental suppression may also cause those genetics to never be expressed. A simple way to think of it is that when exposed to the environment the very genetics that would make the bees resistant or tolerant of mites. are also lethal to the bee. So bees that express resistance in one location die in the next the trait is no longer expressed. Again that is an extreme example for the sake of explanation.


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## Ian

squarepeg what kinda of selection process do you employ when selecting breeders? Is it simply a flag system to identify performance or do you issolate specific traits that you breed into your stock ( like gentleness )

Si, 3% kills hives. When you see DWV it's too late, the colony is already dead.


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## beemandan

The basic concepts that Randy Oliver is suggesting have been in use for decades. Maybe not by the commercial volume producers but by countless smaller scale breeders and research groups. I know with certainty that UGA ran a queen breeding program for years along the same lines. Much of the stock from these various smaller programs found its way into commercial producer's programs. And, I do believe that is one reason that we have the level of mite resistance/tolerance that exists today.

We've been at this for decades now. I have said it before. I believe that all of the significant mite resistant traits that are hidden in the existing honey bee genome have been teased out. I think that we've hit a plateau and anything short of a miraculous mutation will result in inconsequential increments of improvement.

I hate to sound so negative but I think that Randy's writings are overly optimistic. I think now there is much more room for improvement in seeking solutions from the direction of the parasite.

I think that Randy's proposals will carry some weight once he can provide working proof that his concepts actually make a difference.


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## Ian

Squarepeg I read Randy 's Jan Feb submissions, I enjoyed the read. All I read was a mandate. It was a good set up (I hope) to the next article where he explains his game plan. That is what I need help with. The mission is set, now the commander has to convey his marching orders. It's those marching orders I'm really interested in. 
I sat there and read all the good intentions, I read about him discribing all those resistance mechanisms and for a second there I sat there feeling smart. But that is where it stops. Good intentions and hype doesn't translate a single thing into my breeding program. 

A question I've been foolishly asking over and over and every different way I can think of; 
how do you control traits in an animal with such diversity that it's nearly impossible to track those traits

How do I set up a selection program to find these traits. And when I find them how do I best propagate them, track and monitor them to continuously improve on those traits? 
Sounds simple right? Straightforward right? 
not to me and probably not to most beekeepers out there. So if the idea is to have beekeepers select and breed stock in the same intensive manner as high level breeders do, we need a road map to help organize our average minded thoughts


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## Swarmhunter

His possible road map, laid out in a yearly calendar format would be a great asset.


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## Daniel Y

One of the things that is missing for me. and glaringly. when discussing breeding of bees. I here no discussion or recognition of markers. As an example in breeding of certain Seramas. you can have a mating that produces short legged offspring. Short legs in this breed of serama are an expression of a lethal genetic combination. The chicks either die before they hatch or within days of hatching. That pair is no longer mated to each other. There is no expression in either parent that indicates there is a lethal genetic combination. It is also not true that if you see an expression, such as varroa resistance or tolerance in a queen or her offspring. that breeding her will produce the same. This comes back to what are the selection criteria as well. What exactly do you select for in order to see improved mite related performance. What genetic traits are expressed in a queen that carries the necessary genes for mite resistance? What genetic traits are expressed in drones that posses the same?


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## Ian

Squarepeg what do you use as a road map ? How are you identifying and exploiting those specific traits? What are you looking for to identify them?


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## Ian

Daniel Y said:


> One of the things that is missing for me. and glaringly. when discussing breeding of bees. I here no discussion or recognition of markers. As an example in breeding of certain Seramas. you can have a mating that produces short legged offspring. Short legs in this breed of serama are an expression of a lethal genetic combination. The chicks either die before they hatch or within days of hatching. That pair is no longer mated to each other. There is no expression in either parent that indicates there is a lethal genetic combination. It is also not true that if you see an expression, such as varroa resistance or tolerance in a queen or her offspring. that breeding her will produce the same. This comes back to what are the selection criteria as well. What exactly do you select for in order to see improved mite related performance. What genetic traits are expressed in a queen that carries the necessary genes for mite resistance? What genetic traits are expressed in drones that posses the same?


X2,


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## squarepeg

SiWolKe said:


> It´s a strategy to advance slowly to tf with the advantage not to loose too many bees.


well said sibylle, and this has been the critical piece of the puzzle that has thus far eluded us. as others have stated time well tell if randy's strategy proves effective with his own trials. given that his operation is not isolated and is dealing with all the commercial stressors it should be a meaningful test, although it may take a few seasons for it all to play out.


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## squarepeg

Ian said:


> Squarepeg what do you use as a road map ? How are you identifying and exploiting those specific traits? What are you looking for to identify them?


it's pretty straightforward for me and my small operation ian particularly since i was fortunate to be able to start with mite resistant bees from the git go.

being small allows me to keep a reasonable detailed journal on each of the hives. my selection criteria are survival, favorable response to swarm prevention, and honey production.

since all colonies are off managed off treatments survival is a given. i suppose deselection by attrition is the more powerful operator in this regard. i do look for a least 2 winters or more of colony longevity when choosing a breeder queen. 

swarm prevention and honey production go had in hand. from my journal i can see which hives were the most productive, and a la michael palmer the swarmy and not so productive ones are used for splits/nuc production.

i now have 4 queen lines that i am working with to help with diversity and part of the selection process has to do with keeping a relative balance of those lines across the operation.


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## Ian

What do those 4 queen lines represent?


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## beemandan

squarepeg said:


> given that his operation is not isolated


Actually...unless I misunderstood....in one of the earlier articles Randy had a map of his home and outyards indicating the relative isolation of them to other beekeeping operations.
Of course....I may be mistaken.


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## Ian

Do drones fly over a mile to set up into congregating sites?


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## squarepeg

Ian said:


> What do those 4 queen lines represent?


1. from a survivor that was orphaned on my property in 2009, origin unknown.
2. from a treatment free supplier (tf since 1996)
3. from fusion_power's line (tf since 2005)
4. from fatscher's line (tf since 2008)


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## squarepeg

Ian said:


> Do drones fly over a mile to set up into congregating sites?



that's conventional wisdom, but in the current article randy describes 'drone comets' chasing virgins as they leave the hives for mating.


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## squarepeg

forgot about:

5. a swarm trapped from an overwintered bee tree survivor in a friend's back yard last year.


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## Ian

For a beekeeper like myself, or the other average Joe, to execute any kind of mite tolerance program, we need to be able to identify mite reduction traits outside of holding off treatments and observing which hive keeps low counts. That strategy leads directly towards outright death... I'm not interested in risking my livelihood over good intentioned ideas. 
So I'm looking at those sniffer dog mite biting bees... as one example of mite suppression which could lead promise. is that a specific trait, or a series of complementary traits and/or does it interact with external conditions, if so how. What are all those complementary traits or behaviours and how do I look for them? 
Too many questions I answer, so I guess I'm asking the same thing as Daniel, are there or what are the behaviour, physical markers to look for with these mite suppressing specific traits


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## Ian

I apologize if I have hijacked your thread, and if I seem direct squarepeg, this is what you get when you ask me for feedback.

Those specific lines you are following are merely lines tagged to specific breeders. Are you following those specific lines out of respect to the breeders or do you actually see specific traits in them that encourage uou enough to keep then separate? 

If there is a mite reduction or mite suppression strategy employed by those breeding lines, what exactly is it?


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## Ian

"Those are the ones that survived" is not a good enough explanation. There are far too many variables involved to credit that strategy. It clouds the waters. Genetic diversity at its best can erase years of work because of an incorrect observation of a "survived" colony


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## jim lyon

squarepeg said:


> that's conventional wisdom, but in the current article randy describes 'drone comets' chasing virgins as they leave the hives for mating.


I'm convinced most of the matings are from drones pretty close to the home hive of the virgin. I once had a batch of nucs that was pretty short on drones. I decided to sandwich them between 2 strong yards each about a mile away. The take was far less than in the stronger yards.


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## 1102009

jim lyon said:


> I'm convinced most of the matings are from drones pretty close to the home hive of the virgin. I once had a batch of nucs that was pretty short on drones. I decided to sandwich them between 2 strong yards each about a mile away. The take was far less than in the stronger yards.


Really? That would be great for me. I have only small colonies in my expansion model. Do you think 2-3km are a possibility they mate with my own drones?


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## squarepeg

Ian said:


> ..we need to be able to identify mite reduction traits outside of holding off treatments and observing which hive keeps low counts.What are all those complementary traits or behaviours and how do I look for them?
> Too many questions I answer, so I guess I'm asking the same thing as Daniel, are there or what are the behaviour, physical markers to look for with these mite suppressing specific traits


you'll see when you get this month's journal that randy 'dummies' it down to mite counts alone.



Ian said:


> I apologize if I have hijacked your thread, and if I seem direct squarepeg, this is what you get when you ask me for feedback.
> 
> Those specific lines you are following are merely lines tagged to specific breeders. Are you following those specific lines out of respect to the breeders or do you actually see specific traits in them that encourage uou enough to keep then separate?
> 
> If there is a mite reduction or mite suppression strategy employed by those breeding lines, what exactly is it?


not hijacking at all ian, you are adding valuable contributions to the discussion, many thanks!

i'm dealing with highly hybridized mutts, and not looking at any specific metrics, not even mite counts, but rather overall performance.

but this month's discussion is for larger scale breeders, whereas randy will offer suggestions for us small timers next month.


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## psm1212

Ian said:


> Do drones fly over a mile to set up into congregating sites?


According to Jamie Ellis at the University of Florida Bee Lab, a drone will not fly very far to the DCA because he will need to spend the majority of his energy waiting and then mounting a queen. On the other hand, the Queen will fly much further than a drone on her mating flights because it can be mated by multiple drones in just a very few minutes. So she can spend the majority of her energy traveling to distant DCAs in order to get away from her brothers.


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## Ian

If the metric is mite counts I'm out...
I can't pressure my stock to the point of no return (VIRUS) to find a queen that may or may not be suppressing mite growth. 

In many ways your op breeding program will mirror my breeding program set up, just I have 1500 production hives off the side. 

If we know the bees suppression strategies surely we have ways to identify those traits outside of merely watching which hive keeps lower mite counts


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## Ian

psm1212 said:


> According to Jamie Ellis at the University of Florida Bee Lab, a drone will not fly very far to the DCA because he will need to spend the majority of his energy waiting and then mounting a queen. On the other hand, the Queen will fly much further than a drone on her mating flights because it can be mated by multiple drones in just a very few minutes. So she can spend the majority of her energy traveling to distant DCAs in order to get away from her brothers.


Is that a mile? Typically


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## psm1212

Ian said:


> Is that a mile? Typically


I attended a lecture of Jamie's two weeks ago. He said that drones and queens have roughly 30 minutes of "flight energy." That drones will need to reserve that energy to chase down queens. So 5 mins out, 20 mins chasing, and 5 mins back. A queen can fly for 12 mins out, mate for 5 mins, and fly 12 mins back. So, I would think that a queen could fly well over a mile for her nuptial flights. But I am not the authority on that.


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## BadBeeKeeper

Daniel Y said:


> I thought it was "Survival of the fittest"? Does mite resistance somehow make the bees less fit? Or maybe the whole idea of survival of the fittest is a fallacy. Doesn't seem to be working well for breeders by any means. I personally subscribe to the idea that survival is entirely random and produces a vast variety. But I do find it curious that those very people that attempt to produce a fitter breed do not then believe it will in fact prevail.


It would seem, that some people are under the impression that the term 'survival of the fittest' means that the fittest of all species will survive.

This is not true, and it has never been true. More than 99% of all species that have occupied this planet are extinct. Few species are able to adapt to changing conditions, and few survive over the long term. The vast majority of species have gone extinct because they could not adapt to the pressures placed upon them, due to environment, predators or other factors.

'Survival of the fittest' is applicable *only* in terms of two (or more) diverging branches of a *single* species, where one branch of the species possesses an adaptation that enhances its survival above and beyond the other branches, either because it possesses a competitive advantage that permits it to thrive at the expense of the other branch(es) or because it is able to adapt to [changing] conditions and the other branch(es) cannot. That's it, and that's all.

'Survival of the fittest' is not a guarantee that a species will survive. Some species go extinct because they cannot adapt to environmental changes, loss of habitat, predation by other species, etc. Take the dodo bird, for example. The dodo was fit enough to survive its environment, but now there are no dodo birds. Why? Because people discovered that they were tasty, and ate them. We ate them right out of existence. And that is what V. Destructor does to A. Mellifera, absent our intervention. T. Rex was arguably the fittest of its species at the time, an apex predator, yet T. Rex no longer exists. Why? Because it was unable to adapt to changing environmental/climate conditions, as were most of the other dinosaurs.

It also appears, that some people think that they can 'evolve' their bees to cope with Varroa, as though such an evolution can be forced over a short period of time. This is erroneous and misguided, and unlikely to occur over the lifespan of the average beekeeper to the extent that such bees would be able to survive anywhere where, absent V. Destructor, the climate would otherwise be conducive to their survival. While some species, such as Drosophila Melanogaster (fruit fly) can be forced to mutate relatively easily, this is not true for all species. The genome of D. Melanogaster has been mapped and is well understood, in some labs they have undergone a forced evolution over a period of about 30 years. A comparable evolution in mice would take about 200 years. How long would it take to induce a forced evolution in A. Mellifera? I don't think that is currently known, but I suspect that it would take quite a long time. How long did it take for A. M. Macedonica (the Russian bee from the Primorsky Krai) to be able to cope with mites? I don't know, but I suspect it was a very long time.

Randy states:



> Remember that varroa peacefully coexists with Apis cerana, and evolved to become less, rather than more, virulent to its original host. So our model is not to exterminate the mite, but rather to just keep it subdued.


( http://scientificbeekeeping.com/fighting-varroa-the-silver-bullet-or-brass-knuckles-2/ )

This may not be quite correct. The reason that A. Cerana copes well with mites, is that the version of Varroa that typically infests A. Cerana reproduces *only* in drone brood. The off-spring of foundress mites in worker brood are infertile. ("Varroa Mite Reproductive Biology" Zachary Huang, Michigan State University, 2012). Something specific to the worker brood of A. Cerana inhibits the sexual development of the mites. Unfortunately, we have at least two slightly divergent types of mites, and if the mite that typically infests A. Mellifera is transferred to A. Cerana it does not exhibit the same infertility in worker brood.

I believe that Randy's quote above appeared earlier than the Huang article, I don't know if he has subsequently addressed/corrected the issue.

Where was I going with this? Oh, yes, "survival of the fittest"...in my opinion, absent intervention by us, most sub-species of A. Mellifera would cease to exist due to predation by V. Destructor. Correspondingly, so would most of the version of mite that typically infests A. M., with the possible exception of those infesting resistant A. M. Macedonica in isolated areas where the line remains pure (IIRC, the responsible gene is recessive and out-crossing results in a loss of resistance) and A. M. Scutellata.

Is this what we want to happen?

Personally, I think we should concentrate on finding methods/programs to eradicate the blasted mite, instead of trying to make bees that live with it.


----------



## Ian

That's a bigger wetter blanket then I threw 
Lol


----------



## squarepeg

BadBeeKeeper said:


> It also appears, that some people think that they can 'evolve' their bees to cope with Varroa, as though such an evolution can be forced over a short period of time. This is erroneous and misguided, and unlikely to occur over the lifespan of the average beekeeper...
> 
> ...in my opinion, absent intervention by us, most sub-species of A. Mellifera would cease to exist due to predation by V. Destructor.


there are other opinions:

"Mite resistant bee stocks are no longer a matter of proof of concept—such stocks currently exist all over the world. The only issue is the lack of enough commercially available gentle, productive, mite-resistant queens to allow us to shift over to them as an industry.

During the past twenty years, we’ve had pioneers such as John Kefuss, Danny Weaver, Kirk Webster, and the Baton Rouge researchers continually reminding us that there are no insurmountable obstacles to breeding for mite resistance (with Kefuss recently publishing an excellent update.[5])

5 kefuss, J, et al (2015) Selection for resistance to Varroa destructor under commercial beekeeping conditions, Journal of Apicultural Research, 54(5): 563-576."

quoted from: abj march 2017 vol. 157 no. 3


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## Fusion_power

Make it simple.

http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/00218839.2016.1160709

Badbeekeeper is off somewhere in left field with a proven false argument.


Ian and Daniel, There are mathematical models that can be used to predict heritability of a trait. The key is to have a set of traits to select for and a standard way of rating those traits. My selection in my bees for varroa resistance is very simple. If I see a varroa mite, that queen is killed. The logic is infallible, if I see a mite, there are a bunch of mites in that colony therefore it is mite susceptible. I might (mite) get rid of a good queen once in a while, but I get rid of all of the bad queens.

Please look up BLUP based breeding methods. There are programs running in Europe using BLUP. The primary difficulty with bees is that BLUP is a statistical model that uses an approximation for sex alleles and their effect in the breeding population. I can see North American beekeepers starting a BLUP based breeding program within the next 2 years. We can enhance it if we develop methods to test each breeding queen for sex alleles and therefore can take sex allele effects out of the equations.


----------



## Daniel Y

squarepeg said:


> i now have 4 queen lines that i am working with to help with diversity and part of the selection process has to do with keeping a relative balance of those lines across the operation.


MVP ( mean viable population) which is relevant to an adequate population to have minimal genetic variability. Or in other words gives some idea of how many blood lines might be needed. 

An MVP of 500 to 1,000 has often been given as an average for terrestrial vertebrates when inbreeding or genetic variability is ignored. When inbreeding effects are included, estimates of MVP for many species are in the thousands. Based on a meta-analysis of reported values in the literature for many species, Traill et al. reported a median MVP of 4,169 individuals

4,169 compared to your 4. This is what I have in mind when I comment about the lack of numbers or bottle necking, inbreeding that results from mass production of queens from a relatively few producers. Unless you are up around 3 to 4 thousand hives per blood line you are inbreeding.


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## Fusion_power

Daniel, bottlenecking is less of an issue when multiple beekeepers are sharing queens and when individual beekeepers are not deliberately raising queens from very few breeders. I can show a statistical model proving that a population of 400 properly managed colonies is effectively proof against inbreeding effects for several centuries.


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## Daniel Y

Fusion_power said:


> Daniel, bottlenecking is less of an issue when multiple beekeepers are sharing queens and when individual beekeepers are not deliberately raising queens from very few breeders. I can show a statistical model proving that a population of 400 properly managed colonies is effectively proof against inbreeding effects for several centuries.


My source. quoted above. says that as little as 500 if you ignore inbreeding. But lets see the statistical model. The above is quoted from a source addressing MVP specifically and is not about bees specifically. but it does indicate that a population ten times what you claim is necessary to avoid inbreeding. It is also true that inbreeding is particularly devastating to bees. In large avoided due to the multiple matings a queen has. Most recently I have herd numbers as much as 20 matings or more are common. This increases the genetic mix from any single queen as she later produces drones. 
Even so if I go with your 400 number. how does that compare to the above mentioned 4? How does that measure up to the typical 40 or 50 from the largest of queen breeders? How does that measure up tot he one or two from the thousands breeding their own queens.
My underlying point and always has been is how can you possibly expect to get results from breeding when you don't practice anything remotely resembling breeding. Are you al just counting on some miracle to make up for well known devastating practices. The results continually indicate they are less than adequate. but that is simply written off as being inadequacies in the bee or the beekeeper. At what point do you consider inferior bees the result of inferior production of bees?

So along with you statistical analysis provide a list of breeders that have blood lines that exceed 10% of that requirement.


----------



## BadBeeKeeper

Fusion_power said:


> Badbeekeeper is off somewhere in left field...


It would not be the first time I have been accused of that...but it generally turns out to be true much less often than some people would like.

But it's just my opinion, subject to change if warranted by newer/better data.

However, based on your latest post above, I am not convinced of the accuracy of your opinion regarding mine.
---------------------

Daniel brings up a good point. The thing about that though, is (IIRC) the recessive nature of the resistance trait in the Primorsky bees makes a certain amount of inbreeding useful, perhaps even necessary...but I could be further out in left field with that comment.


----------



## Ian

http://www.beeculture.com/breeding-mite-biting-bees-to-control-varroa/

"Even after confirming an individual gene’s effect on a trait, the value of selecting based on DNA or protein markers would be limited because other unknown genes also influence these traits so you would only increasing the frequency of some of the “good genes.” It seems that at least for now the best way forward is to select based on the trait itself"


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## Ian

"Not enough is known about different variables that influence the trait ‘proportion of chewed mites’ and repeated testing of colonies shows that it varies much more than we would like, which means it is influenced environmental "


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## squarepeg

Ian said:


> "It seems that at least for now the best way forward is to select based on the trait itself"


"Practical application: if you start 1000 test nucs each season, you don’t need to mite wash every one—prioritize productivity by selecting from only the only the top 50% of the hives after 3 months of buildup. That drops your number of alcohol washes in July to “only” 500. My two sons and I, using a portable shaker, can take bee samples and wash them at the rate of about 2 minutes per each—which works out (at $30/hr) to $3 per sample, or $1500. At this time you’d narrow your potential breeder pool down to perhaps 50-100 colonies to continue tracking, meaning that you’d only need to do relatively few washes over the rest of the season."

"Fall assay: in October, take washes from the remaining potential breeders, leaving only those with the lowest mite counts untreated for winter (unless none have low enough mite counts; if so, treat them so that they’ll survive, or consider another starting stock)."

quoted from: abj march 2017 vol. 157 no. 3 pp 265-271


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## Ian

I've seen beekeeper rig up some real crafty shaker jigs. Using a windshield whipper motor they place the sample and gently rock the sample back and forth for 5-10 min while they work
I think I am going to put a shaker together for my apiarist to use this summer


----------



## Ian

I can't see how monitoring an entire operation is practical 
I guess in other areas of the continent there may be time for build up without treatment to allow analysis which would then allow treatment to follow , but here there isn't, and would mean total apiary crash. 

Though I think I'd be inclined to set aside 100 hives isolated to run such a project. A yard which could be salvaged after initial analysis by nucing them out via treatment


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## squarepeg

Ian said:


> Though I think I'd be inclined to set aside 100 hives isolated to run such a project. A yard which could be salvaged after initial analysis by nucing them out via treatment


sounds like a practical approach ian, with some potential for return on investment.


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## lharder

Ian said:


> http://www.beeculture.com/breeding-mite-biting-bees-to-control-varroa/
> 
> "Even after confirming an individual gene’s effect on a trait, the value of selecting based on DNA or protein markers would be limited because other unknown genes also influence these traits so you would only increasing the frequency of some of the “good genes.” It seems that at least for now the best way forward is to select based on the trait itself"


Its sort of why a black box method (letting nature weed out bees) works. Nature juggles multivariate solution space. Now there are multivariate analytic techniques that could bring useful information to the fore and probably necessary in figuring out why some bees can survive and others not. But don't throw out the single variable stuff. It can figure out whether a trait is present or not. Useful information.


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## Fusion_power

Average relatedness of workers in a colony is calculated with the formula X = .25 - .5/Me where "Me" represents the mating effectiveness of the queen. In other words, did the queen mate with 1 drone or 30 drones that were fertile and produced some amount of sperm stored in her spermatheca. Put this into a formula in excel and you will find that mating with up to a dozen drones produces 2/3 of the benefit of polyandrous mating that is provided by mating with 30 drones. This sounds counterintuitive so please do the math and prove to yourself that a queen needs to mate with a minimum of 12 drones to have high levels of worker diversity and with up to 30 drones to produce the maximum diversity. Given that we already know A.M. queens mate with an average of 17 drones, this provides a strong suggestion that queens mated with larger numbers of drones produce colonies more fit than queens mated with fewer.

The number of sex alleles in a population can be expressed as V = 1-1/x where x is the number of sex alleles present regardless of the number of drones the queen mated with. If the queen mated with. As you can see, the more different sex alleles present in the drones the queen mates with, the higher brood viability becomes. When all sex alleles are different, i.e. the queen did not mate with any drones carrying the same sex allele as one of the alleles the queen carries, brood viability is 100%. This formula works for matings where some percent of duplication is present but does not properly express the relationship when all alleles are unique. I counted brood viability in a couple of my colonies and came up with 88 to 89 percent. Plugging this into the formula gives about 9 or 10 sex alleles present in the breeding population.

The problem with bees is that it is necessary to account for both the queen and her offspring when determining how much impact inbreeding will have on the colony.

More on this later.


----------



## Daniel Y

Ian said:


> http://www.beeculture.com/breeding-mite-biting-bees-to-control-varroa/
> 
> "Even after confirming an individual gene’s effect on a trait, the value of selecting based on DNA or protein markers would be limited because other unknown genes also influence these traits so you would only increasing the frequency of some of the “good genes.” It seems that at least for now the best way forward is to select based on the trait itself"



So are you saying that some indication regardless of how realiable it is not better than a blind shot in the dark? That a genetic marker is no guarantee of reproducing that trait is nothing new. Welcome to breeding. That is ho it has always been. Breeding is not some guaranteed result and never has been. not even in pure bred crosses. Not even close. Breeding doe with pure breeds and champion crosses produce far more animals for slaughter than they do improved offspring. And that is with great effort of increasing the odds in your favor. Beekeepers speak of thinking you will overcome those same results simply by blind luck. Pretty much the same thing as thinking you will bred champion blood lines if you turn your dog out on the street to mate. Sure it may happen. you are more likely to win the lottery.


----------



## Daniel Y

A bit more on the issue of improving the odds in your favor. to even understand how that works you need to know how odds work. And what effect improving them in your favor by even a tiny bit effects your results. Without going into to much detail it is simply a certain number of rolls of the dice will result in so many rolls that you are looking for. In any way that you can increase that number of rolls in your favor gives you a greater chance of rolling your number than any other number. It is not , never has been, and never will be that you get your roll every time. you may get your roll one out of 100 times. but every other one only rolls 1 out of every 150. and that is what breeding is like. This is also the reason for the need of thousands of individuals. so yo can roll that dice many thousands of times. only getting hundreds of your favored roll. Or what you describe as limited advantage. that is all there is. Limited advantage. and that is all that is needed. Once you have that advantage you roll the hell out of it. as many times and as fast as you can. then you take your winning rolls and inbreed them. which you cannot do with bees. That is breeding. that is breeding that has been proven effective for centuries. And you can't use it with bees.


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## beemandan

You know that the thread is in serious decline when we start getting lectures on chance.


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## Ian

find those traits, keep promoting them


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## Fusion_power

> then you take your winning rolls and inbreed them. which you cannot do with bees. That is breeding. that is breeding that has been proven effective for centuries. And you can't use it with bees.


 I would love to read why you think bees cannot be inbred? Because it flat out is not correct. It is true that they can't be inbred like chickens without developing serious difficulties associated with the sex allele and with reduced fitness of the colony. Look up work by Tarpy and Page and read what they did to investigate the effect of inbreeding on colony fitness.

If queens are produced and mated via II with 3 of their own brothers i.e. drones produced from the queen that laid the eggs the queens hatched from, there will be a range of viability from 50% to 100%. Go from there and read about the effects. Tarpy and Page: Sex_determination_and_the_evolution_of_polyandry_i.pdf


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## Rader Sidetrack

Here is a link where you can download the _Tarpy and Page_ paper referenced in the post above for free:
https://www.researchgate.net/public...ion_of_polyandry_in_honey_bees_Apis_mellifera


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## Daniel Y

beemandan said:


> You know that the thread is in serious decline when we start getting lectures on chance.


Well remain ignorant.


----------



## beemandan

Daniel Y said:


> Well remain ignorant.


I think it is more your presumption that a Canadian beekeeper who successfully manages 1500 hives...or, for that matter, any of us...... needs a middle school lecture on probability.


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## radallo

beemandan said:


> A rather common opinion...stated as a fact..... without any scientific support. It is just as likely...in my opinion..... that there would be widespread collapse and eventually there would remain small pockets of European honey bees struggling for survival, with a few anecdotal reports of thriving colonies.
> What gives your opinion more merit than mine?


Both opinions have the same value.. 'msl' didn't say HOW it will happen, any you didn't sya that those survivors might be the soluton  
.. maybe we need to pass through a severe bottleneck


----------



## radallo

psm1212 said:


> So 5 mins out, 20 mins chasing, and *5 mins back*. A queen can fly for 12 mins out, mate for 5 mins, and fly 12 mins back. So, I would think that a queen could fly well over a mile for her nuptial flights. But I am not the authority on that.


The successfull one might save this fuel 

Anyway.. I've read somewhere about not all of the drones coming back to their hive.. but being hosted close to DCA, in order to save this fuel on the way back.. maybe, step-by-step they can go further than we expect.. but I agree with the previous opinion, that the main issue is where your queens are really going to mate, rather than where your closest DCAs are.


----------



## beemandan

radallo said:


> Both opinions have the same value.. 'msl' didn't say HOW it will happen, any you didn't sya that those survivors might be the soluton


 I clearly stated that my comment was only an opinion. Many state theirs as though they are irrefutable fact. It tends to indicate a closed minded often untrue view that frequently gets picked up and repeated by others. That is my objection. In this case, msl was actually making a tongue in cheek sort of statement.....and I thought he/she was serious. My bad.


----------



## Daniel Y

I have finally found some information on the breeding program I mention from time to time. I use this program as an example of what is necessary for a program to make progress and actually develop the traits sought. This is a program that has tremendous success. to the point it has re written what many thought could be accomplished via selective breeding. so much so that it was given it's own name. Genetic breeding.

There are a couple of points made in this recent article that I had not seen in previous ones. The original stock for this program was taken from two of the most previously successful breeding programs. Each of which had nearly opposing methods. one basically selected form female stack exclusively the other from male. These two lines where then purchased by one individual and his methods where then used. There is a ton of information on just what his methods are. the degree of difficulty or lack of for various traits. the list of traits selected for and at one time I read information on just how each trait was developed. I will just say each trait regardless of how many of the there where where bred for via a separate bloodline.

Mainly I am writing his to give actual numbers from the breeder on selection pressure. Keep I mind the traits he is breeding for will result in the males only. for females he selects about 20%. For the males he selects the top one half of one percent. In order to supply a small industry that is about 5 million dollars a year. this requires he breeds 60,000 males a year allowing him to select 300 males to continue the breeding program.

Now those are real numbers from a breeder that has been getting real results for the past 17 years. One problem with using them as a comparison is this is a species that does respond favorably to breeding the best to the best. Bees don't.


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## msl

beemandan-no bad, nuance is easily lost on a forum, It is for some reason easy to take a comment out of context of the conversion as a whole, my issues with written communication doesn't help either  
cairfaction of a point is part of healthy discussion


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## jonsl

Daniel Y said:


> MVP ( mean viable population) which is relevant to an adequate population to have minimal genetic variability. Or in other words gives some idea of how many blood lines might be needed.
> 
> An MVP of 500 to 1,000 has often been given as an average for* terrestrial vertebrates* when inbreeding or genetic variability is ignored.


Can you use vertebrates as model organisms for insects?


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## Daniel Y

jonsl said:


> Can you use vertebrates as model organisms for insects?


Why be concerned about this now. every other factor about breeding is readily accepted as applicable. Even those things that have been shown to have differences. Such as sex determination and how it prevents breeding for specific traits.


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## Fusion_power

Something tells me Daniel Y is still looking at breeding models based on Best to Best. This has been proven to have limited potential for long term gain where multiple traits are under positive selection. Best Linear Unbiased Prediction is a statistical model that can enable long term gain far past earlier methods. It is based on treating each potential breeding individual as a data source providing information about all related individuals in the breeding program. Standard breeding methods rarely focus beyond the parent and grandparent in the pedigree. With BLUP, thousands of individuals can be evaluated and contribute to breeding decisions.

BLUP requires an evaluation standard with separate traits verified by large numbers of individuals. Each trait under selection has to be "weighted", i.e. given a value in the breeding program. Honey production might be one such trait with a weighting of 30% of the total value of an individual queen. If you want to read about using BLUP with honeybees, look up papers by Brascamp and Bijma.

Here is what BLUP does not do. It does not effectively control for sex allele effects. Mass selection is a better tool than BLUP when selecting for multiple small traits. BLUP is not as precise as for example marker assisted selection. Long term, we can create a better set of tools than BLUP, but for now, it has the most potential to improve honeybee performance.

Breeding honeybees has often been done by finding a highly selected queen that is then used to rear a large number of daughters. The daughters produce drones that are used at an isolated mating station. What is missed is that the daughters all share the sex alleles from their mother. This means the drones produced by the daughters have a skewed number of sex alleles such that 25% of the drones carry allele 1, 25% carry allele 2, and the remaining 50% carry varying alleles from the drones the highly selected queen mated with. This skewness rapidly leads to inbreeding which has negative effects on traits such as honey production. There is nothing wrong with using this breeding strategy, but it has to be balanced by using a coefficient of inbreeding that prevents reduction in sex allele frequency. This is why I suggest that each queen in a breeding program should be typed for sex alleles so that matings can be chosen to maintain diversity at the sex allele locus while still permitting improvement of commercial traits.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Best_linear_unbiased_prediction


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## psm1212

radallo said:


> The successfull one might save this fuel


Ha! And they call him "lucky!" Ellis said that only about 1 in 1000 drones successfully mate during their lifetimes. Those were roughly my odds when I was in high school.


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## radallo

beemandan said:


> I clearly stated that my comment was only an opinion. Many state theirs as though they are irrefutable fact. It tends to indicate a closed minded often untrue view that frequently gets picked up and repeated by others. That is my objection. In this case, msl was actually making a tongue in cheek sort of statement.....and I thought he/she was serious. My bad.


Sorry, not being native english speaker.. it's tough for me to read beyond the lines.


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## radallo

BLUP model have been modified for honeybees

http://www.coloss.org/beebook/I/queen-rearing/4/1


http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.594.7729&rep=rep1&type=pdf


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## Daniel Y

Haplodiploidy is a sex-determination system in which males develop from unfertilized eggs and are haploid, and females develop from fertilized eggs and are diploid.[1] Haplodiploidy is sometimes called arrhenotoky.

Another feature of the haplodiploidy system is that recessive lethal and deleterious alleles will be removed from the population rapidly because they will automatically be expressed in the males (dominant lethal and deleterious alleles are removed from the population every time they arise, as they kill any individual they arise in).

The later half of the above quotes explain the problem with inbreeding. and is hardly as simple as effecting honey production. It result in a large part of the population (25% in the first generation) having these self eliminating gene combinations. These gene combinations don't exist in bees because a colony with them dies. But then this may be acceptable to beekeepers as a solution Given they find brood elimination behaviors a favorable solution to mites killing their bees.

This lethal gene combination is the result of there only being 2 predominant sex genes in the breeding population.


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## Fusion_power

You still haven't read the Tarpy and Page reference. If you had, you would realize that the sex allele combinations result in 50% viable brood even when queens are mated to their full brothers. This is not enough to sustain a colony, but it can be used briefly for breeding purposes. There are articles about raising queens, inducing them to lay without mating which means all eggs are drones, then using the drones to inseminate the queen. The result was 50% viable and fertile female eggs. It is about as extreme as inbreeding can get with bees and can only be justified to concentrate rare traits.

I'm not advocating doing this, just pointing out that it can be done. My opinion is that inbreeding should generally be avoided with bees.


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## Daniel Y

"This has been proven to have limited potential for long term gain where multiple traits are under positive selection".

The above is from your own post earlier.

So you have set of desire traits. First of all you don't breed for all of them in one blood line. Still it is true that even if you isolate a single one of those traits the effect is temporary unless you continue apply selection pressure.

So first you have the isolation of the desired trait. this requires cross breeding with as many lines as can be found that posses that trait. It also tends to bury that trait because of all the other traits being introduced. but you are counting on those genes being present in that blood line. You then begin to apply selection pressure to encourage the desired trait and flush out the undesired. This may or may not include inbreeding but usually will certainly require close breeding. The effect on bees will already be large. Once a trait is isolated it will not remain unless selection pressure is applied or further inbreeding fixes the trait. or on other words it eventually breeds true. It is this continued inbreeding until a trait is fixed that bees cannot tolerate. If they tolerated the inbreeding required to isolate the trait in the first place. which I see no evidence of. The solution to inbreeding effects is outbreeding. Outbreeding of course is detrimental to the isolation of the desired traits. 
If you then think about it one possible solution not necessary doable would be to have a large number of separate blood lines all that have the desired trait. This is the idea of rotational line breeding. Either you can breed multiple lines for the same trait or multiple lines each with it's own trait. But this method somewhat avoids the issues with inbreeding.

You argue that if bees can survive one generation of inbreeding. then inbreeding is possible. Fixing a trait in honeybees is not possible. big difference.


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## Fusion_power

> Fixing a trait in honeybees is not possible.


 This is the point on which your position is totally incorrect.


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## MissHoney

Honey-4-All said:


> 2. If possible what honest glimmers of hope have we even seen on the scene the past 30 years? Anywhere in the world that is.


Here's the link to the dissertation by Mike Allsopp (2006) about the Varroa Destructor and subsequent resistance in the honeybee population of Southern Africa (NOT 'Africanized honeybees).
http://www.repository.up.ac.za/bitstream/handle/2263/27094/dissertation.pdf?sequence=1


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## squarepeg

it looks like the april abj online version is now available and it has randy's next installment in his 'the varroa problem' series. i'll be digging into it this weekend.


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## squarepeg

whereas last month's article was geared toward larger operations along with specific recommendations on how to move toward more mite resistant stock, this month's installment is aimed at how smaller stationary operations might accomplish the same.

it's pretty clear that randy believes that we can influence the development of the bees' natural ability to deal with varroa by withholding treatments (unless indicated) in order to challenge our colonies and applying careful selection and propagation.

this position is supported in part with this reference:

http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/eva.12448/full



i found a couple of the references very interesting as they where new to me. this one finds evidence that local adaption can occur and may impart a survival advantage thereby making the case that importing queens from distant locations may be counterproductive:

http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.3896/IBRA.1.53.2.01

this one discusses how groups of beekeepers in europe have worked out a cooperative effort whereby guidelines were established for treating only as necessary, followed by selecting and breeding whereby the genetics get shared among the cooperative.

http://www.apidologie.org/articles/apido/full_html/2010/03/m09147/m09147.html



a fair amount of the article is spent discouraging the 'hard bond' approach, and instead what gets recommended is careful monitoring and intervention when indicated to prevent collapse and spreading to nearby colonies. those genetics (queens and drones) get culled in the next season and are replaced with some showing more promise.


this quote reminded me of some of the comments we have seen here on the forum from time to time:

"A common misunderstanding: if you start a hive with package bees from a queen producer who treats for varroa three or more times a year (as most do), there’s no biological reason to expect that those bees will magically transform into a resistant colony simply because you wear a “treatment free beekeeper” hat. Those bees simply lack the genes to do so, and the colony doesn’t have a fighting chance. And when it then does collapse from Parasitic Mite Syndrome, it will flood your neighbor’s hives, as well as any feral colonies for miles around, with virus- laden mites, thus setting back the natural process of evolution. Please don’t be part of the problem!

_To be part of the solution, you’d need to start with either feral, survivor, or bred mite-resistant stock._ Otherwise, please manage varroa!"

(italics mine)


and this quote helps to underscore how the needs and expectations (genetically speaking) are different for us stationary back yarders as compared to large scale migratory beekeepers, which runs contrary to the practice that most of the stock here in the u.s. is produced without regard to what kind of operation the bees are headed for:

"I concur with the authors that there is huge opportunity for smaller breeding programs for locally-adapted, mite-resistant stock well suited for stationary beekeeping. That is not to say that the large queen producers should not continue to produce breeds specifically tailored for migratory beekeeping operations—such breeds being adapted to that specific (albeit artificial) ecological niche."

(refering to "the darwin cure for apiculture...." paper at the first hyperlink above)

quotes taken from abj april 2017 vol. 157 no. 4, pp 375-379


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## squarepeg

i like the way randy opened this month's installment with:

"I’d like to move beyond the hostility and blaming that is so common in discourse these days. We’re all beekeepers, and we all want what’s best for the bees. So let’s take a moment to imagine that you are holding hands with whatever type of beekeeper that you’ve previously demonized, sing a couple of verses of Kumbaya together, and look at the situation through the objective and unbiased eyes of a biologist/beekeeper."

abj april 2017 vol. 157 no. 4 p. 375


----------



## Ian

Kumbaya !


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## Riverderwent

squarepeg said:


> and this quote helps to underscore how the needs and expectations (genetically speaking) are different for us stationary back yarders as compared to large scale migratory beekeepers, which runs contrary to the practice that most of the stock here in the u.s. is produced without regard to what kind of operation the bees are headed for:
> 
> "I concur with the authors that there is huge opportunity for smaller breeding programs for locally-adapted, mite-resistant stock well suited for stationary beekeeping. That is not to say that the large queen producers should not continue to produce breeds specifically tailored for migratory beekeeping operations—such breeds being adapted to that specific (albeit artificial) ecological niche."
> 
> (refering to "the darwin cure for apiculture...." paper at the first hyperlink above)
> 
> quotes taken from abj april 2017 vol. 157 no. 4, pp 375-379


Kiosk queen rearing. The clock just ticked. Square says that Randy says that Peter Neumann and Tjeerd Blacquière say, "Sustainable solutions for the apicultural sector can only be achieved by taking advantage of natural selection and not by attempting to limit it. While treatment against disease is helpful, it nevertheless prevents natural selection for improved host resistance and tolerance (Fries & Bommarco, 2007; Råberg, Graham, & Read, 2009)." _The Darwin cure for apiculture? Natural selection and managed honeybee health_, Neumann & Blacquière 2016.

And ... "Here lies a great opportunity for beekeeping in several countries, where economic constraints are no longer leading as beekeeping has become a hobby sector, with dispersed and small apiaries being the rule." _The Darwin cure for apiculture? Natural selection and managed honeybee health_, Neumann & Blacquière 2016

But many (of us) smaller scale, local, treatment free beekeepers have not really picked up the ball for this kind of "kiosk queen rearing", as I would call it. The very things in our character, interests, and circumstances that cause us to want to raise bees like we do may keep us from raising enough queens to satisfy the demand for queens of the geographic area that could benefit from our fecund ladies. Just thinking out loud.


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## gww

River
Which is why on other threads and in some vidios you see push back from guys the treat that say if it is so good then why do we never see numbers and why don't you send queens out everywhere as a way to discredit what the guy doing it and sharing what he knows knows does work for him. I am proud of those that do go out and try to save the world but I just don't have the energy to get involved in such a fassion. Not that I am in anyway even committed to treatment free cause I have no experiance but when I do, I still won't want to fill out paper work for some study or get real involved with commitees or go to the effort to save the world. I keep bees so I have an excuse for being an introvert hermit and a reason I have to stay home.
Cheers
gww


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## Riverderwent

> but when I do, I still won't want to fill out paper work for some study or get real involved with commitees or go to the effort to save the world. I keep bees so I have an excuse for being an introvert hermit and a reason I have to stay home.


I think that sort of illustrates my point. Cheers,


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## squarepeg

Ian said:


> Kumbaya!


now that's the spirit! same back to you my friend.


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## snl

Ian said:


> Kumbaya !


That's just "up yours" in pig latin!:lookout:


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## Riverderwent

Ian said:


> Kumbaya !


“Few things are harder to put up with than the annoyance of a good example.” Mark Twain, _Pudd'nhead Wilson_


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## BernhardHeuvel

Never heard of Kum ba yah before.  Am learning something new every time I read beesource. 

Have a good time, beekeepers! 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z26BvHOD_sg


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## 1102009

Where were you Bernhard? I learned Kumbaya in school. You must be much younger than me! 
To sing together is much more joy than a missing handshake.


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## Ian

Hmmm, I'm hearing Kumbaya...yet nobody is holding hands, 

...ever try to prepare a meal for a vegan and a big game hunter...,


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## BernhardHeuvel

More meat for me, no problem. They can have my veggies.


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## Brad Bee

The supper I ate tonight came from an animal that's a vegetarian, does that count as a serving of vegetables too?


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## Ian

Riverderwent said:


> “Few things are harder to put up with than the annoyance of a good example.” Mark Twain, _Pudd'nhead Wilson_


I'm happy to entertain you with now two "good examples"


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## Riverderwent

Ian said:


> I'm happy to entertain you with now two "good examples"


: ) Glad you're here.


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## squarepeg

i believe this installment wraps up randy's 7 part series '_the varroa problem_' that he began last november. the first 5 installments are already available for free viewing on his website http://scientificbeekeeping.com/articles-by-publication-date/, and the last two probably will be over the next few months.

so has the case randy laid out for utilizing monitoring and selecting for mite resistance in the breeding process caused anyone here, whether running a small operation or large, to adopt any changes in how you proceed going forward?


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## johno

What we really need to do is breed a more benign form of DWV, there are bees living with mites on the island of Fernando De Noronha but there is no Dwv. So all will be well until the virus gets there somehow. Nice Island I was there for a couple of weeks in 1991
Johno


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## msl

we have it all ready, type A, and it inoluacts agaist the outhers 
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rw9XfkI17rQ&t=1739s


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## Ian

squarepeg said:


> so has the case randy laid out for utilizing monitoring and selecting for mite resistance in the breeding process caused anyone here, whether running a small operation or large, to adopt any changes in how you proceed going forward?


Yes, it has provided a nudge in the right direction. I have the Queen program moving forward anyway, but I've adjusted a few strategies to adopt a more thorough selection process 

And I've been following a few trains of thought from your apiary management 

And don't you worry, I have more than just two "good examples" to give


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## Ian

One of the queens I sent away to participate in a genome sequence project was an import queen. It's hygienic characteristics topped the list....discounting commercial queen breeders is mistake number 1, an unfair assumption spewed from ideology

It was a KONA queen


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## squarepeg

Ian said:


> ...It was a KONA queen


that's very interesting ian, and many thanks for your valued participation!


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## radallo

About the GEI experiment, the link provided was to the guest editorial.

The whole JAR issue was about that experiment.

please find here
http://www.tandfonline.com/toc/tjar20/53/2

more papers that distangle all the results acheived from different perspectives


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## squarepeg

many thanks for that link radallo.


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## catbackr

I cant seem to find the article. what is the title of it?


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## squarepeg

http://scientificbeekeeping.com/articles-by-publication-date/

the january article was actually part 4 in a series that started last november.

click on this link and scroll down, you are looking for 'the varroa problem'.


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## squarepeg

i let my abj subscription expire last winter because i was mostly reading randy oliver's stuff and it comes out free eventually on his website.

he released this article in the june issue about where he has gotten with respect to selective breeding for varroa resistance:

http://scientificbeekeeping.com/selective-breeding-for-mite-resistance-walking-the-walk/

from which is quoted:

"Practical application: When I see such lovely colonies handling varroa on their own, it gives me goosebumps!"

the article gives a fair and balanced review of the progress randy has made with his breeding program thus far and he shares guarded optimism about his chances for success going forward.

well worth the read.


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## gww

Square...
Thanks for posting.
gww


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## Juhani Lunden

Nice that he is able to report of colonies that fight back. Colonies where infestation levels are going down. This is happening in all TF apiaries.

The question is: would there now be more breeders available (and more all important variation) if the treatment threshold had been for instance 5%? But I guess 3% is safer to keep mite situation in control in large operation.


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## squarepeg

gww said:


> Thanks for posting.


you are welcome gww.


----------



## Litsinger

squarepeg said:


> ... well worth the read.


Great article, SP. Thank you for sharing. I imagine for most serious students of bee genetics, much of this was intuitive. That said, there were a few observations concerning both genetics and his management thereof he made that stood out to me, namely:

_"In correspondence with Dr. John Kefuss, he suggested that I should have allowed some of those hives to try to recover. So in November of 2018 I retained potential breeders with infestation rates up to 3 mites/hundred bees (Fig. 9), and was glad I did.
… 
The few that I chose to keep despite their showing higher counts at that time were kept in the running because they were exceptionally gentle, productive, and came from high-mite yards. But perhaps most impressive, they then brought those counts back down without help."_

_"Any selective breeding program consists of bottlenecking the genetic diversity of the breeding population — in this case by applying strong selective pressure for the trait of mite resistance. But in the case of honey bees, we must always keep in mind that one needs to maintain enough diversity in the sex alleles in order to ensure viable worker brood. Thus, I try to strike a balance by breeding off of at least 25 different queen mothers each season."_

_"Each season’s virgin queens will supply all the genetics for the next season’s drones — I’m counting on this, rather than using instrumental insemination.
...
Thus, even with complete drone flooding, the best that one can hope for is to shift the genes responsible for mite resistance in the drone population by less than 50% each season."_


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## little_john

Yes - a very interesting read - thanks for posting the link.

My only concern is - can it possibly work ? By this I mean - that despite the huge amount of work that Randy is putting into this, and even if he were to finally succeed in effectively selecting for genetics which eliminate the need for treatments ... what happens afterwards ?

By this massive amount of work he will have selected for traits, in exactly the same way that Brother Adam did, only in pursuit of a solution for a different problem. But - as we all know, it's impossible to maintain the Buckfast strain without an ongoing huge amount of effort - the moment you stop imposing human control over those genes, then the bees revert to type.

The vast majority of beekeepers on this forum keep mutts - primarily because it's just too darned difficult for the average beekeeper to maintain a pure strain. So why would anything be different with Randy's Varroa-intolerant queens ?

We so often talk about genetic selection conferring an advantage to a privileged individual or population - whereas it's actually the reverse dynamic which is far more important: that those *without the advantage* will fail to survive when circumstances get tough - thus removing their future competition with the advantaged organisms. But - if circumstances never become tough, then those otherwise disadvantaged organisms will continue to survive and prosper.
In the case of Varroa, as long as 'genetically disadvantaged' colonies can still reproduce before the inevitable mite build-up causes a collapse of those colonies, their 'inferior' genetics will continue to be passed on to future generations.
LJ


----------



## Juhani Lunden

little_john said:


> My only concern is - can it possibly work ? By this I mean - that despite the huge amount of work that Randy is putting into this, and even if he were to finally succeed in effectively selecting for genetics which eliminate the need for treatments ... what happens afterwards ?


Big areas of TF bees are created. Then there is no need for mating control, or treatments. This process is already happening.



little_john said:


> By this massive amount of work he will have selected for traits, in exactly the same way that Brother Adam did, only in pursuit of a solution for a different problem. But - as we all know, it's impossible to maintain the Buckfast strain without an ongoing huge amount of effort -


Buckfast bees are no different of any other bee race in this respective. Same amount of effort is needed. Whether it is huge or not don´t know.


----------



## little_john

Juhani Lunden said:


> Big areas of TF bees are created. Then there is *no need for mating control, or treatments. *This process is already happening.
> 
> Buckfast bees are no different of any other bee race in this respective. *Same amount of effort is needed.* Whether it is huge or not don´t know.


So which is it - no effort, or the same effort ?

When someone engages in *selective* breeding, by definition they are artificially choosing characteristics that would - if they really did confer an advantage - already have been chosen by a process of true *Natural* Selection.

Although the term 'Natural Selection' is frequently used to describe such selective breeding, it is far from being 'natural' as human effort - and decision-making - is involved.

In the case of Buckfast bees (as I understand the process), specific strains are maintained under tight control, which are then brought together on offshore islands specifically maintained to provide suitable isolated mating areas. I would describe that process as being a 'huge' ongoing effort to maintain that strain. An effort which is worthwhile, I'm sure, for such a commercially valuable bee, and one which attracts a high price tag.

However, you appear to be suggesting that once artificially-created TF colonies have gained a foothold in a region, they will then automatically proceed to expand across the country and thus change the genetic make-up of bees - without any further human intervention ? 

I note you did not address my key point - as 'genetically disadvantaged' (i.e. non-TF) bees will continue to be able to reproduce before Varroa takes it's toll by weight of numbers, how will such bees ever get to be eliminated from the gene pool ?
LJ


----------



## GregB

little_john said:


> ..... - as 'genetically disadvantaged' (i.e. non-TF) bees will continue to be able to reproduce before Varroa takes it's toll by weight of numbers, how will such bees ever get to be eliminated from the gene pool ?
> LJ


LJ, marketing.
The non-TF bees will not be "cool" anymore.
The TF bees will be in the vogue.
Notice - the article has a large marketing implant about the bee buyers to be *demanding *the TF bees of the bee sellers.
I am sure you have seen it - at the very end.
THAT is the key.

Step back from the discussions of the selection and such.
Large enough injection of some particular genetics into a said area - does matter and will not go away unnoticed.
All due to public demand, just like with most any new gadget.

A large injection of desired generics into my metro will help significantly. 
The bee buyers grew tired of annually buying the same, reliably dying bees, I feel.
(the local correspondence shows - most people don't know how to do to treat their bees OR have no time/desire to bother)
At this rate, TF bees for sale are in demand - good thing.
2-3 packages sold does not mater much.
50 packages sold - well, maybe does matter.

Works for me.
This season my area got a large injection of the Russians because the Russians become the "it" around here (for now).
I am all for the Russians and TF swarms flying around.


----------



## squarepeg

randy's 1500 colonies most likely comprise a large if not the largest component of the genetic footprint in his area.

if i recall correctly he is also making queens from his selected stock available for free to other beekeepers in his county.

in addition to selecting breeder queens from those colonies with the lowest mite counts, he is deselecting by pinching queens from those colonies with the highest mite counts.


----------



## little_john

Well - let's hope it works. I wish Randy every possible success.
LJ


----------



## squarepeg

little_john said:


> Well - let's hope it works. I wish Randy every possible success.
> LJ


"Note to commercial queen producers: I’m making no promises, but am merely sharing what I learn as I determine whether my proposed simplified selective breeding program is worth pursuing. If it proves out, it’s so simple and cost effective that it will eliminate all excuses for you not to be seriously breeding for resistance. If it doesn’t work, rest assured I’ll let you know as well. 

I gotta tell you though, seeing these strong, gentle, productive hives that are able to maintain minimal mite levels over the course of an entire year of near-continuous broodrearing in California has got my crew danged excited about the possibility of a future in which we would no longer need to worry about varroa and its associated viruses."

(randy's closing comment)

cite: http://scientificbeekeeping.com/selective-breeding-for-mite-resistance-walking-the-walk/


----------



## gww

What I find interesting is the fact that randy finds good colony in an area of so many bad bees. On one hand he makes the point that a small guy should not even try but on the other hand, there are apparently good bees even in bad places. In my mind, the whole hive might not have to take part in the mite fight as long as some of the bees in the hive does. 20 drones worth of sperm.

This tells me that anyone can find a few good queens and that randys quest is to make the odds consistent and not an anomaly. 

Maybe that is why it has been easy for me to draw a lucky hand so far on such a small scale beekeeper.

It was definitely not a lot of work and I definitely know that packages that don't work are brought into my area.

So on a scale of success, it seems that the consistency might be at different levels (say the difference between 30 percent loss compared to 5 percent) but that the bees are capable most every where with out much work.
Cheers
gww


----------



## GregB

squarepeg said:


> "Note to commercial queen producers:...............
> cite: http://scientificbeekeeping.com/selective-breeding-for-mite-resistance-walking-the-walk/


Like I said - these are the main points of the article (re-quoting):

1) put pressure on whoever she purchases her bees from, to *seriously select for mite resistance.*
2) eliminate all excuses for you* not to be seriously breeding for resistance.*

Supply and demand usually rule the place and get the things done.
About darn time.

Just like with the cars...
Anyone still fixing their own cars?
Few do, but not many. 
Fixing your own car is NOT the mainstream activity anymore.

"Treating" your car regularly is a thing of the past - you outsource some work and you just don't want to bothered with your car be breaking down routinely - it should not be breaking down (you get rid of the "lemons").
Cars are now days virtually "treatment free" appliances that people just replace every X years due to normal wear (or desire for a change).

The same for the bees - just another treatment-free/low-maintenance commodity (like the old times, actually) - and I like it this way.
(the potential end result should be good - get your honey once a year for the holidays - forget the bees until the next year - works for me and how it should be).


----------



## GregB

GregV said:


> Like I said - these are the main points of the article (re-quoting):
> 
> 1) put pressure on whoever she purchases her bees from, to *seriously select for mite resistance.*
> 2) eliminate all excuses for you* not to be seriously breeding for resistance.*
> ........


Interestingly, a local bee seller has shown interest in talking to us (a couple of local TF freaks).
I also see less bashing of us, the "mite spreaders", on the local forum - the typical talk if you rewind back few years.
Hehe....

This only means - if you are in bee selling business, you better start doing some moves if to still be around in few years.
Because someone else will.
Your customers will not want to be treating their bees - people really have other things to worry about (than the dying bees, no matter the treatment).
And the bees should be just there, forgotten somewhere in the backyard corner, just doing what they have been doing for eons.


----------



## little_john

GregV said:


> LJ, marketing.
> The non-TF bees will not be "cool" anymore.
> The TF bees will be in the vogue.
> Notice - the article has a large marketing implant about the bee buyers to be *demanding *the TF bees of the bee sellers.
> I am sure you have seen it - at the very end.
> *THAT is the key.
> 
> Step back from the discussions of the selection and such.*
> Large enough injection of some particular genetics into a said area - does matter and will not go away unnoticed.
> All due to public demand, just like with most any new gadget.


Consumer influence was a dynamic I'd completely overlooked, Greg. I'm indebted to you for that reminder of worldly reality. 
LJ


----------



## GregB

little_john said:


> Consumer influence was a dynamic I'd completely overlooked, Greg. I'm indebted to you for that reminder of worldly reality.
> LJ


Consumer is the King, LJ (I hope still is).

Then you brainwash the King to do what you want him to do.
One issue -everyone wants to brainwash the King.
But right now the King is leaning to get off the chems (everywhere, bees included).
Haha!


----------



## Juhani Lunden

little_john said:


> So which is it - no effort, or the same effort ?
> 
> When someone engages in *selective* breeding, by definition they are artificially choosing characteristics that would - if they really did confer an advantage - already have been chosen by a process of true *Natural* Selection.
> 
> Although the term 'Natural Selection' is frequently used to describe such selective breeding, it is far from being 'natural' as human effort - and decision-making - is involved.
> 
> In the case of Buckfast bees (as I understand the process), specific strains are maintained under tight control, which are then brought together on offshore islands specifically maintained to provide suitable isolated mating areas. I would describe that process as being a 'huge' ongoing effort to maintain that strain. An effort which is worthwhile, I'm sure, for such a commercially valuable bee, and one which attracts a high price tag.
> 
> However, you appear to be suggesting that once artificially-created TF colonies have gained a foothold in a region, they will then automatically proceed to expand across the country and thus change the genetic make-up of bees - without any further human intervention ?
> 
> I note you did not address my key point - as 'genetically disadvantaged' (i.e. non-TF) bees will continue to be able to reproduce before Varroa takes it's toll by weight of numbers, how will such bees ever get to be eliminated from the gene pool ?
> LJ


It only need co-operation of beekeepers. A common interest and change in opinions (TF is possible/ TF is not possible). There is need for a project leader and hard work but when all beehives will be requeened with resistant material, beekeeping can continue without treatments and with natural matings. 

There are many ways to keep Buckfasr bees. Some do it the hard way (and copy Brother Adam) and keep records, make controlled sister matings etc. 
Some use Buckfast bees in areas where they are dominant in an area. 

My point is Buckfast bees are not something special, fancy and difficult to understand. It is a race like any other race and can difficulties keeping it pure are exactly the same with all other races.


----------



## little_john

Juhani Lunden said:


> My point is Buckfast bees are not something special, fancy and difficult to understand. It is a race like any other race and can difficulties keeping it pure are exactly the same with all other races.


Not so - the Buckfast bee is NOT a race of bee - it's a hybrid. A completely artificial bee which would most probably never have existed naturally. That's why the effort to keep the bee just as Brother Adam had created it requires so much human effort - just like keeping back the sea in places like Holland. 

But - Greg has nailed the situation well - there is a customer demand for Buckfast bees (the real thing - not the usual 'once-upon-a-time' Buckfasts so often seen advertised) - which ensures that the effort and expense involved in maintaining that strain continues, and so I predict it will be exactly the same with Randy's 'super-bees': it will be customer demand which will ensure the future dominance (or not) of those bees rather than any potential genetic advantage - which would otherwise only become diluted over time and eventually disappear altogether.

When it comes to issues of 'Natural Selection', it's essential that human influence is removed from the equation - otherwise it becomes a contradiction in terms.
Humans employing what they believe to be the Principles of Natural Selection is NOT the same as Natural Selection itself.
LJ


----------



## Juhani Lunden

little_john said:


> Not so - the Buckfast bee is NOT a race of bee - it's a hybrid.


Today Buckfast is not a hybrid. 

It started as a hybrid, but is now like any other bee race.


----------



## GregB

Juhani Lunden said:


> Today Buckfast is not a hybrid.
> 
> It started as a hybrid, but is now like any other bee race.


Buckfast in Europe; the Russians in North America - these are both originally hybrids (man-made vs. random).
What they are now - I have not a clue.

One thing in common, however...
Both Russians in North America and Buckfast in (Eastern) Europe sell right now like hot pies - it is a feeding frenzy it seems per my Internet chatter monitoring.
So the current customer demand will make the significant impact at the distribution of these genetics (in the short term).


----------



## little_john

Juhani Lunden said:


> Today Buckfast is not a hybrid.
> 
> It started as a hybrid, but is now like any other bee race.


Yeah, sure ....



> *The Buckfast bee is a hybrid* that requires the periodic introduction of new blood to prevent inbreeding and to accentuate certain genetic attributes such as e.g. mite tolerance. Consequently, new combinations are always being tested for possible future incorporation into the strain.
> 
> *Keld Brandstrup, Buckfast Denmark*
> https://buckfast.dk/index.php/en/about-us





> All of these excellent traits of the *Buckfast Honey Bee are a manifestation of the heterosis qualities of a hybrid.*
> 
> *https://apiexpert.eu/buckfast-honey-bee/*


There are plenty more if you don't believe the above ...

Established and distinct sub-types (races) of honeybees have been in existence 'as such' for millions of years, whereas the Buckfast bee has only existed for 100 years (since around 1914). A new race of bee in just 100 years ? I don't think so.
LJ


----------



## little_john

GregV said:


> So the current customer demand will make the significant impact at the distribution of these genetics (in the short term).


Which is exactly how Italians have developed such a dominant presence in the US and so many other countries - nothing whatsoever to do with genetic superiority - but as the result of marketing and customer demand. Dunno why I've never recognised this before ... (failure to appreciate the consequences of commerce).
LJ


----------



## Juhani Lunden

little_john said:


> But - as we all know, it's impossible to maintain the Buckfast strain without an ongoing huge amount of effort -





little_john said:


> Y A new race of bee in just 100 years ? I don't think so.


Buckfast is like any other bee race. When you take buckfast virgin queen and mate her with buckfast drones you get a buckfast queen.

No tricks needed.

If you wish to haves an italian queen, you need to get an italian virgin and italian drones.

Just the same effort. 

If you wish to have a carnica queen, same thing.


If you take italian virgin and let her mate with what is in the surroundings, you get a mut. 
Same with all other races, including buckfast.


----------



## GregB

little_john said:


> Which is exactly how Italians have developed such a dominant presence in the US....LJ


The "Italian bee idea" is still dominant in the marketing ideas pushed into the masses.
Even if only implicitly.

See - Sam Comfort videos toying with his "comfort hives".
The idea of working the bees in flops, with open belly, and a straw hat is a common commerce propaganda that most often not is the reality.

That's the "Italian bee propaganda" with the idea pushed the common folk could be doing the same - in the flops.
Never mind Sam Comfort is not publishing the videos of him opening the large production hives undressed (but the folks never think that far). 

I don't find this to be a great idea, even for common safety - working the bees undressed.
But the consumer want is ALL in the same box - not a reasonable expectation. Not with bees.


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## Litsinger

little_john said:


> Which is exactly how Italians have developed such a dominant presence in the US and so many other countries - nothing whatsoever to do with genetic superiority - but as the result of marketing and customer demand. Dunno why I've never recognised this before ... (failure to appreciate the consequences of commerce).
> LJ


I've been reading through Mr. George Imirie's 'Pink Pages' and found this entry from his March 2002 article _'A Magic Bullet'_ apropos to this concept:

_"Good hygiene is a genetic factor found in every race of bees, and this factor can be passed on in a queen's progeny if the drones that mated with the queen were also hygienically clean. This is going to take several years of selecting queens for breeding by queen breeders so that a high percentage of the queens that breeders produce possess this hygienic trait rather than the small percentage that have it today. No one can ORDER or DEMAND a queen breeder to supply you with a hygienically clean queen, but questioning by a large number of potential customers may well force a queen breeder into doing some research of his own breeding stock to comply with customer requests."_

http://pinkpages.chrisbacherconsulting.com/2002_Mar_-_A_Magic_Bullet.html


----------



## Juhani Lunden

little_john said:


> Yeah, sure ....
> 
> The Buckfast bee is a hybrid that requires the periodic introduction of new blood to prevent inbreeding and to accentuate certain genetic attributes such as e.g. mite tolerance.


If you keep Italian bees there is a need for introduction of new blood to prevent inbreeding, same thing with all races. 


From the link you provided (https://apiexpert.eu/buckfast-honey-bee/):
"When it comes to characteristics that directly impact the performance and economical value of the race, the uniformity is excellent."

You don´t get excellent uniformity from a hybrid. You get the widest possible variation.


----------



## little_john

Juhani Lunden said:


> If you keep Italian bees there is a need for introduction of new blood to prevent inbreeding, same thing with all races.


You know full well that what I posted was: 
"*The Buckfast bee is a hybrid* that requires the periodic introduction of new blood to prevent inbreeding and to accentuate certain genetic attributes such as e.g. mite tolerance."

It was only the emboldened words which were relevant, not the rest of the text which was only included for completeness.



> From the link you provided (https://apiexpert.eu/buckfast-honey-bee/):
> "When it comes to characteristics that directly impact the performance and economical value of the race, the uniformity is excellent."
> 
> You don´t get excellent uniformity from a hybrid. You get the widest possible variation.


Keld Brandstrup in particular is a commercial breeder of Buckfast bees who describes the bee as being a hybrid - but for some reason or other you do not want to accept this. If you're not prepared to accept an expert's description then I see little purpose in my own labouring of the point. You must believe what you wish.
LJ


----------



## Juhani Lunden

little_john said:


> Keld Brandstrup in particular is a commercial breeder of Buckfast bees who describes the bee as being a hybrid - but for some reason or other you do not want to accept this. If you're not prepared to accept an expert's description then I see little purpose in my own labouring of the point. You must believe what you wish.


What I said was that Buckfast was started as a hybrid, but is not any more a hybrid in that meaning what you wrote:

"But - as we all know, it's impossible to maintain the Buckfast strain without an ongoing huge amount of effort -"


Buckfast does not differ in this respective, effort of maintaining, from any race.


----------



## Riverderwent

squarepeg said:


> http://scientificbeekeeping.com/selective-breeding-for-mite-resistance-walking-the-walk/ ...
> 
> the article gives a fair and balanced review of the progress randy has made with his breeding program thus far and he shares guarded optimism about his chances for success going forward.
> 
> well worth the read.


Figure 5 in the article was painful.


----------



## msl

I thought #14 was more painful, reality hurts 
Grafting not splits..
I have been chewing in this one a bit
"Note to hobby beekeepers: I say this to make clear that beekeeper Jane Treatment-Free is dreaming if she thinks that allowing her colonies to die from lack of mite management is going to improve honey bee genetics overall. If she wants to improve honey bee genetics, she’d do best to treat her hives to keep them healthy, but put pressure on whoever she purchases her bees from, to seriously select for mite resistance."

Thinking on the myth Vs reality of bee breeding for mite resistance 
Looking at my favorite TF keeper out there, Sam Comfort.
How did he go TF? 
The Myth seems to be he caught feral survivor stock and bonded it
Reality, as he got in to a bit in his last round of videos, He took what was left of a thousand hives and grafted from the best building that operation back to 1k, then hand selected the 5 he felt were the best (top 0.5%) and moved them to an isolated canyon to keep TF, when he came back to NY he was allowed to hand select 5 of Kurt Websters breeder queens. Along the way he has purchased many $300 breeder queens and uses VSH queen cells from the Miksa's by the hundreds 

Greg hits the nail on the head, its all about consumerism. The problem is many that treat don't care, and many of those that are TF have been told they have to do it them self. 
So the market for resistant stocks is much smaller then it could (should in my book) be.

Beekeeping would be very different if every one trying to be TF bought resistant stocks from those who all ready produce it, it would be very different if northern beekeepers weren't demanding packages before the last snow/a mounth before swarm season... maby that's NOT the time to start a hive.
to change things people need to vote with there $$. That means supporting those who raise resistant stocks.


----------



## AR1

Some questions. There has been severe pressure on bees for what, 30 years now? A heck of a lot of bee lineages are dead. Shouldn't there have been a considerable shift towards bees that can tolerate varroa, across the board? Has anyone noticed this happening? I am hearing hints, but few statements. You older guys and gals that went through the 90s and early 2000s and saw the massive death, do you think the average bee is going to do any better today than the average bee did in 1995? 

If not, why not? 

Is the pressure from the big almond and honey folk for max production preventing adaptation? Is there a big conflict between max production and mite tolerance? I again am hearing hints that some believe this to be true, but Randy Oliver seems to think he is selecting a line that is doing both.


----------



## little_john

AR1 said:


> There has been severe pressure on bees for what, 30 years now? A heck of a lot of bee lineages are dead. Shouldn't there have been a considerable shift towards bees that can tolerate varroa, across the board?


Well expressed. 

Bear in mind also that Randy isn't creating anything 'new' - he's effectively identifying characteristics which already exist within his existing stocks in a 'dilute' form (that is, within a handful of colonies per thousand) and concentrating those characteristic so that they then become dominant - in all, or nearly all of his stocks.

But - it's already been suggested that total dominance of such characteristics within a colony isn't absolutely necessary - and providing that a modest percentage of bees are Varroa-intolerant, Hygenic, whatever - then they will be able to deal with the mite problem on behalf of those bees which can't.

But if this is indeed the case, why haven't we seen some evidence of this activity having already begun to spread away from those areas where it is said that TF bees are located ?
LJ


----------



## little_john

msl said:


> Greg hits the nail on the head, its all about consumerism. The problem is many that treat don't care, and many of those that are TF have been told they have to do it them self.
> So the market for resistant stocks is much smaller then it could (should in my book) be.
> 
> Beekeeping would be very different if every one trying to be TF bought resistant stocks from those who all ready produce it, it would be very different if northern beekeepers weren't demanding packages before the last snow/a mounth before swarm season... maby that's NOT the time to start a hive.
> to change things people need to vote with there $$. That means supporting those who raise resistant stocks.


The above is effectively a sales-pitch for a product - the effectiveness and reliability of which still has to be confirmed. I know full-well that VOA works (and incidentally - I do care), but I've yet to be convinced that TF is anything other that either the pipe-dream of self-deluded individuals or - in the case of a handful of well-regarded beekeepers - a localised phenomenon.
LJ


----------



## beemandan

As I’ve pointed out in the past, what Randy Oliver is doing isn’t anything new. In the decades since the arrival of varroa, professional entomologists and geneticists have been conducting bee selection programs….using the same techniques. They have brought much more tolerant/resistant bees than we originally had. New World Carniolans, Minnesota Hygienics, VSH and Purdue Ankle biters are just a few named breeds. Many more are unnamed. Sadly we are at a plateau. 
This is not a simple parasite/host relationship. Varroa coevolved with the European honey bee’s cousin the Asian honey bee. Because of this bee family’s similar life cycle varroa hit our bees as an especially destructive parasite. There is no indication that Apis mellifera was ever exposed to varroa before the nineteenth century. Because of the sophisticated life cycle relationships between our bees and varroa, no single genetic mutation is going to create resistance. 
In spite of all of the armchair geneticists and entomologists who are convinced that the holy grail of beekeeping resides in their backyard bees, genuine resistance or tolerance (as exists in Apis ceranae) will require multiple, coincidental mutations that may or may not ever occur over the next few millennia. 
Just my opinion.


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## GregB

beemandan said:


> .........will require multiple, coincidental mutations that may or may not ever occur over the next few millennia.
> Just my opinion.


As it has been said more often now - NOT few millennia.
Rather few decades.
In fact, those few decades are just about to be over.
Think for a few minutes - we are actually set for the break over.
The year 2020 few months away, last I checked - we are talking 50-60 years of this Varroa saga in the Western world.
Many places moved on long ago and resumed normal programming - IF they chose to do so.

It is really the people who are problem at the moment, not the bees.

This is up to the masses to decide IF they are done treating (ineffective for the most back-yarders, as it is) and just ask for the resistant, low-maintenance stock.
The resistant stocks are available - everyone should just ask for them.
Feral stocks are also available - just ask for them right on this board, if really care.
As long you do your annual swarming/splitting routine (just a common sense, normal, sledge-hammer-type management) - you are done.
If you over-centralize your bees - well, again, you are just creating a generic, ticking-bomb problem (not parasite specific) - artificial, general problem.

Bees should be a low-maintenance item, just like your car, fridge, washer and dryer.
Heck, unlike cats and dogs, bees are already predisposed to be a low-maintenance thing - they feed themselves and go outside to poop themselves.
Enough is enough.

My older car is 2007 Toyota Sienna minivan (the beekeeping dump on wheels).
This is how the bees should be too - once-per-year oil change and tire rotation - maintenance done.
Still unsure if I need to change the original spark-plugs ($$$$ on this V6) - I could as well run this thing into the ground as is and just replace the entire van, when done with it.


----------



## little_john

beemandan said:


> In spite of all of the armchair geneticists and entomologists who are convinced that the holy grail of beekeeping resides in their backyard bees, genuine resistance or tolerance (as exists in Apis ceranae) will require multiple, coincidental mutations t*hat may or may not ever occur over the next few millennia. *
> Just my opinion.


That's also the opinion of Charles Darwin:


> That natural selection will always act with extreme slowness, I fully admit.





> I do believe that natural selection will always act very slowly, often only at long intervals of time, and generally on only a very few of the inhabitants of the same region at the same time. I further believe, that this very slow, intermittent action of natural selection accords perfectly well with what geology tells us of the rate and manner at which the inhabitants of this world have changed.
> *From: On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, 1859*


What Greg is referring to is Human Selection - a different thing entirely. What can be done in the short term can equally be undone in the same timescale. Permanent change will take millennia.
LJ


----------



## GregB

little_john said:


> That's also the opinion of Charles Darwin:
> 
> 
> What Greg is referring to is Human Selection - a different thing entirely. *What can be done in the short term can equally be undone in the same timescale.* Permanent change will take millennia.
> LJ


Agree, LJ.

The consumer mood swing quickly and wildly and *cyclically *(just look at the annual fashion shows - crazy manipulation of the masses by the so-called designers - plain cheats, IMO). 

But the cyclical moods of the human consumer are, pretty much, an axiom. 
It never fails - save for few minor adjustments/facelifts - so the recycled ideas/things are not so obvious.

To compare, inertia in the beek world is massive - both bad and good - it slows things down by a factor of X (compared to the clothing business).
But once the Titanic is moving - try stopping it.
Still, the same principles apply.

What it means - 50-60 years of frantic efforts to find the final and effective mite treatment (as simple as the morning oatmeal) could well flip to the 50-60 years of hands-off, low-maintenance beekeeping. The 50-60 year time-span is huge and may result in wild outcomes (not likely for us to see first hand, but who knows...).
I am pretty darn sure, everyone will finally see what is possible.

Anyway, I would not dwell on the millennia thing - that is topic for geologists, evolutionary biologists, and their ilk.
Really, irrelevant in our context.
Things happen pretty quickly here when pressure is applied - not as quickly as annual virus mutations, but pretty darn close.

PS: 
Do you still change oil every 3000 miles/3 months?
Well - don't (check the latest tune from the oil companies - it quietly changed too).
I have not been doing this 3000 mile practice for the last 10 years - not needed.
What is really needed - high-end fully synthetic oil and high-end oil filter - once-per-year maintenance is sufficient - "quality stock" vs. "cheap stock".


----------



## Gino45

GregV;
My older car is 2007 Toyota Sienna minivan (the beekeeping dump on wheels).
This is how the bees should be too - once-per-year oil change and tire rotation - maintenance done.
Still unsure if I need to change the original spark-plugs ($$$$ on this V6) - I could as well run this thing into the ground as is and just replace the entire van said:


> I suggest that you replace the spark plugs. I expect you will appreciate the difference. Shouldn't be more than $35, if you shop around.


----------



## GregB

Gino45 said:


> I suggest that you replace the spark plugs. I expect you will appreciate the difference. Shouldn't be more than $35, if you shop around.


The part is peanuts.
I don't care for the part cost.
It is the labor cost what matters - 1K to replace the plugs - that hurts a little.... and does it even make sense to do?
On my older I4's I was doing the labor myself.
Well, not on cross-V6 - I will not do this, a bit too advanced getting to those back plugs.

Agreed - the performance is not there anymore. I know full well.


----------



## beemandan

As I said….the things that Randy Oliver has been doing aren’t anything new. This selection process has been going on for decades already. I have yet to see any sort of true breakthrough.
By the way….talking about consumerism. Danny Weaver has been claiming to be running a treatment free multi thousand hive operation for over a decade. He sells queens. Why hasn’t everybody jumped on the BWeaver bandwagon?


----------



## GregB

beemandan said:


> .....He sells queens. Why hasn’t everybody jumped on the BWeaver bandwagon?


They should.
But they also need to get used to NOT be working the bees in the flops then - only normal IMO.
That pop-culture "Italian bee idea" is bad (working the bees bear naked and brag about it) - very good bees do not get traction because of it.

The idea of working the bees with your bellybutton open does not mix with the BWeaver queens too well, if I understand this.
I got a line originating from BWeaver and some feral blood mixed in - my favorite line - will be going into the 3rd winter with no chems.

Well, I already hear of the Russian's feisty-ness in the local chatter.
Lots of Russian hybrids got sold in my area this spring.
People sound happy enough.
But comments of the feisty bees arose also.
About time to get some good bees going (feisty, but manageable) - will only make people better beekeepers.
These bees force their owners to pay some attention to their own behavior and respect the bee.

BTW, now days there is so much good protective gear available, 100 years ago one could NOT even dream about.
Clearly back then they were very fond of the "Italian bee idea".


----------



## crofter

I see quick genetic shifts, even if possible, as being potentially a dangerous thing to a species. Probably why we dont see it happening except in microbes. If man could so easily engender changes why not do it to the mite (it is the problem) and not risk messing up the bees program! 

The types of bee that Beemandan mentions, New World Carniolans, Minnesota Hygienics, VSH and Purdue Ankle biters are probably an easier group to work with in regards to living with varroa. Many of the tendencies make life more difficult for the mites well being. That said they are not the most suitable to filling the needs of the migratory pollinators who employ perhaps 90% of America's bees.

I picked up some Chilean nucs to help me recover from EFB. They are productive and reasonably easy to work with but I sure am not in favor of the way they are continuing to lay frame after frame of brood going into my winter. They would be ideal mite breeders though! They are easy to get as early as you want in spring unlike our local stock and will breed whenever there is food in front of them. Here in the north I did not have drones flying in good numbers till near middle of June. 

When Italian genetics so suits the pollination business you can see how they call the tune. I think the Darwinian beekeeping promoters are merely humming in the background.

You can wring your hands about a situation but when the economics of it push hard in one direction that is where it will go. Honey bees really are not endangered species despite the media hype.


----------



## GregB

crofter said:


> ......
> 
> *I picked up some Chilean* nucs to help me recover from EFB. They are productive and reasonably easy to work with but I sure am not in favor of the way *they are continuing to lay frame after frame of brood going into my winter*....
> 
> .


It is beginning of spring in Chile right now.
Of course they should be laying frame after a frame.
They should if they are just off the plane - they still think they are in Chile.


If anything, migration from Chile to Canada will mess up the bees pretty good.
Shipping cross-US is nothing, to compare.
Same hemisphere - peanuts.
I can only wonder what pathogens could have hitchhiked on those Chilean nucs from down under.


----------



## msl

little_john said:


> The above is effectively a sales-pitch for a product - the effectiveness and reliability of which still has to be confirmed. I know full-well that VOA works (and incidentally - I do care), but I've yet to be convinced that TF is anything other that either the pipe-dream of self-deluded individuals


The USDA VSH has a fairly good track record as a resistant stock, Treatment free it is not, but may be a good starting point( as it has been for others), there are some fokes claiming the traits dulte slower and with more regularity then say Russians.
No were did I say there is any off the shelf TF stock available! 
the point was the common US TF message of "catch local "feral" swarms(usually commercial stocks from other beekeepers) and see what happens, split every thing that lives" has a low probability of a successful out come for many reasons.
Supporting those who are truly running a resistance breeding program has a better (short and long term) probability of success. In short I feel that message is cutting off their nose to spite their face 



> why haven't we seen some evidence of this activity having already begun to spread away from those areas where it is said that TF bees are located


Who says it hasn't and how would we know if it spread? Maby that's what randy is working with (lol) . With out heavy pressure giving it a survival advantage (beekeeper section) its almost surely negative impact on other important traits and quickly drops in to the back ground
Why aren't bees naturally hygienic enough to resist AFB? 
When there is no AFB around to give that behavior a survival advantage, it quickly drops into the back ground as it has "costs" just like any other trait and those colonlys not paying those costs can survive better.


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## crofter

GregV said:


> It is beginning of spring in Chile right now.
> Of course they should be laying frame after a frame.
> They should if they are just off the plane - they still think they are in Chile.
> 
> 
> If anything, migration from Chile to Canada will mess up the bees pretty good.
> Shipping cross-US is nothing, to compare.
> Same hemisphere - peanuts.
> I can only wonder what pathogens could have hitchhiked on those Chilean nucs from down under.


Well they certainly were not carrying any mite load! Hey maybe they are the holy grail! 
I expect they had to pass a fairly stiff inspection to get Canadian approval to import. Haven't researched anything to that effect but my reaction is to trust them further than the alternatives from California! I think the Hawaian shipments were greatly reduced this year too.
I just am not used to seeing that heavy brooding in the fall compared to my usual bees that are quite heavy to Carni habits.


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## little_john

I don't know if this relates directly to this thread, but in 2010 a guy named Ron Hoskins of Swindon, Wiltshire (UK) announced to the world that he's bred a Varroa-Hygenic bee. This 'good news story' was duly lapped-up by the media (https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-wiltshire-11089792) - but very little has been heard of his 'super-bees' since that time. Certainly I've not heard of the beekeeping community 'beating a path to his door' which is what's supposed to happen when anyone develops an improved mousetrap.

That was nine years ago, and so I 'did a Google' to find his website: http://www.swindonhoneybeeconservation.org.uk/for-sale/

Now if we remove the rose-tinted spectacles and look at the site critically, we read: "We do not sell F1 queens unless they have been proved ‘Varroa-tolerant’."
At first sight this looks like a most responsible attitude to adopt - but it also indicates that these bees are not breeding true with regard to their behaviour - otherwise there would be no need to undergo post-breeding selection. So - should I choose to purchase one of Hoskins' queens, it is clear that I would also then need to carefully check the behaviour of colonies headed by each of her daughters.

Hoskins also writes: "We ask the new keepers of our F1 Queens to refrain from the use of Chemicals ..." - but what happens to those colonies headed by daughters of this 'Super-Bee" which do NOT proceed to exhibit Varroa-tolerant behaviour AND are not being treated by chemicals as Hoskins suggests ?

Am I tempted to try such bees ? No. Would you ?
LJ


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## Juhani Lunden

little_john said:


> Am I tempted to try such bees ? No. Would you ?



TF bee material is so scares that you have to take all in, if there is evidence about their resistance. Is there, in Hoskins case?


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## GregB

little_john said:


> ...
> Am I tempted to try such bees ? No. Would you ?
> LJ


I would be - no problem (if not for being a cheap-skate).
But eventually, I want and need to bring in 2-3 outside queens of desired qualities again (certainly, not from UK).
Hopefully, on the cheap.
If have to - will pay the full retail price.
M. Bush is one good source for me that I am mulling about (due to the near location).
Certainly, it works for me.

Really, IF you are handling bees, don't you know this?
Don't you know that *each and every queen* outputs a unique combination of the traits?
I mean - *each and every.* 
What is so new in this old concept?

This is *exactly *what I want.

(I am being rhetorical, LJ, NOT personal - to be sure).

With bees one can not fix anything in place. 
Impossible and waste of time.
It is the opposite - you have to play the percentages game and keep tossing the dice over and over.
The more the better.
The higher the numbers of trials, the higher the probabilities of getting needed results within the given constraints.


BTW, Yahtzee is one of my favorite games.
It is stupid simple.
And yet one day I had 5 or 6 (?) 600 point games in a row (those who know will appreciate this; this means I had several repetitive Yahtzees in the same game; then it repetead in the next game; and again - very very very unlikely).
My wife kept loosing with 400 points - that kind of stuff just does not happen - yet it did.
Weird things.
My wife and I keep talking about that strange day (been more than 15 years ago; was stormy too, May or April).
Should have bought a lottery ticket that day (stupidly did not).


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## GregB

crofter said:


> Well they certainly were not carrying any mite load! Hey maybe they are the holy grail! ........


But seriously, this is probably the most radically opposite case of "keeping the bees locally".
It is what it is.


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## squarepeg

GregV said:


> But seriously, this is probably the most radically opposite case of "keeping the bees locally".



if i recall correctly crofter is located so far north that there isn't really a 'local' population present.


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## crofter

GregV said:


> But seriously, this is probably the most radically opposite case of "keeping the bees locally".
> It is what it is.





squarepeg said:


> if i recall correctly crofter is located so far north that there isn't really a 'local' population present.


Yes there certainly is not a local bee population! zero ferals. Until EFB I had virtually no winter losses with bees originating from Tibor Szabo queens. His father was a pioneer in varroa research in Canada back in the 80's: Governor Generals award for contributions to the industry.

From 13 hives in two seasons I arrived at 1 colony, plus one that was queenless. Bought 2 of the Chilean Nucs because that was all that was available. Back up to 6 colonies and am working now to eliminate the Chilean genetics that dont quite suit my pace and situation. 

I would not slag the Chileans in the least but I have the feeling that their breeding habits would make them a bit harder to winter and I suspect a bit too early getting going in the spring for my climate.

I think much of this thread suggests that polination driven commercialization contributes to the dominance of a bee whose habits make varroa management more difficult.

They serve the present purpose but are not, in my mind the most likely source of stock to start developing a low maintenance bee.

Now that is what it is!


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## AR1

Back to my question. Do current bees resist or tolerate varroa any better than bees 30 years ago did? 

Is it all in the management? Pretty clearly the big traveling folks don't see any realistic way to get around using chemicals. This doesn't surprise me. If 95% of the cows in America were shipped to California every year, mixed together then shipped back across the 50 states, most of them would die of disease every year. They would also spread brucellosis and anthrax and tuberculosis and to every local cow they came close to. We would see lots of diseases that are merely minor problems explode into plagues. 

The big surprise isn't that so many bees die, but that any bees survive.

Russian bees seem to survive perfectly well in their natural habitat, and in the US in anything similar to the natural habitat. Africanized bees survive perfectly well in the wild and resist varroa. If we packed 20,000 colonies of these bees onto trailers and shipped them to the almonds and back to Texas, and didn't treat them, would they survive? I doubt it.

My personal view, and I don't claim to be any sort of expert, is that concentration of colonies with movement to and from CA are the big problems. I don't see any easy way to fix those problems.


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## GregB

AR1 said:


> Back to my question.........
> My personal view, and I don't claim to be any sort of expert, is that concentration of colonies with movement to and from CA are the big problems. I don't see any easy way to fix those problems.


That's what Randy Oliver does and has.
Pollination (part of his business).
Concentration (part of his business).
Hence - I am all ears.

Yes, I agree, AR1.
Excessive concentration and long-distance migration are killing us.


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## GregB

crofter said:


> Yes there certainly is not a local bee population! zero ferals..... Now that is what it is!


Hardly a unique situation.
I have no ferals.
There are lots managed bees around me, however.
Some of these are fully qualified local bees (just managed).


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## John_M

Bees do tolerate varroa better now, but varroa has become much more virilent. We could never allow the mite levels we did in the late 80s and 90s today. Mites have also become or have become recognized as viral vectors, I think have become since we can now longer expect a 100 mite per shake test to survive, if they would even survive to a level that they could get to that high a level.

As far as treatment free vs treating, definition is needed. Are we talking treatment(aka chemical) free or management free, ie brood breaks, drone culling etc. because these are treatments. IMO, the best hygenic, ankle biting bees around will not survive the stress of an introduced high level mite load. Bad genetics, no, just more than should be expected of them. I may resist whatever cold/flu is going around just fine, but one night swapping spit with a woman who is still contagious, or even a milder exposure after a stressor like not enough sleep, a chemical exposure and I am now sick. Bees are no different. We expect that we can stress them by keeping them much closer than they would ever be in nature, throw nuerotoxins, aka pesticides, at them and they won't succomb to a parasite or pathogen is completely unrealistic. The miricle is that they do survive despite what gets thrown at them. But for how long. And are they our canary in a coal mine for what we do to ourselves. Of course they have infectious disaeses we cluster the things together in yards where pathogens can flourish. Under natural conditions the pathogen would die with the colony it killed. But under our care the pathogen can spread to 10s more colonies being spread by the new hosts eagerly robbing out the remaining resources.


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## John_M

Could we accelarate the natural selection procees by not treating, sure. Who wants to be the first to accept 90% losses yearly? Who wants to live with many foods costing 10 x as much because of lack of pollinators? And endure those costs and losses year after year.


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## gww

John M


> Could we accelarate the natural selection procees by not treating, sure. Who wants to be the first to accept 90% losses yearly? Who wants to live with many foods costing 10 x as much because of lack of pollinators? And endure those costs and losses year after year.


I realize I am comparing apples to oranges but if the feral bees died by 90% but have now rebounded and have life spans as long now as they did before mites, it says something.

If weever took his 90% loss the first year and then the years after, the loss went down than it might be disingenuous to say that 90 percent losses should be expected year after year.

I do not blame and do not expect change from someone who is making a living from bees and is happy enough with the way things are now. If I was buying shoes for my kids through bees, I would treat if I found that to be working.

I do see something different where I am and as a hobby beekeeper. It might change though. I do not provide brood breaks or cull drone brood. I have fed sugar before but so do most that treat. Going to try with out that this year, if I don't chicken out. I am pretty sure that my hives have mites. I do have my ten hives stacked on top of each other. I understand that randy is taking his bees to almonds and stressing them much more then my bees will see though my neighbors probably buy some of those almond bees and bring them to me. 

I hear you but also do not think randy is crazy in thinking it is possible to make a better bee that will work for him. The proof will be in the pudding and time will tell but I believe he knows the studies out there on the subject and how nature responds in its ebbs and flows.

I am not convinced of it being impossible. 
Cheers
gww

Ps
I read a guy on bee L that does treat that lost 80% of his hives one year. It was not a normal year and did not happen before or after. I understand the cold analogy you made and expect that in nature no matter what you do. It happened sometimes before mites arrival also.


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## GregB

John_M said:


> Could we accelarate the natural selection procees by not treating, sure. Who wants to be the first to accept 90% losses yearly? Who wants to live with many foods costing 10 x as much because of lack of pollinators? And endure those costs and losses year after year.


Losses:
- heck, I have been doing it live and reporting on this exact forum; read my thread at all?
- I will repeat the same this year; no problem

Pollination: 
- I challenge this pollination hysteria a BS 
- need to let the natural bug fauna to recover and that will do (question is - is it even possible now? if possible, how quickly?)
(first they carpet-kill all surrounding by pesticide; then haul in the honey bees to plug the hole artificially created)
- all the while the food availability artificially inflated and food pricing artificially deflated (in the West, anyway); 
.......complaining of low honey prices, anyone?


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## John_M

Right, but that same carpet bombing with pesticides is another of those stressors that make them more suseptable. Monoculture farming, pesticide use hurt more than the bees. It destroys the whole food web in the soil and makes our food less nutritous and our plants more prone to pest and disease. And what does it do to us eating those foods. What does it say about us when we raise our food animals in conditions we wouldn't impose on prisoners of war. Just because you intend to eat the animal doesn't mean you should treat it inhumanely, to my mind it's all the more reason to give it a happy life. What price do we pay for cheap meat and cheap food.


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## John_M

Oh, and I would never call Randy crazy. He's one of the most realistic forward thinking beekeepers I've heard.


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## GregB

John_M said:


> Right, but that same carpet bombing with pesticides is another of those stressors that make them more suseptable. Monoculture farming, pesticide use hurt more than the bees. It destroys the whole food web in the soil and makes our food less nutritous and our plants more prone to pest and disease. And what does it do to us eating those foods. What does it say about us when we raise our food animals in conditions we wouldn't impose on prisoners of war. Just because you intend to eat the animal doesn't mean you should treat it inhumanely, to my mind it's all the more reason to give it a happy life. What price do we pay for cheap meat and cheap food.


I don't argue.
Cheap food must die.
The food is NOT cheap.
Food surrogate is cheap.


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## GregB

> that may or may not ever occur over the *next few millennia*.


I propose you guys step away from the bees for a minute.

Read about microbes for a change:



> “*Bacteria can be genetically identical but phenotypically different*”


https://www.quantamagazine.org/bacterial-clones-show-surprising-individuality-20190904/

And here is the point some of us already proposed many times over - NOTHING need to change with the bees.
Nothing.

They can do the job as-is and now.
No evolution is needed.
That quoted to death evolution theory is to be reviewed, anyway.
About time.


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## little_john

John_M said:


> *Could we accelarate the natural selection procees* by not treating, sure.


There's very clearly a total misunderstanding of what Natural Selection entails. You can no more 'accelerate' Natural Selection than you can 'manage' it (as being claimed in another thread).
Charles Darwin went to a great deal of trouble to distinguish between Human Selection and Natural Selection, with the first four chapters of 'Origin of Species' being devoted to comparing these - and yet people will keep referring to how Natural Selection can be influenced in various ways by human activity.

It can't. We humans don't feature *at all* in Natural Selection - that's why it's called 'Natural'. Not only do the two types of Selection involve completely different timescales, they differ by Human Selection having a pre-determined objective prior to any selection taking place. It is precisely that objective which determines what form the selection will take. 

Not so with Natural Selection - when any changes which may occur only ever become apparent with hindsight. There is absolutely no way of knowing beforehand what changes may or may not occur. The European honeybee has not changed very much - if at all - during the last few million years - and so the prospect of it doing so now by the process of Natural Selection, in order to benefit **** sapiens, is not very likely.
LJ


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## gww

I guess if you believe in learned behavior in addition to natural selection, pressure can make a difference in response. It has seemed to make a difference in some studies and the speed of adjustment of the bees to the mite.
Cheers
gww


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## GregB

little_john said:


> There's very clearly a total misunderstanding of what Natural Selection entails. ......
> LJ


Agreed.
Like LJ said already, I personally never once muttered anything about "natural selection".
It is impossible and not needed in this particular, extremely short-term context.

Human selection driven by the consumer markets will do a fine job.
All people need to do - buy the critical mass of particularly behaving pheno-types and create the sustainable market for them.
Let the other pheno-types just drop off, NOT be to saving them "at all costs".
This has been done before many, many times.
Successfully.
This is how the Italians replaced the Black bees in America - just like that - everyone bought them.
It is being done now (as discussed above about Buckfast, etc).

The article about microbes is a good hint - bees have the same mechanisms as the microbes, and much, much more (being more complex life-forms).
Mechanisms are built-in.
Available now, right this moment.
They are just swept under the carpet and diluted.


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## little_john

gww said:


> I guess if you believe in learned behavior in addition to natural selection, pressure can make a difference in response. It has seemed to make a difference in some studies and the speed of adjustment of the bees to the mite.


I think it's important to clarify - for the benefit of anyone who may not have read 'Origin of Species' - that Darwin is actually quite complimentary about Human Selection when it comes to relatively superficial (my choice of word, not Darwin's) changes, such as improving the performance of racing pigeons, increasing the milk yield of cows, altering the colour/ appearance of flowers, and so on ... but he is also aware of it's limitations.



> How fleeting are the wishes and efforts of man! how short his time! and consequently how poor will his products be, compared with those accumulated by nature during whole geological periods.


And do bear in mind that Natural Selection - as a mechanism - is completely indifferent, and will be working just as much to the advantage of the mite, as to that of the honeybee. It is only we humans who have a preference for one to survive, and the other not.

LJ


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## JWPalmer

little_john said:


> And do bear in mind that Natural Selection - as a mechanism - is completely indifferent, and will be working just as much to the advantage of the mite, as to that of the honeybee. It is only we humans who have a preference for one to survive, and the other not.
> LJ


Well stated.


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## dudelt

The older I get, the less I appreciate mankind's job of artificial selection in other species. One of the purposes in having a wide gene pool within any species is to create differences in the individuals, not make them all the same. Nature wants numerous varieties of every species because at any given time, certain traits will hold a temporary advantage. That advantage will not last forever and may not even last for a full year. Trying to create the varroa resistant bee will probably lead to other problems down the road. There are plenty of examples the look at that prove the point. Humans did a great job of creating sweet corn that tastes great but without humans, it will go extinct. The plant cannot reseed itself any more in numbers large enough to keep the species alive. Modern cows would not stand a chance against predators. According to some sources, modern wheat consumption may be a major health risk to a huge portion of humans. Africanized honey bees are also a perfect example. The problem as I see it is that any time you try to create something new through genetic manipulation or artificial selection, you must also give up something else. Before creating the next super bee, it might be nice to know what the bees are going to have to give up in the process.


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## Cloverdale

Little John “ Charles Darwin went to a great deal of trouble to distinguish between Human Selection and Natural Selection, with the first four chapters of 'Origin of Species' being devoted to comparing these ”..

Charles Darwins book is on the evolution of man isn’t it? I thought the evolution of man was still a theory.


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