# Live and Let Die - Do you really reduce the gene pool?



## Adam Foster Collins

In cases where bees are not given mite treatments, and those who cannot survive are allowed to die, the approach is sometimes called "The Bond Method" or "Live and Let Die".

An argument against this approach suggests that you reduce the gene pool by losing bees that might have other valuable breeding traits.

But given that users of the method are so much in the minority, wouldn't it stand to reason that any of the genetic traits of a given be that are not maintained in the treatment free yards would be carried on in the treated yards in the same area?

Adam


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## Solomon Parker

This seems to me to be a very nebulous subject. It's like dumping one bucket of water into another and trying to identify which molecules you've lost. How do you tell what you've lost? What does one set of bees have that another doesn't? Sure, you can _say_ that something's lost, but what?

If I die without having children, is the human species somehow disadvantaged because it no longer has something in the gene pool it once did? Most of our foods have been bred from plants and animals originally what we'd consider inedible. Goldfish revert to their native brown if they go several generations without selective breeding. Beyond that, there is massive amounts of stored information in our DNA that is inactivated, relics of our ancestors and of viral DNA that has inserted itself into our code.

Perhaps what's lost, as in the case with the goldfish, is certain combinations of expressed traits. Without selection, those combinations are reordered, the wrong combination to a lock if you will. All the numbers are still there, they're just not in the right order.

What do you think?


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## Riskybizz

Adam

The Bond Project consisted of 150 isolated colonies and reached its conclusions based upon that set of circumstances. It may seem nebulous to some, but not to Dr. Locke, as she describes it in part of her doctoral thesis. 

http://pub.epsilon.slu.se/9036/1/locke_b_120912.pdf


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## squarepeg

rb, can you give a quick summary of her conclusions from the study?


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## Riskybizz

Peg, 

The link to her study can only explain it far better than I ever could. Take the time to read it; great paper. One of her summations is that “chemical treatments of honey bee diseases even if successful at the colony level in the short term have not eradicated the problem of pathogens at the population level". In other words you might be able to kill a few mites but you will do more harm to the bees as a superorganism in eliminating their ability to fight off pathogens and viruses that ultimately will lead to the demise of the colony as a whole.


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## squarepeg

and this gets into the genetics of it which are above my pay grade.

i'm all for not continuing lines of bees that consistantly require treatments to survive.

this could be accomplished by requeening, if the only genetics that are carried forward are in the queen's dna.

there was some information presented here (by wlc i think) that suggested that genes make it into the bees by other means, but i don't understand that.

i take a look at the paper, thanks!


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## squarepeg

ok, did a 'speed read'.

looks like at least two strategies responsible for varroa resistance have been developed in nontreated bees, and these traits are passed on to future generations. it was not determined if this is through the queen or the drone or both. so it makes sense to requeen with resistant stock, as well as cull drones from nonresistant colonies while pushing drones in the resistant ones.

it also looks like the use of fluvalinate (apistan) was found to temporarily increase virus loads in colonies receiving treatment with it.


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## Riskybizz

see Peg your not so square after all.....(smiles) one does not have to be a geneticist to understand the basic principles of a proven study.


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## squarepeg

thanks rb, i think. 

when i did my master's thesis, i had to use the .05 level of statistical significance to say that my data supported my hypothesis. but even that meant i had a one in twenty chance of being wrong.

so 'proven' is always relative, and i don't know enough about this field to question the methodology ect.

but it looks pretty straightforward, and the results are not surprising. i tend to like randy oliver's reviews on these studies, as he has the background to critique and challenge them.


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## Daniel Y

Adam Foster Collins said:


> In cases where bees are not given mite treatments, and those who cannot survive are allowed to die, the approach is sometimes called "The Bond Method" or "Live and Let Die".
> 
> An argument against this approach suggests that you reduce the gene pool by losing bees that might have other valuable breeding traits.
> Adam


First keep in mind that natural selection and breeding selection have nothing in common. Natural selection is extremely diverse. It is selecting for a very wide range of traits under a wide range of conditions. so it actually selects for a vast genetic pool. It also practices in some ways inbreeding. For example when environmental conditions are favorable there is a higher rate of survival. creating a higher population and an increase in cross breeding. In times of unfavorable conditions there is a high rate of failure. at times coming near extinction. population s are smaller and can often become isolated resulting in inbreeding of specific genetic traits. These traits become more set as a result and some traits may even be bred out.

In comparison selection for breeding is targeted to a very small set of traits under comparable identical conditions. variability is limited as well as the genetic pool. None of teh traits selected for are not necessarily beneficial to the bee or it's ability to survive. much less survive a wide variety of conditions.


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## Ian

look into the Saskatraz Honey Bee Project,

http://www.saskatraz.com/

right up your guys ally 

I'm buying queens from this outfit


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## squarepeg

very cool ian. if i were north of the border i'd get mine from them too.


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## Michael Palmer

The near death of the native bee of the British Isles comes to mind. When Acarapis woodii invaded, Apis mellifera mellifera all but disappeared. This bee, that lived on the southern edges of the ice for eons, was taken out by a parasite it had never before encountered. Were the genetics of the bee that remained diminished in some way? I would say so. 

Also, I witnessed the initial infestation of Acarapis in North America. It killed my yellow bees, leaving the dark colonies seemingly untouched. My operation went from almost entirely yellow bees to almost all dark in just a few years. Yes, I requeened with carni and buckfast stocks...dark bees. But I also raised my own from strong colonies...both dark, and yellow if I could find them. The yellow bees all but disappeared. Was there a loss of genes? I would assume so.

Now, it's been 25 years. I still raise my queens from my best stocks...not selecting for color. While my bees are predominantly dark, yellow colonies are coming back...and I haven't bought in any yellow stocks since the mid-80s.

So was something lost, or something gained, or was it there in hiding all along? Beats me.


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## Adam Foster Collins

Michael Palmer said:


> ...So was something lost, or something gained, or was it there in hiding all along? Beats me.


That's interesting. Makes one wonder about genetic traits, and how they might appear and disappear under different conditions. I don't really know 'yellow' bees. I hear of them, and have read about them many times in Brother Adam's work, but I don't think I know them to look at. Does it refer to the more typical Italian coloring? Is it really that yellow, or is that just comparative to the carni's and russians?

I just feel that anything I'm liable to 'lose' in my yards, is just as liable to be sustained by another beekeeper in the area. I just don't see what is lost with the death of a small number of colonies in terms of important genetic material.

I've heard of saskatraz a number of times. I sent them a one line email asking a couple of questions about getting queen cells. It took just over one month to get a reply, which was a shorter line than the one I sent and didn't answer my questions.

I ended up going to Bill Ferguson for Buckfasts.

Adam


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## Ian

your in NS though Adam, they have just broadened their wings a bit supplying out of SK. I would assume once they get logistics down, and have good demand, sending them further abroad would become more feasible. 
I can fly cheaper to England from here that I can fly to Fredricton


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## Adam Foster Collins

I understand. No doubt a busy man, and until this summer, Nova Scotia complicated things with a closed border and requiring permits. Looks like they've done a lot of genetic work up there, and I can see bringing in some of their stock at some point. Are you running Saskatraz stock now, Ian? If not, where do you source queens?

Adam


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## jdmidwest

Genetics have resulted in pesticide resistant varroa mites after years of treatment. So why can't the bees adapt to resist the mites. Many colonies may die, but the survivors will be stronger.


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## Ian

yes I have bought some of their stock this past season. Good producers anyway, time will tell if I like them or not. Im not sold on the mite tolerance bit though I do support all their work on the project. That is the main reason why I bought some in, 200 queened nucs.
I also source California. But im getting tired of getting poor queens. I am seriously considering re vamping my whole op to run off the reliance of early queens



Adam Foster Collins said:


> I understand. No doubt a busy man, and until this summer, Nova Scotia complicated things with a closed border and requiring permits. Looks like they've done a lot of genetic work up there, and I can see bringing in some of their stock at some point. Are you running Saskatraz stock now, Ian? If not, where do you source queens?
> 
> Adam


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## Ian

jdmidwest said:


> Genetics have resulted in pesticide resistant varroa mites after years of treatment. So why can't the bees adapt to resist the mites. Many colonies may die, but the survivors will be stronger.


Its not just a matter of resisting the mite, they also have to become resistant to the number of viral infections transferred from the mite. before they were able to manage with a relatively high pop of mites, now, it seems if there is a trace of mites in the hive they will crash. Its the virus interaction also. so ya, they just have to be able to eliminate the presence of mites within the hive


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## Adam Foster Collins

I'm thinking of trying some queens from Quebec next season. Have you heard anything about these people?

http://mielsdanicet.com/en/

Adam


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## Ian

looks like a good bet,

are the queens flown?


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## Ian

you probably do not have alot of options over there in Nova Scotia,
where do you get your queens now?


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## Adam Foster Collins

I had very few options until this summer. 

• NS had a closed border for 20 years. 
• No importation of bees without special permits.
• Province imported all the queens for everyone at one time each spring from one supplier in Hawaii.

I obtained a permit this summer, and I got 10 of Bill Ferguson's Buckfast queens and queened my wintering nucs with those. We'll see how they're doing come spring.
The fruit industry (blueberries, and namely Oxford, who is the single largest beekeeper out here with 15,000, colonies pushed the province to open the border, because even with the all their colonies, they're still short on pollination. Also, I have a feeling they plan to get out of the bee business. We shall see.

Anyway, it appears that this year will be more open, and while that may increase competition for pollination contacts, it will make it easier for me to bring in strong genetic stock to build my own with. I am just getting started. My primary goal is a sustainable bee population. I am aiming to run about 100 colonies. Right now, I have 13. A ways to go. 

After that, who knows?

Adam


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## Ian

Those Buckfast queens have a good rep


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## sfisher

*RE: Live and Let Die - Do you really reduce the gene pool?* I wouldnt think the gene pool would be reduced as much as queen breeders who raise thousands of queens from just a few.


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## Daniel Y

Adam Foster Collins said:


> I just feel that anything I'm liable to 'lose' in my yards, is just as liable to be sustained by another beekeeper in the area. I just don't see what is lost with the death of a small number of colonies in terms of important genetic material.
> 
> I've heard of saskatraz a number of times. I sent them a one line email asking a couple of questions about getting queen cells. It took just over one month to get a reply, which was a shorter line than the one I sent and didn't answer my questions.
> 
> I ended up going to Bill Ferguson for Buckfasts.
> 
> Adam


Lets say you only have two genes that effect aggressiveness. and aggressive behavior is dominant. Aggressive we will call gene B and calm we will call gene A. Both the male and the female have two queens for this trait. but each will only pass on one to the offspring. or new queen. There are 4 possible combinations

AA, AB, BA, or BB.
Any bee with a B gene will be aggressive, SO only an AA is a calm bee that every beekeeper is looking for. So nearly all beekeepers are picking out colonies to produce queens from that are calm. the problem is that in all of these there are only A genes. There is zero chance that the B gene will get passed on.

Now beekeepers everywhere are saying, "So What"! We don't want that gene anyway. Well maybe. what if the only gene that disease resistance is connected to is a B gene?

Now it is not nearly this simple. many traits have a dosage factor involved. that means that a bee with just one B gene will not be as aggressive as one with two B genes. this simply means that more genes means the trait shows up stronger.

Now it gets complicated. it is very unlikely that aggressive behavior is the result of just one gene. but actually a combination of genes. Genes are put together in strands and different part or alleles can get on the string in different combinations. Some traits are a result of one gene being closer or further from another in the string. So lets say aggressiveness is a result of how close A and B are together. So a bee with ABXYZ gueens is far more aggressive than a bee with AXYZB genes. But Z is our disease resistance gene. and for bees to be resistant disease this gene must be right next to gene B. And B must be within one allele of A. In this case only a AXBZY or an AXZBY bee will show both disease resistance and some calmness. If you every get a very clam bee it will be susceptible to disease.

As you can see with even a few different genes you get a lot of combinatins that mix with a lto of other combinations for a huge number of possible combinations. in a good genetic pool these combinations will number in the millions. not hundreds or thousands.

In nature the end result of millions of small variations is that when a new disease comes along. nothing has to develop a resistance to it. the combination that can resist that disease already exists. That man is trying to get the bee to resist the last 4 or 5 problems is a huge problem. what man needs to be doing is breeding the bee that will tolerate the next 4 or 5 that we know nothing about yet. But man wants his big colonies that make lots of honey and do so as gentle bees. Not the making of a vast variety that is already prepared to withstand any future threat. That is a healthy genetic pool. it contains millions of variable combinations.


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## Michael Palmer

Adam Foster Collins said:


> Does it refer to the more typical Italian coloring? Is it really that yellow, or is that just comparative to the carni's and russians?
> 
> I just feel that anything I'm liable to 'lose' in my yards, is just as liable to be sustained by another beekeeper in the area. I just don't see what is lost with the death of a small number of colonies in terms of important genetic material. Adam


Yes, yellow=Italian 

I wasn't talking about losses from a small number of colonies. I'm talking 25-50% of the colonies every year for a number of years. By the end of that time, there were no "yellow" looking colonies left in my apiaries.


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## squarepeg

sfisher said:


> *RE: Live and Let Die - Do you really reduce the gene pool?* I wouldnt think the gene pool would be reduced as much as queen breeders who raise thousands of queens from just a few.


true, until you condiser how few of the genes of the breeder mother make it into your hive. (25% at the most)


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## Joel

It seems due to factors beyond our immediate control our best options for building better bees goes out the window for a couple of reasons:
1) Successful natural selection comes from members of a species adapting and surviving a range of variables in region which will be limited in scope by the travel abilities/habits of the species combined with the species being exposed in a limited in scope to the conditions and pathogens which would exist in that region and the limits of exposure to new threats due to the same factors. In modern times new threats or issues are introduced in multiples which would not exist in a "natural world", ie. packages of bees from Austrailia, Africanzed bees from South America or Africa as are believed to have either migrated or been introduced from a ship and migration of colonies, being kept contary to natural conditions, nation wide. This factor it would seem places a very un-natural pressure on the species. This seems to eliminate this natural selection as a having much viable impact due to the never ending cycle of what appears to be bee pandemic.
2) Treaments, which if not in existance, would have likely resulted in at least a large (perhaps I should say larger looking at CCD) depopulation of bees, a great reduction in both commercial pollinators needed to support the worlds food supply, and hobby beekeepers who would likely not be able to invest in the cost of buying from very limited bee suppliers. Drugs are not what any of us want, they negatively impact the betterement of the species but are absolutely necessary as a bridge for the industry to reach a future. Israli virus (one of many), hive beetles, varroa, wax moth, AFB, Africanization, pesticides, etc. - too many un-natural and constantly chaning factors on scene at once.
3) The "puppy mill" effect on queen breeders as a result of the perfect storm of conditions from many factors which arise from a sudden large demand for replacement bees and queens. This has decreased the quality of queens as studies have shown and may even be increasing the spread of negative survival factors on a large scale, ie. queens being shiped with unusual numbers of virus strains and the decreased ability to do more selective breeding due to losses in breeding operations.

When I look at these factors combined with the 2012 drought I wonder where is the safety net of time and resources that allows us to get out of the survival mode and develop a more comprehensive model to deal with what we face and overcome the multitude of issues on a large scale which more comprehensively deals with the current issues and treatments. Maybe some of the folks who have the protocol and have written a thesis could work on such a model or make suggestions in how we get to that model? It would be good if the research monies were distributed in a way to eliminate duplication of work and aimed at developing a model we could all understand and work with. Is this approach possible?


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## Ian

>>It would be good if the research monies were distributed in a way to eliminate duplication of work and aimed at developing a model we could all understand and work with. Is this approach possible?

wow that was a breath of fresh air! I m with you on that


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## Solomon Parker

I was thinking about this subject because it's one that comes up again and again, posed in opposition to Bond Method beekeepers.

Here's my thought. All the bees we have are descended from a relatively small population of bees already, especially the commercially available ones. And if the stories are to be believed, a relatively small number of colonies were imported to this country some hundreds of years ago. Furthermore, the honeybee genome is a tenth the size of the human genome, containing only 10,000 genes. The honeybee genome has evolved more slowly than that of other insects and has fewer genes for immunity than other insects. In this country, there are around 2.5 million kept colonies and for the sake of argument, let's say there are just as many feral ones. Since each colony is essentially one reproductive individual and each drone only gets to mate once, we might think of colonies as individuals, at least for a simplistic view.

If I'm losing a fifth of my hives on average each year, and everybody else seems to be losing just as many, I ask again what's being lost? Bees aren't endangered. I haven't seen any evidence that the species has lost any specific gene or trait. They still do all the things they used to. 

I calculated that it takes something like 29 generations before any given queen has more direct ancestors than there are base pairs in her DNA. If a hive exists in a tree and swarms once a year, then outside of any supersedures, that hive achieves 29 generations in 29 years. Any significant similarity in the DNA of the granddaughter is gone long before then.

I'm just trying to understand the scope of this subject in real numbers.

Here's what I believe according to the evidence I have gathered: The number of colonies is so great, and the amount of genetic information is so great that the chance of losing any given piece of information with the death of any given hive is miniscule or functionally impossible. That's what I believe according to the evidence I have seen, but I am always open to new evidence or interpretations of the evidence.


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## Ian

you would have to agree that certain traits can and will be lost after generations of selection pressures. you would also have to agree that while loosing those certain traits, they are replaced with favorable traits related to that selection pressure. So really nothing is lost right?


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## adamf

Solomon Parker said:


> Here's what I believe according to the evidence I have gathered: The number of colonies is so great, and the amount of genetic information is so great that the chance of losing any given piece of information with the death of any given hive is miniscule or functionally impossible. That's what I believe according to the evidence I have seen, but I am always open to new evidence or interpretations of the evidence.


If one looks at the concept of Founder Effect and more generally Island
Biogeography in biology and evolutionary biology, one may see the same
questions asked and answered or at least theories proposed to answer the
questions raised in a "Bond" or "Live and Let Die" scenario of selection
pressure.

A salient point in honey bee heredity is sex determination. Honey bees'
sexual heredity is allelic, not chromosomal (XX vs XY) as in vertebrates.
Thus, one may find their population limited by a homogeneous expression in
the sex allele area, causing poor brood pattern and general decline.
This inherit mechanism forces drone promiscuity to be positive, and forces
small populations of isolated bees to retain a specific size necessary to allow the sex
allele expression to remain diverse enough to keep the general population
viable.

Physiologically, a small, isolated honey bee population will go extinct after X
number of generations due to the inherint homogeniety that will occur
in sex allele inheritance.

One could say that drones fly and virgins fly, each to mate, to increase
the chances of heterozygosity in sex allele expression by mating with
others that have different sex allele expressions.

BOND or Live and Let Die would encourage the rapid sex allele
homogeneity, if the population became to small. The Paige-Laidlaw model for
breeding in a closed population addresses this somewhat, but folks who use
this model still bring in new breeders now and then, injecting new genotypic
combinations where specifically, sex determination, needs to be made more
heterozygus: more diverse. You get the idea.

If one has a small, highly controlled breeding population, one will indeed
need to create an artificial gene flow by bringing in new blood, or one will
lose all. If one has a small breeding population and one is open-mating, then one is
usually okay with the way the gene flow occurs.


Adam Finkelstein
www.vpqueenbees.com


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## Solomon Parker

adamf said:


> If one looks at the concept of Founder Effect and more generally Island Biogeography...


But we're not dealing with a Founder Effect situation, nor is there anything approaching an island. The Bond beekeeper is not isolated, or at least I'm not, and I know of no one who is.




adamf said:


> Physiologically, a small, isolated honey bee population will go extinct after X number of generations due to the inherint homogeniety that will occur in sex allele inheritance.


Without filling in the X, what can this mean?




adamf said:


> BOND or Live and Let Die would encourage the rapid sex allele homogeneity, if the population became to small. The Paige-Laidlaw model for breeding in a closed population addresses this somewhat, but folks who use this model still bring in new breeders now and then, injecting new genotypic combinations where specifically, sex determination, needs to be made more heterozygus: more diverse.


A closed population is a perfect condition which does not exist for the vast majority of Bond style beekeepers. Michael Bush has other people's bees all over his territory, as do I, and everybody else I know of. On a side note, I have ceased bringing in outside queens as I have found them to be of poorer quality than the ones I already have. I will see what effects crop up over the next few years.

I understand how these models work on isolated populations like Galapagos tortoises and many New Zealand native species, but that's not what we're dealing with. What relevant information can we find that fits the conditions we have?


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## squarepeg

seems to me like a big part of the equation, and what i hope i can capitalize on at my location, is the drone contribution from the local ferals.


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## Solomon Parker

Ian said:


> you would have to agree that certain traits can and will be lost after generations of selection pressures.


I would politely disagree on that point. Perhaps there are traits which are suppressed in favor of other traits, and with further inbreeding, those traits can be firmed in. But introduce that population back into the general population, or do nothing while the general population reinserts itself into your population and much variability is returned. Even with a well inbred population, are the traits truly gone or just well suppressed? Furthermore, is such a population still fit to survive?




Ian said:


> So really nothing is lost right?


That's what I'm trying to figure out in very real and actual terms. I cannot see how anything is "lost" by the Bond beekeeper. They are merely using a firm selection criteria for a few specific traits, some of which are unknown, that keep bees able to deal with mites or whatever other pressures they have. Firm selection criteria have been used since time immemorial on all sorts of species.


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## JRG13

I think it's because of what you just said Sol, hard selection for a FEW traits. You lose some diversity in your population of bees as you may lose most of you hives but with open mating I don't see any bottlenecking taking place. I think people would just rather see a more controlled breeding practice of bringing in your desired traits with known stock and introgressing those genes into current apiaries and keeping more of the diversity people like to see in their bees.

The only other issue I see is if something else comes in early in your rebuilding phase and now all your bees are susceptible to that because most of your hives are now base from what few surviving colonies you had left and are probably pretty similar to each other.


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## squarepeg

i think we may be giving ourselves too much credit for what we can and can't do with the bee. maybe managed, but never domesticated.


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## Solomon Parker

On the nose Mr. Peg.


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## squarepeg

thanks sol,


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## squarepeg

and i thought that drone comment was pretty darn good too, imnsho!


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## adamf

Solomon Parker said:


> But we're not dealing with a Founder Effect situation, nor is there anything approaching an island. The Bond beekeeper is not isolated, or at least I'm not, and I know of no one who is.


Ahhh geee.

The original questions was one that is more academic then practical, but a
good one:

*"Live and Let Die - Do you really reduce the gene pool?"*

I was answering that really the only way a "gene pool" or a honey bee
population's gene flow would be throttled to the point of damage would be
with pressure on sex alleles, not on "valuable traits" etc. It is a great
question. And sure, if there's open mating and one is using BOND, one
should have no genetic load or genetic bottlenecks.

Of course there's Founder Effect in honey bees--the USA is a perfect
example--honey bees were introduced here--the population is completely
artificially selected. Sure there are pockets of naturally feral bees, but on
the whole, we're influencing the honey bees with our agricultural
selection. I'd like my bees to survive AND make honey AND be gentle--that's
quite a bit of selection pressure I put on the bees I work with.

Island Biogeography is a concept where populations are split from each
other and they differentiate because of lack of gene-flow between them. That
also happens all the time here in the USA. Any commercial operator that's
using bees to make a living is in a sense practicing selection Island
Biogeography-style. Those populations are not under natural selection
--they're under agricultural selection. Much different then feral bees or bees 
found in un-managed colonies in the wild.

The point I was trying to make is that the only area where "loss through
selection" can occur quickly in honey bee populations, is with homozygosity
in the the sex allele expression. This can happen faster than one would
think.

Any "loss" of traits through hard selection via BOND or non-treatment
scenarios will favor the survivors. Sure those might lack some possibly
good traits, but with open-mating and judicious re-selection, they can be brought
back.




> A closed population is a perfect condition which does not exist for the vast majority of Bond style beekeepers. Michael Bush has other people's bees all over his territory, as do I, and everybody else I know of. On a side note, I have ceased bringing in outside queens as I have found them to be of poorer quality than the ones I already have. I will see what effects crop up over the next few years.


Yes, yes right...the closed population point was made to provide
an example where sex allele load can occur quickly without management.
If one is open-mating, one is going to have a very gradual selection
effect on one's population. Gradual is fine. Nothing wrong with
gradual. Most queens that are made properly following all the 
necessary physiological rules are excellent. Often that's more
important in untreated success--quality queens can overcome many hurdles.


Adam Finkelstein
www.vpqueenbees.com


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## squarepeg

>>The point I was trying to make is that the only area where "loss through
selection" can occur quickly in honey bee populations, is with homozygosity
in the the sex allele expression. This can happen faster than one would
think.

please rephrase this if you can, preferably in english.


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## adamf

squarepeg said:


> >>The point I was trying to make is that the only area where "loss through
> selection" can occur quickly in honey bee populations, is with homozygosity
> in the the sex allele expression. This can happen faster than one would
> think.
> 
> please rephrase this if you can, preferably in english.


Sure.

If you look into how honey bees's heredity for sex determination happens, you'll see that
it is not like us, Mammals where there's an XX or XY chromosome and you have female vs. male, but
it is an actual spot on the chromosome, a set of allelles where the sex is determined.

If the expression is homozygus, the egg is a goner and you have a hole in your pattern. If it is heterozygus,
you have a worker:

X1 X2, X2 X3, X5 X6 = worker
X1 X1, X2 X2, X4 X4 = diploid drone lethal, hole in pattern

so

If you are slecting too hard and too closely, the chances of you getting too many of the above X1 X?, X2 X?, X3 X? being the same is much greater. 
That's the "homozygosity in the the sex allele expression"

Its pretty simple really. Think of it as another trait that if you have too many carriers having the same parts contributing to the offspring (virgin X drone) 
there will be similar expressions: X1 X1, X2 X2, X3 X3 etc. rather then X1 X2, X9 X5, X12 X4.

So if you are limiting the breeding units in your population through hard selection (BOND or whatever) the chances that the ones surviving will have similar units to donate to the sex allelle in the next generation, is much greater.

Hope this helps ya...

Adam Finkelstein
www.vpqueenbees.com


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## squarepeg

ok, you are going to have to work with me on this one.

sex determination of the bee is different than ours, check.

sex determination of the bee is determined by the queen, (really by the workers who prepare the cells for her eggs, but..), when she lays her eggs.

if the egg is fertilized with a drone sperm, the egg becomes diploid (two sets of chromosomes, one from queen and one from drone), and the expression of traits will be a function of the two influences. 

if the queen is 'encouraged' to lay in a drone cell however, the egg is not fertilized with drone sperm, the egg remains haploid (one set of chromosomes, only from the queen), and would be expected to express traits of the queen herself. plus, the genes these drones pass on to the next generation queen, which will be expressed as half of the genes in the next generation worker, will effectively give the mother queen the opportunity to pass her traits on through those drones.

my approach is to select for, well, happy bees. the strong, healthy, get the job done bees. i'll do this by using the best colonies for queens and drones, and relying on drone contribution from the many feral hives in the woods near here.

i believe you are saying this is a good strategy, but i still don't understand the potential problem you submit when selecting for traits.


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## taydeko

There are a couple of other things that have been overlooked here. Most drones are monoploid, so they only have a single set of chromosomes. They are a clone of the queen, basically. Naturally, a monoploid organism will be homozygous.

The other thing that I don't see in this discussion is the effect of gene expression. Not all genes are active all the time. Genes can be turned on and off by environmental factors, allowing organisms to respond to environmental change without requiring mutation or recombination through sexual reproduction. While genetics is almost infinitely complex because of the number of genes available, genetic expression makes it much more so.

Ted


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## Solomon Parker

adamf said:


> Of course there's Founder Effect in honey bees--the USA is a perfect example


Not really. The Founder's Effect is predicated upon a very small and isolated population. While this may have been the case for a very short period of time 400 years ago, it has not been the case since then, with new strains of bees being added at many points throughout the time since.




adamf said:


> the closed population point was made to provide an example


Examples are good, good for understanding concepts and ideas, but this thread is a question of a real method. As ever the realist, I seek examples which fit or explain reality. I believe you can provide them.


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## Solomon Parker

taydeko said:


> The other thing that I don't see in this discussion is the effect of gene expression.


I would say that when we are talking about traits, gene expression is what we are talking about ultimately. Perhaps I am mistaken in my understanding.


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## squarepeg

so what's he saying sol, as far as negative effects of selection?


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## Solomon Parker

Squarepeg, I am not convinced of any significant negative effects of selection. Inbreeding, yes, we understand that. But even inbreeding is naturally remedied. Selection happens always.


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## taydeko

Solomon Parker said:


> I would say that when we are talking about traits, gene expression is what we are talking about ultimately.


Very true, but the presence of a gene does not mean it is expressed. So to go back to the rest of the thread, just because a trait is not expressed in some bees does not mean it is necessarily lost from the gene pool, conditions might just not be right for it to be expressed. 

So breeding for particular traits may or may not cause loss of diversity, within a local gene pool, depending on the mechanism that is causing that trait to be expressed. 

I think modern (the last 50 years, maybe) breeding methods have caused some loss of diversity among bees, but it seems like there is a resurgence of people raising their own queens, and letting them breed naturally. Treatment free beekeeping is allowing diversity to creep back into the bee population, as is the apparent resurgence of feral bees in various parts of the country.

Ted


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## Specialkayme

JRG13 said:


> You lose some diversity in your population of bees as you may lose most of you hives but with open mating I don't see any bottlenecking taking place.


Marla Spivak thinks otherwise.


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## squarepeg

what does she think sk?


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## sqkcrk

Riskybizz said:


> Peg,
> 
> The link to her study can only explain it far better than I ever could. Take the time to read it; great paper. One of her summations is that “chemical treatments of honey bee diseases even if successful at the colony level in the short term have not eradicated the problem of pathogens at the population level". In other words you might be able to kill a few mites but you will do more harm to the bees as a superorganism in eliminating their ability to fight off pathogens and viruses that ultimately will lead to the demise of the colony as a whole.


We don't want to know everything there is to know about beekeeping, we just want to know enough to argue about that which we don't know much about at all.


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## squarepeg

sqkcrk said:


> We don't want to know everything there is to know about beekeeping, we just want to know enough to argue about that which we don't know much about at all.


can i quote you on that mark? that's brilliant! 

duh, it's the paper mentioned earlier in the thread, and i did 'spead-read' it. 

specialkayme, i'll have to give the paper another look. i don't recall her warning of 'bottlenecking', it that is what you were referring to.


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## Specialkayme

squarepeg said:


> what does she think?


I had a conversation with her about hobby beekeepers setting up methods to create breeding systems for the selection of mite resistant stock. She told me it was not possible for an individual with less than 100 colonies to successfully create such a system without genetic bottlenecking. I disagreed with her for a bit, giving alternative scenarios such as having neighboring colonies in the area (or ferals). She remained unchanged in her opinion. 

According to Marla, even if you are able to select for a specific trait (such as mite resistance), after just a few generations you lose so much genetic material that a second factor (nosema, other mites) will devastate the colonies.

The same holds true whether you are actively selecting for a trait (hygienic behavior) or letting them select themselves (bond survivability), considering there is usually one item selecting for survival.


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## Specialkayme

squarepeg said:


> specialkayme, i'll have to give the paper another look. i don't recall her warning of 'bottlenecking', it that is what you were referring to.


The paper mentioned in Post #3? That was not written by Marla.

I was not referring to that paper.


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## sqkcrk

squarepeg said:


> can i quote you on that mark? that's brilliant!
> 
> duh, it's the paper mentioned earlier in the thread, and i did 'spead-read' it.
> 
> specialkayme, i'll have to give the paper another look. i don't recall her warning of 'bottlenecking', it that is what you were referring to.


Sure sp. Actually I was thinging about starting a Thread titled "I don't want to know everything there is to know about bees, ..." I just want to know how tyo keep bees.

Michael Bush spoke a little about bottlenecking this weekend at our meeting, mentioning the lack of diversity w/in the gene pool in North America. I wish I could recall exactly what he said. I'm sure it's on his websight.

By the way, I am amongst those who discuss what we think we know, but only really know enough to get ourselves in trouble. Just sit at a table w/ folks who really know what they know in depth and then you will know not to speak up.

Not that I am trying to dampen the interchange. Proceed.


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## squarepeg

specialkayme,

oh, i was misled, my fault. not good with names.

of course, she's the 'expert'. but i think you and i raise a valid point.

that may be her interpretation, in her not so humble opinion?

i'll have to say i will challenge it, and will attempt to gain more information to accept or refute in my own mind.


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## sqkcrk

Specialkayme said:


> According to Marla, even if you are able to select for a specific trait (such as mite resistance), after just a few generations you lose so much genetic material that a second factor (nosema, other mites) will devastate the colonies.



Almost exactly what Michael Bush mentioned this weekend. Interesting.


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## squarepeg

i'm open to learning more about this.

here's how one could create a bottleneck if they wanted to:

start with just one hive and build it up to a strong double deep and try to have a few drone frames. split the queen out of the hive and make a two frame nuc. let the hive raise 9 good queen cells, and make 9 more nucs up out of it, for a total of 10 hives deriving from that one queen. be sure and locate these far away from any other bees.

if the mating occurs mostly with the drones from the parent hive. all of the bees will be so inbred, or bottlenecked, that the diversity would be all but lost.

in this extreme, and anything that approximates it, you should get marked bottlenecking.

for most operations, especially those around forested areas, i think you would have to try awfully hard to achieve a bottleneck.


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## squarepeg

my bee suppier raises all of his bees from 2 or 3 queen mothers per year. his bees were derived from 6 feral cut outs, 14 years ago, near his location. there are probably many dozens of feral colonies mating with his queens. he has never used any treatment of any kind ever. he sells a couple of hundred queens and nucs each year. they consistantly perform beyond expections, with an ocassional dink of course.


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## Solomon Parker

Specialkayme said:


> after just a few generations you lose so much genetic material...


How do you lose genetic material? If there is a different amount of genetic material, you either have a severe mutation or a different species. I hope you are only mistaken in terms.




Specialkayme said:


> considering there is usually one item selecting for survival.


There are many. VSH is a trait that varies wildly in survivor bees. Any given bee needs many traits to survive unless you plan on feeding them everything they eat and medicating for every pestilence, heating the hive in winter, cooling it in summer, providing pre-drawn comb and too many more to list.




squarepeg said:


> i think you would have to try awfully hard to achieve a bottleneck.


Yes, and who would want to? It certainly has precious little to do with real life beekeeping.


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## squarepeg

probably no one would want to, but they might inadvertently achieve it if trying to turn one hive into 10, with no outside drones.


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## Solomon Parker

Okay, so who has no outside drones?


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## squarepeg

hmmm, good point sol.


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## sqkcrk

I think what I picked up this weekend was that when you select you narrow. When you choose certain traits you may lose others thereby bottlenecking. Does that make sense? I'm not sure.


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## squarepeg

it does to a point. the problem is all of the traits you are getting anyway regardless of the 'one' you are selecting for.

personally, i am selecting for successful happy bees.


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## Solomon Parker

Letting bees alone to deal with disease is not selecting too narrow. It's the very description of what bees do naturally. Where we could possibly get into trouble is if we breed for only one other trait, like honey production or gentleness or VSH or something. I've heard of queens so VSH that they can't brood properly and have to be supported by adding brood all the time. Is that what people are thinking about when they ask this question (the thread)? It's not like that at all. That's very artificial. Bond method is natural, it's what real bees do, setting aside all the other things we do to them of course.


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## squarepeg

i bet that's what they were talking about sol.


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## Specialkayme

Solomon Parker said:


> How do you lose genetic material? If there is a different amount of genetic material, you either have a severe mutation or a different species. I hope you are only mistaken in terms.


I'm not mistaken.

I was referring to the genetic pool as a whole. If you have 20 colonies existing within a given area, and all 20 of those have slightly different genetic material, it is highly likely that several of those hives will contain a specific set of genetic combinations that none of the other hives contain. By eliminating 18 out of 20 of those hives, then rebreeding from the remaining two, you wreak havoc on the potential gene pool.

Or so Marla says. I tried to dispute otherwise. Who knows.




Solomon Parker said:


> There are many.


You misinterpreted my comment.

If you have high varroa populations, then you lose a number of colonies, you've just experienced one item that reduced your gene pool. The same would hold true for a severe nosema infection. Your colonies don't magically disappear from a number of mysterious diseases, infections, viruses or parasites. You lose each colony to one infection. One disease. One parasite. Multiple factors may have weakened the colony, but multiple factors didn't kill the colony. One factor did. That's the selecting factor.


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## Specialkayme

Solomon Parker said:


> so who has no outside drones?


Moving from one hive to ten with no outside drones is the extreme situation. Let me give you a more likely one.

Say you start with 10 colonies, and there are another 20 within mating distance of your hive. Assuming all 30 colonies are headed by different genetic backgrounds, any given queen has no option but to mate with a drone of a different genetic background (unless of course the drone is from the same hive, making him a brother). If a virgin mates with 12 drones, and 29 hives are of different lineages, the odds are greatly in favor that she will introduce new genes other than those she currently has. Now, if you requeen your other 9 colonies with your most productive hive, all 10 colonies are headed by similar (not identical, due to haploid/diploid birth) genetic material. Now the odds of any given virgin mating with similar genetic material increases to 1 in 3 (as 10 of the available 30 hives are sisters). Those 10 similar hives now produce drones that are very similar, which mate with the offspring of the 20 feral colonies, causing them to be more like your hives than they originally were. Then you increase your 10 hives to 30 hives, using sister queens from your most productive hive. Now the odds are actually greater that your virgin will mate with a related drone than with one of the "feral" drones. The entire time, skewing the curve toward inbreeding, and selecting for an isolation of genetic material. If the queen that you selected to head your 30 hives didn't contain a desired gene (mite chewing behavior, excessively developed ovaries, good wax capping patterns), the odds are that you just removed that gene from the available gene pool. And the fight goes on.

You said you couldn't see how a genetic bottlenecking could occur. The above is a very reasonable example of it occurring within 3 years. 

Yes, it is extremely rare that you will encounter 0 outside drones. But, if you aren't careful you may have 98% of the drones in a 5 mile radius be from your hives (and all brothers). That (in genetic terms) is very close to having 0 outside drones available.


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## squarepeg

that's the case that approximates the extreme case. i would not personally requeen the majority of my apiary from one queen mother. but i can see how someone might give that a try.


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## Daniel Y

Actually due to the other genetic factors. the mating of a queen to it's brother is about the same thing as a female mating with it's own half clone. You can pretty much consider the drones clones of the queen that produced them. This does have the effect that bees have figured out how two females can mate and produce offspring. ever thought of that? The true Amazon.

Anyway this woudl result in a drastic in breeding effect and it is highly likely such genetic pairings could survive. The offspring woudl be subject to a wide variety of mutations and deformities.

In addition queens do not mate with just one drone. making it even more unlikely that every mating would be with a brother. There are other factors that prevent the likelihood that brother and sister will mate but they are not as well known and as far as I know not as well supported. One of them is that drones and queens travel significantly different distances during mating flights. As much as a two mile difference from some sources I have seen.

It is still pretty amazing that the bees has managed in effect to figure out how to get female to mate with a female via a surrogate carrier of one of the females genes and produce offspring.

One very interesting point in all this. Where did that female gene come from? If the queen only has a male gene. how did it become a female gene in the drone. I suspect the queen actually has a female and a male gene. but to produce a female bee (worker) it requires two doses of female genes. One from the queen and one from the drone to produce a female bee. So in actuality the drone is an exact clone of the queen except that it has only one female gene resulting in a male offspring.

I may very well be wrong but if I am right then the genetic make up of a queen woudl be XY X being male Y being female. The genetic makeup of a drone, any and all drones are also XY. Remember a drone is genetically identical to the queen that produced it.

So a queen that lays an unfertilized egg made an egg with XY chromosomes. Resulting in a male offspring. it takes two Y's to make a female. But when that males sperm is added to the egg of any queen you now have an XX YY chromosome. you now have the two y's required to produce a female and a female is the result. you do not end up with half females and half males because a double Y is dominant. This would demonstrate both dosage and dominant qualities of chromosomes. 

Another way it might possibly happen is that bees only have one sex gene. the queen has one. the drone has the other. in this case we will call the chromosome Y. one Y results in a male. two Y's result in a female. Again allowing every drone to be a clone of the queens genetics but when those genes are combined with the genes of another queen. female offspring are the result

It also makes since that a female would have twice as many Y's (Whys) as a male. Women are always full of questions.

Okay I am ducking now.


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## Specialkayme

squarepeg said:


> i would not personally requeen the majority of my apiary from one queen mother.


But that was why Marla stated that a successful breeding operation couldn't exist with less than 100 colonies. Taking the top performing 1 colony and requeening all of your hives would spell disaster eventually. But what if you have 20 colonies and you requeen half with the top performing 4? Lets say you continued to do that for several years. If every year, one of the original four becomes "non-performing", and is replaced by a sister queen, within 3 years you've eliminated 87.5% (roughly) of the available genetic material from the mating pool. Continue on for a few more years and you are closer to a 98% removal.

That is discounting colonies from outside your operation, but eventually, with enough growth, the drones from your colonies would flood the DCAs, which would turn the ferals into the same genetics as your hives, further inbreeding your operation.


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## squarepeg

fortunately, a queen will never mate with her own drone/clone offspring, because she has already mated before he was born. 

as far as mating with a brother goes, at best a virgin queen might find herself mating with an occasional half brother. even this half brother would like have got a different set of genes than his half sister, because when the queen's eggs are formed, the genetic material is a mix from both the egg and sperm that made her. i.e. every egg that the queen produces has it's own unique set of genes.

in this species, the x and the y do not apply, it's haploid expression and diploid expression.

i have learned recently the the cape bee can make more females by combining two sets of female gametes.


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## Specialkayme

Daniel Y said:


> Where did that female gene come from? If the queen only has a male gene.


You are losing me Daniel.



Daniel Y said:


> then the genetic make up of a queen woudl be XY X being male Y being female. The genetic makeup of a drone, any and all drones are also XY. Remember a drone is genetically identical to the queen that produced it.


That's not how it works. Female eggs (queens, workers) have 32 chromosomes. Male eggs (drones) have 16 chromosomes. The male can not carry all 32 chromosomes the queen had. 

http://www.glenn-apiaries.com/principles.html


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## sqkcrk

Is Daniel our new Francois Huber, declaring that there really are no male bees, only females? I think perhaps you are using too much imagination and not enough knowledge and understanding.

What you wrote make no since to me.


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## squarepeg

Specialkayme said:


> But that was why Marla stated that a successful breeding operation couldn't exist with less than 100 colonies. Taking the top performing 1 colony and requeening all of your hives would spell disaster eventually. But what if you have 20 colonies and you requeen half with the top performing 4? Lets say you continued to do that for several years. If every year, one of the original four becomes "non-performing", and is replaced by a sister queen, within 3 years you've eliminated 87.5% (roughly) of the available genetic material from the mating pool. Continue on for a few more years and you are closer to a 98% removal.
> 
> That is discounting colonies from outside your operation, but eventually, with enough growth, the drones from your colonies would flood the DCAs, which would turn the ferals into the same genetics as your hives, further inbreeding your operation.


you may be right. i would have to sit down and trace it out on paper to see how that works, and i have not done that.

but, let's look at the genetic diversity even in queen daughter 'sisters' from a given season of mating.

if you made 10 new daughter queens from one queen mother, each one would be genetically unique.
this is because each egg 'pulls' its genes randomly from the mother queen's two sets of genes to become one set in the egg, and because chances are that different drone sperm was used to fertilize each of the ten new daughters when they were conceived.

it's the same way for the all of the drones that a given queen will make, in that they are not all identical genetically, because the egg that made them 'pulled' genes randomly from the queen's two sets.

i'm not saying that you couldn't bottleneck a population. my opinion is that nature is providing enough possiblities for different genetic combinations to make that hard to happen.


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## Specialkayme

Very true, sp. A colony holds more genetic material than each individual bee. If a queen mates with 12 different drones, the colony as a whole can contain 24 different combinations of genes (assuming that a queen has 32 chromosomes, she gives 16 of them to workers (at random) along with another 16 from one of the 12 drones). But the percentages doesn't change. If each colony (for simplicity reasons) holds 24 different genetic combinations, and you have 10 colonies, you have the possibility of 240 different genetic combinations (although likely several of them would be duplicates). If you remove 9 colonies from the mix and requeen them from your surviving one colony, you are still removing 216 of the available 240 combinations, or 90%.

The remaining 9 queens won't be genetic duplicates of the mother queen. And they won't individually mate with identical drones that mated with their sisters (or their mothers) making the odds of severe inbreeding reduced. But it doesn't mean it is eliminated. With enough successive selection, without introducing new genes, has the same effect whether you start with 10 genetic combinations or 240. It still gets reduced exponentially.


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## squarepeg

but, wouldn't there really be many many more than 24 possibilities, considering each worker egg has its unique combination of genes pulled from the queen at random?


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## Daniel Y

Squarepeg, you are talking about the mother that is the queen that was mated before the drone was born. I am talking about a sister. They may have been drone on the same day. Half the genes of the sister and all the genes of the brother are the same genes. not alike. they re the same identical genes. Any female that results from such a pairing woudl be 75% the genes of the original queen and 25% the genes of it's grandfather. Any male woudl be half and half.

Regardless the genetic mix of such a close relation would very likely result in an infertile egg anyway or in the case of the bee a drone layer. that is due to even more complex qualities of Chromosomes. If they get to much alike think of it like trying to put to magnets together with matching poles. they repel each other.

Not every egg the queen produces is unique. the colony consists of different genetic combinations this is true. but the number of those combinations are limited to how many drones the queen mated with. so if she only mated with 12 drones. the colony is limited to only 12 different gene combinations. Drones do not produce sperm with different sets of genes.

Bees being haploid means my second example above is correct. Haploid means there is only one set of chromosomes. in the case of a female it gets one from the female one from the male. In the case of a male it only has the one from the female. One sex gene means a male, two means a female.

It would be interesting to know the details of how the cape be is able to produce female offspring from two females only. I am very aware that many wild things can and do happen. their are species that can convert from haploid to diploid also.

Genetics are very complicated. so much so that we still don't know even nearly everything about them. Dosages effects. genes that turn on and off. The location of the chromosomes on the strand of DNA in relation to other chromosomes and much more all play a factor.

In the end you manage it all by simply observing the bees and picking the best. and that is pretty much it.

The important question. is how do you keep that trait going once you find it? Lets say you are the luck one to stumble across the 100% varroa resistant bee. How do you not loose that trait due to all these other factors that seem to want to destroy it as fast as it was found? Actually you develop traits by selection, and you want to be able to select from as wide a genetic pool as possible. but once you develop that trait you set it by inbreeding or line breeding.

A very effective method of setting a trait is rotational line breeding. This method requires that you have 4 unrelated genetic lines that have all been highly selectively bred. you can have lines that where selected for 4 separate traits. but it works better if all 4 lines where selected for the same trait. We will call these 4 lines 1,2,3 and 4

The offspring or queens from line 1 are then bread to the males of line two. the queens from line two are likewise bread to line 3 etc. ending with the queens from line 4 being bred to the males of line 1. This first generation now gives us a genetic mix of 1-2, 2-3, 3-4, 4-1. Confused yet? Don't worry you will be. Now the queens produced from the 1-2 pairings are bred to the males of line 3 resulting in a possible 1-2, 1-3 or 2-3 genetic mix. The same is true for the queens produced from the other three crosses. you now have 12 different possible genetic mixes that hopefully all still show strong varroa resistance in all 12 lines. You then again take the queens produced from these paring and mate them to drones from the next line. The pairing now become so numerous I will not try to list them all. again you mate the queens produced to the drones of the next line. You have now have 4 generations of bees that have been mated to the next unrelated line. the genetic pool has become enormous. the chosen trait has also taken a big hit. This is what you do to fix that. you now take the queens of the 5th generation and breed them back to the original males of their original line. You now just dumped half of the original genes back into the mix. you also just cut out half of the genetic mix you spent 4 generations producing. In effect you just added a fresh dose of concentrated desired trait to the entire thing. You then go through the entire rotation again. ending at the 10th generation with mating back to the original males again. at some point you will begin to see that all the bees are retaining strongly the trait for resistance. 

In the case of bees, they can reproduce from generation to generation so fast that this could actually be done in a matter of months. The down side is that all queens that will be used would have to be II.

This method answers a lot of problems with selective breeding in that it does not reduce or bottle neck the genetic pool but actually dramatically increases it. It will produce traits so well set that when there is very delayed loss of those traits when you take those bees and cross them to others to add another trait to them. You can do one set of lines that is working on varroa resistance. while working on another line that is about honey production. as both lines become more and more set you then start crossing the two sets of liens with each other and you end up with 8 lines of bees that all have better varroa resistance and honey production. You separate them again and focus on just the chosen trait of each and later cross them again.

You not only do not get the loss of trait like you do with selective breeding alone. but when you stop breeding and let the bees go on their own. you do not see as fast a decline in those traits even then. Selective breeding will result in a reversal of all progress in just a few generations. rotational line breeding does not. At least that is the rule of thumb.


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## squarepeg

i only got through your first paragraph, but

>>Squarepeg, you are talking about the mother that is the queen that was mated before the drone was born. I am talking about a sister. They may have been drone on the same day. Half the genes of the sister and all the genes of the brother are the same genes. not alike. they re the same identical genes. Any female that results from such a pairing woudl be 75% the genes of the original queen and 25% the genes of it's grandfather. Any male woudl be half and half.

not so dan, they are *not* the same identical genes. no two eggs laid by any queen have identical genes. read up on *miosis*.


----------



## Daniel Y

Specialkayme said:


> You are losing me Daniel.
> 
> *Yeah, sorry, to many competing thoughts. I will try again*
> 
> In my thinking without looking up any information by the way, I think I am doing pretty good at figuring out the options. The queen in my example has only one sex gene. this turns out to not be true she has two. but my comment above was in regard to the thought that she would only have one and it was male. It would have to be male because a queen is only capable of producing a male. So how does it become a female gene in the drone? Hope that makes since. the entire idea is in error though. since the queen must have two sex queens or her egg cold not produce anything. it takes two. she must have them on her own.
> 
> 
> 
> That's not how it works. Female eggs (queens, workers) have 32 chromosomes. Male eggs (drones) have 16 chromosomes. The male can not carry all 32 chromosomes the queen had.
> 
> http://www.glenn-apiaries.com/principles.html


Okay I have now officially read at least a blurb on this subject. everything I have said up to this point has been just my own reasoning from my knowledge of gens and how they work.

I called the sex genes X and Y the link below states them as just two different alleles. (Allele is another word for gene) It graphically portrays them as red and yellow. The blue signifies an unknown allele contributed by the male.

According to this source the drone can be produced by both an infertile egg containing only the set of chromosomes from the queen or from a fertile egg that receives a male allele from the drone. I have never heard it calmed that a fertile egg will produce a drone before. That is a significant omition.
According to the information in the link there are two sex allele. but a male can result if an egg is laid that only has one allele. I would have to have more information how this is possible otherwise my theory is more sound.
He is claiming that even thou there are two sex genes, a male is the result of there only being one sex gene. yet every female possesses both genes , that is why she is female.

Every female bee including the queen has both X and Y genes. Every drone will have either X or Y depending on what gene the egg had that eh queen laid without it being fertilized.

This drone now only has the one sex gene. 

Now you would consider that half of every egg a queen produces will contain one of the sex genes or the other. so half of the drones she produces will be X drones. the other half will be Y drones. Any queen that a drone mates with will produce half of her eggs with the same sex gene as the drone. resulting in at least half of her fertilized eggs being drones. or eggs with the same sex genes even though there are two of them they result in a drone. 

This obviously is not true. He does mention that fertilized eggs producing drones happens. but on a spotty shot gun sort of frequency. He claims 50% drone brood as extreme and a result of inbreeding. So without other information to support this. it simply is not holding it's own under closer examination.

He does mention that there are thought to be as many as 19 sex genes. and that only a match would result in a drone. This is something I would have to look not further to understanding how it applies. It would explain the dramatic reduction in exact combinations that in fact result.

Basically what he is saying is that there is not just an XY,YX XX, or YY combination that is possible. but there is a gene for eery letter of the alphabet from A to S. and that you can have any combination of those 19 genes. any combination that results in two different genes results in a female. Btu only 19 possible combinations woudl result in males.


The part I still struggle with is that a male an also result form just one allele when a queen lays an unfertilized egg. This is saying that you can genetically arrive at a male bee in two completely different ways. not impossible I suppose. but not very likely either. One male is abnormal and cannot reproduce. That is convenient since if it did it would completely dismantle the female dominance thing of the hive. actually he describes that the females of the hive actually destroy the abnormal diploid drone as it emerges.

Women take note. In order for you to achieve world dominance you cannot allow abnormal males to live. Abnormal is defined as any male with a full set of genes. And half a brain.

I do find this idea of 19 sex genes very interesting though.

I am certain that as I look further into the actual facts of be genetics it will continue to get far more complicated. Keep in mind my comments earlier where made with no looking into the actually genetics of bees. it was comments on the basics of how genetics work. I have often said. it is not that simple.

I say that to be very clear to anyone reading this. don't go off thinking that bees only have X and Y sex genes. that is not what I was saying. I was just using X and y to explain how combinations of genes then work.

If you want to go out and say anything actually happens that has any likely hood of being correct. quote the comments I put in this post. And do that with a grain of salt.

In the end genetics are complicated layered over complicated layered over complicated.


----------



## squarepeg

ok


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## squarepeg

squarepeg said:


> i'm open to learning more about this.


can you really reduce the gene pool?

i think yes, but here's what your up against.


the honey bee genome contains around 10,000 genes.

the queen, being female like the workers, has a double set of genes, and the drones have a single set of genes.

the queen's and worker's double set comes about by the combination of an egg and a sperm.

the egg is a cell manufactured in the queen's ovary and is made with only a single set of genes. this single set of genes comes about by the splitting of the ovary cells dna into two single sets of genes. the composition of the single set of genes in the new egg cell has an almost limitedless number of possibilities, because when the dna splits, it can pull the gene from the queen's mothers side or it can pull the gene from the queen's father's side.

when an egg is fertilized, it receives the set of genes from the sperm that the sperm received when it's egg was made in the ovary.

that's 10,000 times how ever many possibilities for the genetic make up of a bee.

this is why every bee, whether queen, worker, or drone, is as much an individual genetically as you and i. our bee populations are comprised of the most genetically diverse individuals one could imagine. we have to try really hard to mess that up.

having said that, and if you subscribe to the theory that genetic diversity is good, than one would want to strive to introduce diverse genetics into their apiary, and avoid flooding with all one source.


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## JRG13

Daniel, you have a good basic understanding of the genetics but you forgot about recombination of chromosomes when the eggs are formed, therefore variation is increased in the queens drone population as well. Square, it's not limitless, chromosomes recombine in certain regions more than others, and it depends how 'inbred' the queen is as well in terms of traits you're looking at. If she's fixed for a lot of them, variability will be small since even after recombination, alleles would be the same.


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## squarepeg

understood jr. but that's still a lot more diversity than appears to have been considered so far.

maybe only in the millions of possibilities instead of the gazillions? 

do you think one could find two genetically identical indivuals in a colony?


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## squarepeg

and to your complete op adam,

does the bond method lead to decrease in genetic diversity?

my opinion is, probably, a little. but maybe that's not so bad, and, nature is already doing it anyway.

but, at the same time, nature is also ensuring genetic diversity.


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## JRG13

Identical individuals in a hive, I would say it's possible depending on how many different drones the queen mated with and her genetic make up. Just depends on your definition of identical. Could have the same genetic make up, but different allele combinations on chromosomes but in the end the same alleles in total if you get my meaning. Ab aB vs AB ab.

Going on that post that mentioned Marla. I can see where she's getting at especially when you think about the mating practicies of bees. The chances of a drone being successful for any given hive is small, therefore you may lose diversity quickly.


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## squarepeg

very cool jr. i'll locate and read marla's paper, and i wish that i could hear a copy of mike bush's talk about it.

i'm just a beginner, lot's more to learn.....

thank-you for your posts.


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## squarepeg

unable to find a link to marla's work, does anyone have it?


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## squarepeg

http://www.beelab.umn.edu/Research/Publications/index.htm

this is a new site to me. looks like some good winter reading.


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## squarepeg

http://www.beelab.umn.edu/prod/groups/cfans/@pub/@cfans/@bees/documents/asset/cfans_asset_317697.pdf

this one appears to touch the most on the topic of this thread.


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## Daniel Y

From the source I am reading it says there are about 15,000 genes in the honey bee.
But realize that right off the bat half of those are the ones we don't want. so there are really only at most 7500 genes we want at all. but it is actually bigger than that. there are 4 genes associated with hygienic. but to have hygienic bees we can only have 1 of them so if other traits are similar the number of genes we actually even want is really more like 3750. Btu it si not true that every trait only has 4 genes associated with it. sex alone has 19. we only need two. but lets say we keep half of them just cause we are good conscience beekeepers with a healthy genetic diversity. So on and so forth. 

In the end any individual queen actually only has 32 of those possible 15,000 genes. how is that for pairing it down to a bit of a bottle neck?


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## squarepeg

"Haplo-diploid systems are ideal for scaling up
from single gene effects to collective impacts
because these systems have adults that are either
haploid or diploid. Comparing across haploid
and diploid conspecifics may thus shed
light on the collective impacts of some genetic
traits. And indeed, data do suggest that males of
some eusocial hymenopterans are more susceptible
to certain pathogens, for example Varroa
mites in honey bees (94)"

(a quote from the marla spivak paper in the previous post)

when i translated that into english for myself, to me it read:

'if your queen is interbreeding with drones that are close to her genetically, studies suggest you may loose some pest/pathgogen resistance'

is that how you see it jr? specialkayme?


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## squarepeg

>>In the end any individual queen actually only has 32 of those possible 15,000 genes. how is that for pairing it down to a bit of a bottle neck? 

dan, are you confusing the number of chromosomes with the number of genes?


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## Daniel Y

squarepeg said:


> >>In the end any individual queen actually only has 32 of those possible 15,000 genes. how is that for pairing it down to a bit of a bottle neck?
> 
> dan, are you confusing the number of chromosomes with the number of genes?


Actually yes, but then it begins to get confusing beyond the scope of the present conversation as well. still no bee has every gene. Most likely not even 10% of them. Again the example that there are 19 different genes for sex alone. any female only has one. That is only 5% of the available genetic pool. It would take a lot of home work to really get the percentage of genes that an individual bee could not even use. Still less than 150 genes in an indvidual bee is probably a reasonable guess. 

I did find this interesting regard to bee genetics in the stuff I have been reading today.

Quote: we have 46 chromosomes, we get 23 from our mother's egg and 23 from our fathers sperm. Bees have a different number of chromosomes. Females, workers and queens have 32, 16 are contributed by the queen's eggs and 16 come from the drones sperm. Since drones hatch from unfertilized eggs, they only have the 16 chromosomes that were in the egg. Drones are haploid because they only have one set of chromosomes.

You'll notice that the egg can only carry half of the queens 32 chromosomes so she can only pass on half of her genes to her offspring. Each egg contains a unique collection of her genes, so each egg is different. Drones on the other hand only have 16 chromosomes to begin with, so each sperm must contain all the genes of the drone. This means that each sperm from a drone is exactly identical, *they are clones*. This is different from most other animals, where each sperm is unique, just like each egg is. End quote.


So although I did figure a clone in the mix i had it misplaced. The sperm is the clone of the drone rather than the drone being a clone of the queen. If you follow the train. the queen gives the drone his genes. the drone gives the sperm it's genes and the sperm gives it's genes to a fertile egg or female bee. My placement of the clone in the string was off by one. This is because it is the queen that has two sets of genes rather than one.
The effect is that every bee in the colony gets 100% of the genes of the drone.

A second quote from the source puts it this way.

Quote "The effect of this multiple mating is that the colony is composed of different subfamilies. Each subfamily has the same mother but different fathers. Remember that all the sperm from each drone is an identical clone. This means that the workers inherit 50% of the queens genes, but 100% of the drones genes. The workers that belong to the same subfamily are related by 75%, they are called supersisters. End Quote.

I thought the Supersister detail was interesting and was one combination I did not see.
If you are like me it takes a bit of effort to see how it works. But every bee in the hive gets 100% of the drone genes. so sister from the same drone are 50% identical or clones. In addition these sisters will have half of the queens genes that are identical. making them 75% full blood relation.

Again if you think about this it once again shows how even huge numbers of genes can get dwindled down very quickly. And that is the subject of this thread. i am just trying to show various ways in which the gene pool does get reduced. Not necessarily in actually correct ways that genes work in bees. but in accurate enough ways that gene diversity does get lost.

The overall message is it takes a lot more colonies or individual queens to actually have a big 10 or 15,000 gene pool. and even then when you look in at the individual hive that pool gets trimmed to near nothing without doing anything wrong.

I have always found that how the numbers actually work to be misleading when it comes to genetics.

realistically in order to maintain the entire 15,000 gene pool. you are probably looking at a minimum of 400 hives and probably closer to 1000. I don't think that most people when they consider genetic diversity are aware of this. They think 15,000 genes in my one hive. and that is anything but true. they even think 15,000 genes within range of my hand full of hives. and that is very likely not true.

About the only person keeping a 15,000 gene pool is mother nature.


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## Specialkayme

squarepeg said:


> 'if your queen is interbreeding with drones that are close to her genetically, studies suggest you may loose some pest/pathgogen resistance'
> 
> is that how you see it jr? specialkayme?


That's not what I got out of it. To me, that quote talks about ramping up single gene effects into the larger organism, and the larger colony, and the ease of it's use in "honeybee like" genetic structures. The second half talks about one specific example of single gene effects, such as disease resistance in drones, and it's effect on the larger colony. I don't think it had anything to do with effects of inbreeding, or interbreeding.

I very well could be wrong though. I didn't read the paper, just your quote.


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## squarepeg

thanks dan. and you just pointed out a mistake i made in one of my posts above.

the drone's cells are haploid, so there is no miosis, or splitting of the dna when a sperm cell is made. 

all of the sperm from a given drone would be the same genetically.

all the more reason why to have diversity, especially in the drone population.

thanks.


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## JRG13

I don't know if interbreeding is a problem but it could be if all your local bes are derived from a few ferals or your own colonies. I just see it this way, say you have 100 colonies, each one putting out drones. There might be 1-2 queens coming out to mate in a week for example. She might mate with 30 of them, and some will be from the sames hives, excluding a minimum of 70% of your colonies from passing on their genes if they were interbreeding just around your hives. Now we can speculate on drone congregation areas etc... where there might be even more drones from who knows how many other local colonies all competing to pass on their dna to the few queens available every week. Which also brings us to mite vs bee interactions... Mites go through a generation a brood cycle, bees, 1-3 years, thus their major disadvantage in competing with mites on an evolutionary scale as well, but drone pressure helps future colonies but not as high as turning a generation every 21 days. I think it also brings us to the point of having a good diverse genetic make up in your hive by having a well mated queen from different stocks.


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## squarepeg

that makes perfect sense. many thanks jr.


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## deknow

Honey Bee Genetics....in 20 slides...15 seconds a slide.....5 minutes total:
www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=tqFr4P405mo&list=UUpSamzbNwv4Pj5oX5broEdA




...Unfortunately, some of the slides got scrambled in the video process....proper slides are here:
http://beeuntoothers.com/WhereDoBeesComeFromFinal.pdf


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## squarepeg

perfect dean, i learned something new today. many thanks all.


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## sqkcrk

Question: would drones derived from laying workers add to the gene pool available in DCAs? Would laying workers produce drones of greater variation than the workers Mother would have? Or similar?


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## sqkcrk

squarepeg said:


> perfect dean, i learned something new today. many thanks all.


Me too. I learned something about bee genetics and what Dean looks like.


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## squarepeg

i'll take a stab at it mark.

the laying worker's drone offspring would get the genetics from the random splitting of the laying worker's dna. so, genetically, these drones would provide genes at mating in the exact same way as if they came from a mated queen, (i think)

in the practical sense though, they may not be able to contribute that sperm. for example, if they are too small and undeveloped to go through the physical act.


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## squarepeg

sqkcrk said:


> Me too. I learned something about bee genetics and what Dean looks like.



was that you dean?


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## deknow

Yes...that was for a group of crafters (held at MIT). Most of the talks were about quilting, pie making, starting an artist collective, etc. Each slide was timed for 15 seconds, so if you get behind, you are sunk! I spent days preparing for this...I can prepare a 3 hour talk in about an hour...this was challenging.

deknow


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## squarepeg

you do well in front of a crowd. liked the 'special hug'. 

planning to order your book. thanks again.


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## jim lyon

Great presentation.:applause: Everything you wanted to know about bee breeding but were afraid to ask.


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## squarepeg

squarepeg said:


> do you think one could find two genetically identical indivuals in a colony?


jr, i cornered dr. latshaw on the main forum (pollen sub formulations thread), and asked him this question.

he said he thought it would be unlikely.


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## Daniel Y

Very nice Dean. I am still a little tickled I could see that there is a clone in the mix. genetics are not easy to sort through.

The very important thing I believe there is in all this for the average beekeeper as they are concerned with bottle necking or reduction of gene pool.

The queen has 32 chromosomes. I would like to go back and address this since it was brought up. Genes a are put together in strings. These strings of genes are then called Chromosomes. it is this chromosome that is passed on to the offspring. They say a queen bee has 32 chromosomes. but that still does not tell us how many genes are on all those chromosomes. They also say there are as many as 15,000 genes associated with the honey bee. No single bee is capable of having all 15,000 if they did their woudl never be a problem with inbreeding or loss of genetic diversity.

The entire issue over bottle necking or reducing the gene pool is the loss of these 15,000 genes. we don't want to loose them. we actually want to ad to them.

What is a chromosome and what is a gene is really not that critical to this conversation. Understanding how you can loose those genes is. I believe it is far more important for the average beekeeper to understand that to have a large selection of those 15,000 genes requires that there be a large number of colonies in the area.

I see that many beekeepers have a thinking along the lines of. I don't care if I have all 15,000 genes. I only care if I have the very best 500 or so. The problem with having only the very best 500 or so is that as soon as something comes along that those 500 or so genes cannot contend with. like varroa for example. all your bees get wiped out.

What we want is to flood that 15,000 gene pool with varroa resistant genes. We want varroa resistance to be predominant gene throughout bees. Sort of like genes to have wings would be. Every bee has that.

So can every bee have resistant genes? Theoretically yes. Many beekeepers might argue that. but yet they would have no problem thinking that African genes are perfectly capable of taking over every bee in existence. So if bad genes can be a problem. you can make good genes be a problem just the same.

Some genes spread more readily than others. Dominant genes for example are easier to get into your bees and see the effect. Dominant genes can be a problem as well. such as in hygienic traits when all the genes associated with it are recessive. This causes a situation that you can't just get some hygienic genes in your bees and be good. you have to get all the other genes out. the only gene you can have in your bees is the hygienic ones.

And this is exactly the situation I believe it is very important that even the hobby beekeepers has some understanding of genetics. That some situations require that you have pure bees. and that they remain pure. or a trait is completely lost. Africanization begins when even one gene from an African bee gets into your colony. Hygienic behavior happens only when you have purged every other non hygienic gene from your colony. It is obviously easier to Americanize bees than make housekeepers out of them.


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## sqkcrk

The average beekeeper? I doubt that the average beekeeper is concerned about bottlenecking of the ngene pool. I dare say that the average beekeeper wants decent inexpensively priced queens available when they want or need them. They may want a certain strain, but mostly they want live queens as early as possible.

Why7 does the average American beekeeper need to know anything more than how to keep bees? Why do we need to know Bee Breeding and Bee Genetics all that deep. I found Dean's illustration and explanation informative, but I could not regergitate it back to you. Basically I understand it when I hear it. That's enough for me. Am I going to make some mistakes by not knowing genetics any deeper?


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## Daniel Y

Mark I totally agree with where the average beekeepers concerns are. Are they making mistakes. well to look at the past and consider that today is a result of everything that has come before. Yes they have been and are making horrendous mistakes. IF you look at the honey bee and it's resent history. Since the 1930's. bees have been in a declining state at the very same time that almost every other area of agriculture has made tremendous at one time considered impossible advancements. this not only indicates mistakes. it indicates tremendous mistakes. That is just my opinion.


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## Solomon Parker

sqkcrk said:


> I doubt that the average beekeeper is concerned about bottlenecking of the ngene pool.


The average Bond Method beekeeper really needs to produce their own queens and not rely on outside sources. Bottlenecking is something that should be considered, but unless you have thousands of hives and can dominate an area with your own stock, chances are it's not going to happen. Open mating will deal with all the problems, and if you get an inbred queen with a spotty brood pattern, simply replace her as you would any other sub-par queen.


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## Adam Foster Collins

Solomon, what you're saying there is in keeping with my initial thought. 

I can't see how one beekeeper practicing survival of the fittest, or "Bond method" selection is going to make a dent in the gene pool of the area, unless as you say, they are a very large operation which actually controlled the majority of the bees in the region.

Mike Palmer's point about the initial infestation of Acarapis in North America is different. There, you have all the bees of a region being hit by the same selector - the same pressure. In that case, all the bees who can't deal with that one pressure are dying. And in that situation, sure - you're likely to be losing more of the genetic diversity.

But I just don't see it in smaller, local or individual beekeeper scenarios. Even if you have a hundred hives in an area where there are other beekeepers and plenty of open mating, I don't see how your activities are going to dent the gene pool.

Adam


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## Specialkayme

Solomon Parker said:


> Bottlenecking is something that should be considered, but unless you have thousands of hives and can dominate an area with your own stock, chances are it's not going to happen.


I believe bottlenecking is more likely to occur with someone who operates less hives, than with someone who operates more hives (within reason). If you are operating 20 hives on your 10 acre mini-farm, you very well might be maintaining 80% of the colonies that exists within your "mating radius." Possibly more, possibly less, depending on your particular area. Any practices you exercise would thus affect 80% of the gene pool (theoretically, and simplified significantly). However, if you are operating 2,000 colonies, you are not going to be able to place them on one contiguous piece of property (unless you own several hundred contiguous acres). You are going to have to break the colonies up into groups of 50 or so, place them here there and everywhere, stretched out over (possibly) half a county. With all those hives stretched out, you have a greater chance of interacting with other hives (ferals, other beekeepers). While you may have more hives, since you are stretched out over such a greater area you may have a smaller effect on the "mating radius" of each individual yard. Again, depending on location. But who's to say the 50 colonies you are managing in a (potentially) highly bee traveled area is having a greater affect on the gene pool than the 20 you are maintaining on a (potentially) less bee traveled area.

Additionally, if you are maintaining 2,000 colonies, you are likely moving them around, interacting them with dozens of times more colonies than they would be interacting with if left alone at the "home location". Which is exactly what is occurring to the 20 hives kept on the same 10 acres.

Plus, the 2,000 colony operation has a much larger selection pool from which to choose from, further reducing the chances of having a significantly noticeable genetic bottlenecking.


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## sqkcrk

Daniel,
Please clarify what you see as mistakes. It seems like back in the mid1980s we had a choice, treat or don't treat. Steve Taber remarked that if we did not treat that in 30 years the bees and the mites would work things out. Not much of a choice for those who owned any sizeable number of beehives and not a good option for those dependent on honeybee provided pollination.

So please tell me where you see thge mistakes.


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## Solomon Parker

Specialkayme said:


> If you are operating 20 hives on your 10 acre mini-farm, you very well might be maintaining 80% of the colonies that exists within your "mating radius."


This is a _huge _assumption upon which the rest of your theory is predicated. While I cannot speak for the rest of beekeeperdom, I know for a fact it's not the case in my area. Furthermore, if you are breeding locally adapted bees, you are not controlling much, you are only a part of it. I'd love to hear from another Bond Method beekeeper on this, but I may be the only one stupid enough to talk about what I do.


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## Specialkayme

Solomon Parker said:


> This is a _huge _assumption upon which the rest of your theory is predicated.


Not really an assumption. Just one possible example.

You may control 80% of the population. You may control 10%. You also may control 100%. If you are keeping bees in the middle of the desert, or on an island, things will be totally different than if you keep bees in the center of a "beekeeping mecca."

Tom Seeley studied beehives in the Arnot Forest (4200 acres near Newfield, NY) and found between 12 and 15 colonies existed (all feral) between the 1970's and 2006. That's in a forest. What if you live in a suburban, or urban area. More? Less? Who knows. But I'd venture to say about the same. That's what I based my example on.

But, more to the point, you can't tell me I'm wrong, just like I can't tell you I'm right. Which makes further discussion of the topic futile.




Solomon Parker said:


> I may be the only one stupid enough to talk about what I do.


Yes to the first, no to the second.  Sorry, I couldn't help myself.


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## sqkcrk

JRG13 said:


> I don't know if interbreeding is a problem but it could be if all your local bes are derived from a few ferals or your own colonies.


Did you mean INBREEDING? I don't see how interbreeding could be a problem. Wouldn't interbreeding broaden the gene pool?


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## Solomon Parker

I seem to be the only one commenting who practices the subject of the thread.


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## sqkcrk

Well, I guess we should leave you to it then. What's the sound of one Solomon Bonding w/ his bees?


----------



## Riskybizz

Solomon

I am not a strict disciple of the Bond Project per se, but I do prescribe to the practice of localized breeding of the current genetics within my yards. I am probably like you in that there are other people keeping bees within proximity to some of my yards that send forth drones easily within my mating zone areas. I do have 3 bee yards along the Rio Grande River spread out about 2 miles apart. Within this area I know that there are numerous wild hives located in the huge 100 year old cottonwood trees that line the river. Many of these colonies have originated from my hives as swarms. Every year I am also sure that I manage to catch some of these swarms and place them in my yards. As much as I regret losing my own swarms each spring at least I know that these colonies might be the feral survivors of tomorrow. In addition many years ago I worked for a commercial beekeeper (Jerry Cole) when I first moved to N.M. Mr. Cole used to run 70-80 hives in this same area until he passed away 10 years ago. I am fortunate that I am able to keep bees in this area, and that the bees are in very good shape as a whole. Our mite loads tend to be quite light here. Bite my tongue.


----------



## Solomon Parker

sqkcrk said:


> What's the sound of one Solomon Bonding w/ his bees?


What sound does it make when you squish a queen?


----------



## taydeko

Solomon Parker said:


> I seem to be the only one commenting who practices the subject of the thread.


I am right there with you Solomon!

Ted


----------



## Solomon Parker

You know what reduces the gene pool? Monarchy. 

I have been of a mind for some time that a queen should not be called a queen. She's as less a queen than Elizabeth. She's not queen of anything. She's not a sovereign. She's an egg donor primarily and little more. I digress.


----------



## sqkcrk

Bee Hen?


----------



## JRG13

sqkcrk said:


> Did you mean INBREEDING? I don't see how interbreeding could be a problem. Wouldn't interbreeding broaden the gene pool?


I meant both! Square, I saw that post from Dr. Latshaw, cool stuff. I only figured it possible with a fairly inbred queen that mated with limited drones. I think it would be a cool study to pick a couple hundred markers in a bee yard and see how well they're maintained and then we could get some answers.


----------



## Specialkayme

Solomon Parker said:


> I seem to be the only one commenting who practices the subject of the thread.


I don't practice the Bond Method anymore. Key word is anymore. I did from 2004 through 2011. Although I did attempt to bring in _some_ outside genetics, I largely bred from surviving colonies, with no treatments what so ever. Things didn't end well for me. In the spring of 2011 I started with 8 colonies. I increased the number to somewhere in the neighborhood of 24. Then, one by one I lost them all over the course of the fall of 2011. Some to varroa issues, some to what I've come to realize were nosema issues, some for still unknown reasons. By December of 2011 I had 2 colonies. By January I had none. That's well beyond the 3 year "no treatment crash" everyone told me would come.

So, if you are the only one qualified to talk about this issue, why don't we all just sit down and have you "school us" in the way of the bee. Clearly you know way more than anyone else here, and any other form of "contribution" is just getting in the way of you spreading your greatness. I apologize for the inconvenience my words have caused, creating some form of filler between the tid bits of "Sol Wisdom."

. . . 

Or maybe we can treat this more like an open discussion. . .


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## Solomon Parker

Specialkayme said:


> Or maybe we can treat this more like an open discussion. . .


...where most people involved aren't doing what we're discussing. Maybe we should discuss driving monster trucks, or flying commercial airplanes, or competing in Olympic level gymnastics.

Howabout you keep your insults to yourself. They are not helping.


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## Specialkayme

Solomon Parker said:


> Maybe we should discuss driving monster trucks, or flying commercial airplanes, or competing in Olympic level gymnastics.


Or how great sol is, or how amazing his contributions to beekeeping are, or how he's so much more experienced than anyone else in this thread, or this site, or how his logic is un-questionable and his conclusions are automatic law, or about how he doesn't think anyone else's contributions to this thread, or occasionally this site, are even worth the cost of the electricity needed to read it . . . 



Solomon Parker said:


> Howabout you keep your insults to yourself.


Keep your comments about others' contributions and experiences to yourself, and I'll keep my "insults" to myself. I think that's a fair trade.


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## Solomon Parker

You know, one of the greatest things about not being a moderator is I quite literally don't have to put up with this anymore. Consider yourself blocked.


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## squarepeg

'let the sparks fly and the chips fall were they may.....' 

i agree in open discussion, and not limiting participation by any arbitrary criteria, and i agree that profanity and personal attacks don't have a place on the forum.

this thread was a perfect example of how a group of people with diverse experiences and backgrounds can roll a topic around and end up learning something new, or advance their understanding.

i'd be willing to bet, that most everyone involved in the conversation here, not to mention all of those just viewing it, would claim that they were edified by it in some way. jmho of course.


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## Adam Foster Collins

I am just this season going "treatment free", and it's tense, I must say. I can see mite damage, and it's difficult not to break out the oxalic acid. 

That said, I also split a lot this year. I also plan to create a nuc-based operation moving forward, so I imagine the splitting will keep the mites under control to some extent. I'm not going that way in order to combat mites, but I'm well aware that it may just work out that way.

Adam


----------



## Oldtimer

squarepeg said:


> i agree in open discussion, and not limiting participation by any arbitrary criteria, and i agree that profanity and personal attacks don't have a place on the forum.


Agreed. Also, most of us learn to sift the wheat from the chaff.

If we confined discussions to only those who are self annointed practitioners / experienced experts in it, we would have to exclude that large portion of the TF forum, who tell us they've had bees for nearly a year now and never treated, so it must work.

Is Specialkayme qualified to speak on the subject? Well since he practised the bond method for years, I would say more qualified than most. Blocking him is just excluding opinions that vary from one's own personal dogma.

If say, Adam Foster Collins was successful with his use of the bond method, he would be welcomed? But if next year he lost them all, would it be OK to report that, or would he get blocked?


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## squarepeg

many thanks oldtimer. 'wheat from the chaff...', i really like that.

specialkayme's posts will still appear here, and so will everyone else's, since sol is not the moderator anymore. (barring profanity and personal attacks, as judged by barry, the new moderator)

by blocking, i'm guessing that only means personal messages


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## Solomon Parker

It means one doesn't have to read the blocked persons posts anymore. Alastair's been blocked for a while. I have grown tired of reading the thinly veiled insults. It has nothing to do with any other content in posts. Just insults.


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## squarepeg

so the rest of us will continue to see specialkayme's posts, right? just you won't see them anymore?


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## Barry

Correct, and I don't see the need to inform everyone else who you (not you) have on your block list. Let's move along. Oldtimer's right on the money.


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## jim lyon

Like Barry said:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5NNOrp_83RU


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## Specialkayme

I believe that is correct sp



Oldtimer said:


> Blocking him is just excluding opinions that vary from one's own personal dogma.


Sol wouldn't be the first to criticize me after 'failing' at TF. Half the TF forum shunned me like a leopard. They don't like listening to info they don't like to hear. And an apiary failing after going TF for 7 years will do it. 

But I don't think Sol is blocking me because he disagrees with what I say. He's blocking me because he thinks I'm insulting him. I'm fine with that decision. I don't lose out. I just find it funny that he can criticize everyone, but when someone points out his shortcomings, it's viewed as insults, and we just can't stand for that.


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## squarepeg

yes specialkayme, that is correct. barry confirmed it, probably while you were typing.

sorry to hear about your previous bad experiences on the tfb forum.

i've heard about others having some too, before my time here.

we are all people, and people are funny, and

'almost as interesting as bees.........' 

wadda ya'll say that *all* of us do our best to check our egos in at the door, and see if we can't generate some more good discussions like this on the tfb forum.

it's too important of a topic to all beekeepers for us not to try.


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## Adam Foster Collins

Threads quickly get tiresome when people get off-topic, and on personal attacks. So let's not do that. Specialk, is a tf apiary that fails after seven years really a failure of treatment free?

New thread for that I guess...

Adam


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## Daniel Y

sqkcrk said:


> Daniel,
> Please clarify what you see as mistakes. It seems like back in the mid1980s we had a choice, treat or don't treat. Steve Taber remarked that if we did not treat that in 30 years the bees and the mites would work things out. Not much of a choice for those who owned any sizeable number of beehives and not a good option for those dependent on honeybee provided pollination.
> 
> So please tell me where you see thge mistakes.


Sorry Mark, This conversation is moving fast and I have not been back to the computer in nearly 24 hours. I am not ignoring you.
To keep it simple. the 80's and other "Bad" periods are the symptoms of the mistakes. It is a bit like getting the flu and then saying. but I stayed in bed, drank lots of fluids etc. etc. etc. When others are talking about how to not get the flu in the first place. Theoretical at best. the flue will happen regardless of weather you stay away from sick people. just not as frequently.

I will say that conversations just like this one. and that someone like you that admittedly says it is not that much of a concern to you. is a good sign. you are still willing to take your time to listen and contribute. It will be very few individuals that are willing to look at the bee under the microscope. it is the majority that want to look at them from a lawn chair. And this is very true. One challenge this fact presents is how do you effectively take the information from the microscope to the lawn chair. part of that responsibility lies with the person setting in the chair. They have to be at least willing to hear that their is a better way. This gets diluted when to many promises that do not bear fruit begin to happen. Sooner or later everyone starts saying. Yeah Yeah Yeah, Shut up and keep bees. Now the guy looking in the microscope has an elevated burden of proof to meet.

Anyway my comments are trailing off in to to many side issue. 

Suffice it to say it is a complicated multi faceted issue. and this conversation that is actually going very well is just taking a close look at one of them.


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## Specialkayme

Adam Foster Collins said:


> is a tf apiary that fails after seven years really a failure of treatment free?


That's how I viewed it. How would you view it?

Something failed. It might be the genetics of the hives, it might be the location (or the individual apiary), or it might be the treatment practices. Since I used the bond method, I selected the genetics of the hives through a "treatment free" practice. So to me, the first and last are interchangeable in this regard. As far as the location goes, I was stretched out over 3 different locations, all within about an hour and a half of each other. I used these locations over the course of the previous 5 years (admittedly not all 7). I only saw high losses of colonies in years 2 and 3. Year 5 I lost approx 50%. Year 7 I lost 100%. 

That tells me it's not the location. It also tells me it wasn't "chance." I can understand losing 100% of my hives in year 7 if I only had 3 hives. Losing 100% of your hives when you are operating in the 20's is more than a coincidence.

If you ask me, the treatment free practices, in addition to the gene selection, created weaker bees than would have existed if I had treated periodically (with moderation) throughout the 7 years. The bees that resulted were able to fight off varroa (to some degree) but were completely unable to defend themselves against just about any other type of invader (nosema, SHB, and to some degree wax moths).

I've been told the failure of my apiary was not the bees fault, it was my fault. I was told that I wasn't doing tf correctly, in that I didn't use small cell comb (I used foundationless), I didn't rotate the combs out fast enough (I was on a 5 year rotation), I should have used 8 frame hives (I use 10), I should have used deep brood chambers (I used all mediums), I should have used more upper entrances, more screened bottom boards, less screened bottom boards, I should have purchased tf nucs, or purchased tf packages, or I should have shaken all the bees out of the hives for the first few years to get them to regress their cell size . . . the list goes on. It's easy for others to point the finger at me, and tell me I did something wrong, the bees didn't. Whether that's accurate, who knows.


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## Daniel Y

Solomon, somewhere in the last two pages or so said that a bond beekeeper should make their own queens. this is not entirely true.

It is more of a matter of take a wide selection of genes and then select out for the traits you want. try to make those traits prevalent. but then you are going to then go outside and dump in a new selection of genes and do it again. But you want to select carefully those outside genes.


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## Solomon Parker

Daniel Y said:


> Solomon, somewhere in the last two pages or so said that a bond beekeeper should make their own queens.


I said it. I see no utility in letting bees die if one is not going to reap the rewards of weeding out the weak. They should and generally speaking, they do. Not all of them perhaps, but that is not what I'm saying.


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## Daniel Y

Specialkayme said:


> But, more to the point, you can't tell me I'm wrong, just like I can't tell you I'm right. Which makes further discussion of the topic futile.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Yes to the first, no to the second.  Sorry, I couldn't help myself.


Unless you are referring to the discussion about who is right or wrong. I think you may be missing some very important purposes of discussion. one being the simple congregating of thoughts. opinions. observations and ideas of others. Right now today cancer treatment is on what many call hyper advancement mode. and they woudl pretty much agree this is caused by one thing and one thing alone. the ability and actually doing the sharing of information.

So if conversation can be key in curing cancer. can it possibly be key in developing treatment free beekeeping? One other key point though. is the conversation about being right. or finding answers that work? I for one don't think right exists. there is only better and worse wrong.


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## Barry

Originally Posted by *Adam Foster Collins*  
is a tf apiary that fails after seven years really a failure of treatment free?




Specialkayme said:


> That's how I viewed it. How would you view it?


How about a treatment apiary that fails after a bunch of years? The name Hackenberg comes to mind. Total, to near total die-offs happen. Yet there are plenty of other beekeepers in the same boat, be it TF or treatment, that continue to keep bees successfully (how ever they define success). Something did fail for you. That's what you will need to figure out.


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## jim lyon

For sure all beekeepers have had their low points. I don't think it's out of line to suggest that any total loss of ones bees has to be considered a failure since at that point you are either quitting or repopulating from someone else's bees that you may know little if anything about. I doubt that many get into bees under the notion that they will most likely lose all their bees in a few years but that's ok. I, for one, haven't bought any bees to repopulate hives since pre varroa as odd as that might sound and even then it wasn't that we lost all our bees, only that we had too many empty boxes to fill in just one year.


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## Specialkayme

Barry said:


> Something did fail for you. That's what you will need to figure out.


Good point Barry.

But, it's often difficult to find a culprit when there are no survivors. 

I probably should have taken samples of workers and wax and sent it to get tested. The cost of getting them tested prevented me from doing it on the first few hives that were lost. The sheer confusion prevented me from testing them on the vast majority in the middle. And the complete dismay and sorrow prevented me from taking any actions on the last two.

Live and learn though. I caught 4 swarms this year (three of which absconded later, during the dearth), and purchased 7 hives from a beekeeper who was moving to Canada. So all is well for now.


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## Beelosopher

sqkcrk said:


> I think what I picked up this weekend was that when you select you narrow. When you choose certain traits you may lose others thereby bottlenecking. Does that make sense? I'm not sure.


Mark this is what I picked up as well.

I am not sure my comments below directly address the thread(well they do in a round about way at least), but I had to toss this in as I attended the meeting as well with Michael Bush speaking. In the segment on how to select I really found a lot of what he had to comment on interesting. Particularly some comments that be made about bees being gamblers. I will paraphrase so hopefully I capture it (might be covered on his site but I hadn't read this anywhere yet).

All bees are gamblers. Some build up brood early (A), some in the middle (B) and some late (C). Based upon how the year rolls out A, B or C may have the advantage in production, etc. However just because one year a hive is busting loose with bees doesn't mean it is your best hive, rather it could mean it simply gambled and won. If the year had extremely odd weather, out of sink flows, etc. stock taken from this hive could prove a poor producer the following year when weather resume its more familiar cycle. i.e. a hive that builds up super early might out produce in a season with an early spring, then the following year starve due to too much brood and no nectar flows yet. Micheal's suggestion was perhaps we should be looking to avoid selection from the outlier hives, good or bad. Instead choose from the pretty good hives so we are able to hedge a bet against the next big bee crisis with broader diversity in the yard. Reading Specialkay's scenario makes me wonder if selection could have been part of the issue (not enough diversity for the other ailments to be survived).

There was a stark contrast between MB's talk and that of the Russian bee association. Which was very much about selection of the traits "we" deem important. It did come off to me like we could manipulate stock to do what we want if we keep the blood line pure. Working in such a vacuum concerns me. Especially when i listened on and found how working with Russian bees, (according to the speaker -Steven Coy?-) requires working in a vacuum of sorts to preserve the Russian bee genetics. Once the interbreeding occurs (Italian stock or feral, etc.) your advantages are virtually nonexistent and not notable with Russian bees. This to me was a huge warning flag. Not only is it very impracticable for many to attempt this, it really made me think we are setting ourselves up for the same pitfalls with Russians via narrowing as we already experienced with Italians. 

All that said I am not sure that the bond method would select too narrowly, so long as the keeper makes the right selection choices and avoids a full on outlier approach.

If I misrepresented anything there I apologize in advance.


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## Adam Foster Collins

SpecialK,

With the added details of your experience over the 7 years, I can see that it was rough, or some version of a failure for the duration. In that case, the total loss at year 7 would indeed seem like a failure of your attempt at treatment free. 

It's all so darned FRUSTRATING, isn't it? There are just so many conflicting reports and opinions.

This is why I've come to believe that you just have to try everything for yourself until you find what works for you and your bees in your part of the world. All a forum like this does is give you a sense of options, and adds (or subtracts) a level of confidence in what you're trying at a given moment.

What a pain!

Adam


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## Adam Foster Collins

And I wonder...

Does regular, systematic requeening have the potential to reduce the gene pool just as much as the bond method?


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## jim lyon

Adam Foster Collins said:


> And I wonder...
> 
> Does regular, systematic requeening have the potential to reduce the gene pool just as much as the bond method?


I see it as an opportunity to do quite the opposite. You may choose as many and as diverse a mixure of breeder queens as you want.


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## Adam Foster Collins

Sure, it can be, but couldn't it be the opposite?

If you're practicing annual requeening from a major queen producer, isn't every queen you squish along the way a potential loss of more diverse genetic code? Let's say some of those queens are swarms you caught. You're getting rid of their variation in favor of the range of genetics maintained by your queen producer.

I guess my point is, if the bond method is criticized for reducing the gene pool, couldn't it follow that any willful or systematic elimination of queens could do the same thing? The difference is that the Bond method lets nature do the killing.

I'm not suggesting that requeening is a bad thing, but asking if certain approaches to methodical requeening coud be eliminating genetic diversity to the same degree (or more) than the bond method of selection. With periodic requeening, the only factor in the decision is the queen's age - not a genetic trait at all.

Adam


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## jim lyon

Adam: I can only speak for what we do and what I would expect other prudent queen producers to do. It is really easy to bring in whatever genetics you feel would improve your operation. We most definitely choose breeders for their different traits.


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## Adam Foster Collins

Sure enough. I guess I'm kind of thinking 'out loud' and realizing that pretty much any form of selection has the potential to reduce the gene pool. No matter why it happens, when bees die, there is the potential for some genetic material to be lost.

Bottom line for me is that I just don't see how the Bond method of selection is special in that regard, so I don't see how it stands up as a criticism. I started the thread when I read a quote from Marla Spivak criticizing the bond method for it's potential to narrow the gene pool. 

But I don't see how it does so any more than any other form of selection.

Adam


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## Solomon Parker

Adam Foster Collins said:


> Does regular, systematic requeening have the potential to reduce the gene pool just as much as the bond method?


An interesting thought, to be sure.

With the Bond Method, some queens get to live, adapt, propagate their genes. Systematic requeening kills every queen no matter her abilities and replaces her with one from somewhere else.


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## Oldtimer

Well yes and no. Many beekeepers will select traits they want and breed from those, whereas with the bond method you leave it to the mites to decide, and thereby risk losing good traits, or any traits except one, being mite resistance. The extreme example of this is seen in Russian bees which it could be argued have been produced by the bond method. In their pure form, mite tolerant. But that's about the end of their usefulness. Don't store much honey, swarm constantly, and can be aggressive.

A human controlled breeding program, done right, we can work towards several good qualities, mite tolerance being one of them.

Not decrying the bond method, on some of my hives I'm doing it myself. As it's only done on the tinyest fraction of hive numbers, it alone is not going to cause loss of genetic diversity, although it could, locally. But just about every bond practitioner I know buys in the odd queen anyway.


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## jim lyon

Solomon Parker said:


> An interesting thought, to be sure.
> 
> With the Bond Method, some queens get to live, adapt, propagate their genes. Systematic requeening kills every queen no matter her abilities and replaces her with one from somewhere else.


Depends on your definition of systematic requeening. If you are buying mated queens from a single source then you are at the mercy of the supplier to be sure. In our case we are requeening with a diverse group of virgins who then get mated by the drones from the hives being requeened so the genetics from the replaced queens very much remain alive.


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## Adam Foster Collins

Well, one could also suggest that the Bond method does not only select for mite tolerance. That may be true if one believes that every colony will die from mite-related issues if mites are not treated. But I don't believe that personally.

The bond method is selecting for survival above all. And the truth is, all methods do that. A person could practice the bond method, and at the same time be selecting for traits beyond survival.

I'm not suggesting that a person can't do a great job in their regular re-queening either. I'm just saying that any method of selection - natural or otherwise - has the potential to narrow the gene pool. I mean, of course it does. That's what selection means in a sense - narrowing down to something desired. And as a consequence - something is discarded.

Adam


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## deknow

Here is a short talk by Randy Quinn, who did much of the field work for the Starline and midnight queen operations.....talking about these same issues.
http://www.beeuntoothers.com/CIG/index.php/lecture-archives/2008/randy-quinn

Deknow


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## Oldtimer

Adam Foster Collins said:


> The bond method is selecting for survival above all.


True. But remember, for however many zillions of years bees have been on the planet, they've been getting selected for survival. Another few years of that, say, the last 30 years, is a drop in the ocean and isn't going to change bees at all. Unless, there is a new factor. Varroa mites are a new factor and a major one. So if the Bond method does bring about any change, it would be varroa related, as our current bees are already a product of thousands of years of the Bond method, but without varroa.


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## sqkcrk

It seems as though y'all are wondering about how to not bottleneck the gene pool or how to keep the gene pool ever wide or widening. Is that about right?

I can tell you the results of nonselection thru splitting and allowing the raising of ones own queens by the bees themselves. The Engelhardts of Antwerp,NY ran 2 or 3,000 colonies and took hives to SC back in the 1950s, 60s, and 70s. They would split each colony in the Spring and allowed the split to raise its own queen there in the swamps of SC. Apiary Inspectors in NY used to refer to Paul Engelhardt's bees as Engelhardt's Hornets.

They never bought any queens nor did they graft. So, what are you selecting for when practicing nonselection?


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## Barry

It doesn't look like Engelhardts were selecting for gentleness. My guess is survivability and honey production, if that is how they made their income.


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## Michael Palmer

sqkcrk said:


> It seems as though y'all are wondering about how to not bottleneck the gene pool or how to keep the gene pool ever wide or widening. Is that about right?
> 
> I can tell you the results of nonselection thru splitting and allowing the raising of ones own queens by the bees themselves. The Engelhardts of Antwerp,NY ran 2 or 3,000 colonies and took hives to SC back in the 1950s, 60s, and 70s. They would split each colony in the Spring and allowed the split to raise its own queen there in the swamps of SC. Apiary Inspectors in NY used to refer to Paul Engelhardt's bees as Engelhardt's Hornets.
> 
> They never bought any queens nor did they graft. So, what are you selecting for when practicing nonselection?


Buster told me that there was a population of Amm in the swamps near Loris where he kept his bees. Buster bought out the Englehardts. That's why he quit making walk away splits and used mated queens instead.


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## sqkcrk

Survivability was not a concern and their focus was keeping bees, taking hives to SC to have Winterloss replacements. I don't think that selection was even thought about, just getting more live colonies. Things were much different back 50, 60, and 70 years ago when big crops of white honey were produced in the St. Lawrence Valley of NY.


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## Barry

So the local Amm was behind his mean bees. Surely we can't apply that to all who let their bees raise their own queens?


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## sqkcrk

Michael Palmer said:


> Buster told me that there was a population of Amm in the swamps near Loris where he kept his bees.



Makes sense. So, maybe aggressive bees isn't necassarily what one will select for if one practices nonselection. But, one apparently is subject to what is out there in the environment. I guess.


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## sqkcrk

Barry said:


> So the local Amm was behind his mean bees. Surely we can't apply that to all who let their bees raise their own queens?


I guess not, but, if you grow thru nonselction you are letting fate take you where it will.


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## Barry

Isn't that OK? One can always buy queens if the fate route turns south at any given point.


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## sqkcrk

And Live and Let Die? Sure.


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## Barry

I don't follow.


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## Solomon Parker

Adam Foster Collins said:


> That may be true if one believes that every colony will die from mite-related issues if mites are not treated. But I don't believe that personally.


Nor do I.




Adam Foster Collins said:


> The bond method is selecting for survival above all.


Survival above all, but not survival only. 




sqkcrk said:


> So, maybe aggressive bees isn't necassarily what one will select for if one practices nonselection.


Again, let me point out what actually happens rather than dealing in the hypothetical. Bond Method beekeeping is not non-selection. It's the same beekeeping that everybody else practices without the parts about helping the bees with disease. There is still selection for honey production and gentleness. A good beekeeper still doesn't put up with mean hives even if he believes in letting weak ones die. The two aspects are virtually unrelated.




Barry said:


> One can always buy queens if the fate route turns south at any given point.


Yes they can.


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## Daniel Y

Live and let die is itself a selection process. It is one that no one is in charge of what is being selected for and the only real selection trait being selected for is survival. Now their are many paths to surviving. aggression would serve it well.

This is my number one problem with the live and let die idea. what makes anyone think they will not end up with bees every bit as useful as African bees if they just let fate take it's course? Why is there so much thinking that all desirable traits of bees are found in them surviving? It is likely that your bees will eventually survive well. and almost guaranteed you will be sorry as all get out that they do. They are likely to become like weeds that you cannot get rid of.

I just don't see how the thinking that having no intelligent selection going on results in desired selections. The selection process is probably the most critical step in the entire process. so much so that breeding programs live or die on the skill of the person making the selection.

If that is true. what will be the result of just throwing that choice to the wind?


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## jim lyon

deknow said:


> Here is a short talk by Randy Quinn, who did much of the field work for the Starline and midnight queen operations.....talking about these same issues.
> http://www.beeuntoothers.com/CIG/index.php/lecture-archives/2008/randy-quinn
> 
> Deknow


Nice link Dean: There was nothing Randy said that I would disagree with. I don't think this issue is quite as complicated as everyone is making it out to be. When a hive dies, something is lost. When large numbers of hives die even more is lost. I think it is a good thing that some beekeepers are trying to exist without treatments as the resulting bees may prove beneficial. I also believe even more strongly that commercial beekeepers play a far bigger role by keeping lots of bees alive so that we have as broad a choice of bees to select from as possible. We commercial folks are selecting for (at least those who arent buying all their queens) large populous hives that serve our purpose of large scale pollination and honey production while treatment free folks are selecting for another set of goals. I am pretty sure that the end result of either system won't give us a bee that works for everyone.


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## Solomon Parker

Daniel Y said:


> what makes anyone think they will not end up with bees every bit as useful as African bees if they just let fate take it's course? Why is there so much thinking that all desirable traits of bees are found in them surviving? what will be the result of just throwing that choice to the wind?


I don't mean to beleaguer the point, but no one does that. Natural selection is not the only selection criteria. Good beekeepers do not tolerate mean bees. 

This is a straw man argument. It's making a case against things that nobody is doing. This (as with everything) has to be approached from a perspective grounded in reality. Perhaps you should ask someone who uses the method rather than speculating.


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## Daniel Y

I don't have an account to view the information above and don't have time to deal with it this morning. I did read the description an the idea of splitting and recombining hives.

I did find it interested that it said. "This usually results in a new queen (adding to the gene pool from whatever source the drone came from) but if not you are usually better off.

Taken at it's face value this is saying if you add to the gene pool you are taking a step backwards. You whee better off with what you had in the first place. If the queen from the split does not survive you have added nothing. If she does you have replaced half of your original genes with who knows what. I would have to see how he goes about fertilization of the new queen.

Genetics are complicated in that you have confusing factors influencing confusing factors. and then throw in a healthy does of exceptions.

There are the basics of how genes work. and then there are the specifics to any species.

For example almost every known animal in the world has it's sex determined by only 2 genes. an X and a Y two X's means a female an X and a Y mean a male and only males can carry a Y. This creates a 50-50 chance of any offspring being a male or a female. But in bees this is not true. they have multiple genes and only a combination of two of the same or even one of the same results in a male. All others result in a female. this is the cause of the female dominated production of offspring. now for the exception. the queen can alter the chance of an egg receiving the same gene from the sperm by simply laying an egg with no contribution from the drone. she controls how many males will even be produced in a hive.

If there are 19 genes in each drone that determine sex. and the queen mates with 10 drones. this means there is a pool of 190 possible genes that determine the sex of every fertile egg in the hive. The chance that a drone will result from a fertile egg is almost impossible.

It it possible that with no selection process desirable traits will result? certainly. It is more likely you will get struck by lightening but it happens.

Over 10,000 genes most of which are undesirable and by chance you will draw only a combination that is desirable.

What if out of all of those 19 genes only one produces a top quality productive queen that passes that tendency toward top rate productivity to her daughters? You have less than 5% chance of drawing that gene. and even if you do you still have 169 additional draws to be just as lucky. You have to be lucky and get the right hygienic genes. and the right aggression genes. and a better set of smelling and taste genes. etc. etc. etc.

Anyone ever tried to draw 140 straight winning hands at poker? Let me know when you have done it.


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## deknow

Daniel Y said:


> Taken at it's face value this is saying if you add to the gene pool you are taking a step backwards. You whee better off with what you had in the first place.


Well, it depends what you are trying to do. If you are trying to fix traits in a population, adding genetics is a step backwards. If you are trying to add traits (or "roll the dice"), then adding genetics is a step forward.
Any breeding program must have some kind of uniformity (color, temperament, behavior, production, etc) as a goal...which means that at some point, even if you are bringing in some new genetics, you have to largely work with what you have. A popluation with no fixed traits is random, and of little use for any kind of breeding (except for 'rolling the dice')




> But in bees this is not true. they have multiple genes and only a combination of two of the same or even one of the same results in a male. All others result in a female. this is the cause of the female dominated production of offspring. now for the exception. the queen can alter the chance of an egg receiving the same gene from the sperm by simply laying an egg with no contribution from the drone. she controls how many males will even be produced in a hive.


...except for the fact that larvae with homozygous sex determination genes are eaten by nurse bees within a few hours of the egg "hatching". Unless you work in a lab, you have never seen a diploid drone.
...therefore, the odds involving the sex determination gene has NOTHING to do with the abundance of females in a colony.


> If there are 19 genes in each drone that determine sex. and the queen mates with 10 drones. this means there is a pool of 190 possible genes that determine the sex of every fertile egg in the hive. The chance that a drone will result from a fertile egg is almost impossible.


Daniel, I understand that you are trying to grasp this stuff, but this isn't true, and it isn't helpful.

A gene resides at a specific location (loci) on a chromosome. An allele is a variation of a gene. In the case of sex determination in honeybees, there is ONE loci where the sex determination gene resides. There are 19 or so alleles of the sex determination gene...in that one location on the chromosome, one of 19 possible alleles is present.

All of the sperm from a given drone is identical. If a queen mates with 10 drones, and each drone has a separate sex determination gene, then each female offspring will have 1 of those 10 alleles.
On the queen side, she has 2 sets of chromosomes, and therefore, has two different alleles of the sex determination gene (they are not the same as one another, otherwise she would have been a diploid drone). Each egg she produces has one of these two alleles.
So, each female offspring has one of the two sex determination genes that the queen has, and one of the 10 carried by the drones.
If one of those drones had one of the alleles carried by the queen, then 1/2 of the female offspring fathered by that particular drone will be homozygous at the sex determination gene....1 in 20 (average) workers (or queens) will be diploid, and not viable.


> It it possible that with no selection process desirable traits will result? certainly. It is more likely you will get struck by lightening but it happens.


Natural selection is a selection process...one that brought about virtually all the life you see around you. If one wants to keep bees, the most desirable trait is bees that are alive...without that, you can't do anything else.


deknow


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## sqkcrk

Barry said:


> I don't follow.


I was not aware that Bond Beekeepers did any grafting and raising of queens, selecting for traits other than survival.


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## Solomon Parker

If you ask nicely, they will be happy to tell you.


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## sqkcrk

Solomon Parker said:


> Good beekeepers do not tolerate mean bees.



Obviously you never met Paul Engelhardt. "I don't care what you call my bees, they make honey." He'd rather have mean bees that produce than gentle ones that don't produce as much. He was working w/ what he had.

So, I think your statement about good beekeepers is too much a blanket statrement and doesn't take into consideration the commercial point of view very well.


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## Solomon Parker

Perhaps you may not see it my way Mark, but I stand by my statement. I don't want to get off topic because this is interesting, but mean bees are a liability in many many ways.


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## sqkcrk

I agree. But they can also be the best producers. One has to decide what is best for themselves.


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## Solomon Parker

One benefit of you much more experienced beekeepers is great stories of old so-and-so's who did things you ought not to do. Your experience as an inspector provides plenty of those.


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## sqkcrk

We learn best from our mistakes. Sometimes from those of others.

Thomas Jefferson's biographer just recently said, when asked about Jefferson's flaws, "I learn more from sinners than Saints." Or something like that.


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## Beelosopher

deknow said:


> Here is a short talk by Randy Quinn, who did much of the field work for the Starline and midnight queen operations.....talking about these same issues.
> http://www.beeuntoothers.com/CIG/index.php/lecture-archives/2008/randy-quinn
> 
> Deknow


Thanks for this video. It seems there is a beautiful simplicity to some of the solutions for queen raising.


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## deknow

....I also highly recommend this video, from the same conference. Kerstin Ebberston on sustainable breeding practices.


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## Stonefly7

Thank you Dean for the links. Interesting. 

I for one, would be interested in knowing what happened to SK's operation. After that long TF, what a disappointment. Did he breed from his stock that had the genitic traits he liked? he mentioned he brought in some new genitics a couple of times. 

Jim, can a 700-800 hive operation become sustainable by breeding from your own stock, and importing genitics you wish to have, also as a secondary source of sustainability? I have tried MP's system of overwintering nucs whith great sucess. The weak ones, queen gets squished, back to a nuc with new queen added. I guess that's not "live and let Die" is it?

Sol, hot hives have been some of my best producers, no fun to handle, but when production is by the barrel, you deal with it. I don't like it, but production is the goal. I make a note, and requeen when time allows. I watched a old forum member, (Tecumseh), get hit 12 times on the thumb, in the same place, over and over. I grabbed my gloves, but he is tough. 

Thanks for sharing.


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## Adam Foster Collins

Like Sol, I just want to remind the thread that I'm talking about the Bond method as it would likely be used by a beekeeper - not as it might have been used in an isolated experiment. I'm not thinking of survival as the only method of selection, but as a response to treating for mites - one which any truly "treatment free" practitioner would be doing.

Of course, you're still going to requeen an agressive hive, and you're going to select from more productive queens for grafting, etc. In practice, it wouldn't be a totally hands-off selection process.

I do understand any confusion, though...

Adam


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## Solomon Parker

Stonefly7 said:


> Sol, hot hives have been some of my best producers, no fun to handle, but when production is by the barrel, you deal with it. I don't like it, but production is the goal. I make a note, and requeen when time allows.


I understand. Even the illustrious Solomon Parker waits until after the flow to requeen. But I do requeen, and so do you. And that's good. The neighbors often have small children.

This reminds me of some bee guru who once said he had create an AFB resistant strain of bees. They weren't good for much else, but they could clean up AFB like nobody's business. The same used to be said of treatment-free bees, they survived, but no honey and mean. But with everything, you get what you breed for, generally speaking. Survival is bred for by the bees, and I only make increase from hives that make honey and that I can work in the rain with no smoke. That rain part may or may not be literal depending on inspection day, but you get what I mean.


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## Specialkayme

Stonefly7 said:


> I for one, would be interested in knowing what happened to SK's operation. After that long TF, what a disappointment. Did he breed from his stock that had the genitic traits he liked? he mentioned he brought in some new genitics a couple of times.


I often let the bees raise their own queens via supercedure or walk away splits. Occasionally I would graft. 

But I always selected from my "best" colonies, placing an emphasis on 1) survivability, 2) gentleness, and 3) honey production. In that order.

I would occasionally import queens from other locations. When I did, I'd strive to find treatment free local queens (or VSH queens), or the best you could find of treatment free queens at the time. The goal was to add some genetics into the gene pool that my "survivors" didn't have (such as VSH or Hygenic traits). I'd observe for a year or so to see how they worked before I'd graft from them though.

I never did mite counts. I viewed it as a waste of time. If they survived with high mite counts, they still survived. If they died with low mite counts, they still died.


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## taydeko

I have a very hot, very productive hive. I certainly do not intend to use this hive as a source of new queens. I suppose if I breed from other hives, the drones from the hot hive will continue to pass on some of their characteristics.



> The weak ones, queen gets squished, back to a nuc with new queen added. I guess that's not "live and let Die" is it?


That is a form of live and let die, since the queen provides all of the genetic material in the hive. Killing the queen is the same as letting the colony die. They will all die in a couple of months anyway and will be replaced by offspring of the new queen.

Ted


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## squarepeg

i am still trying to understand the reasoning behing letting a hive completely die out.

i get the part about not propagating weakness and vunerablility to pests and pathogens. but it seems like requeening would take care of that, and without loosing the whole colony, (and setting it up for possible robbing and the spread of the problem to nearby colonies).

is the hive allowed to die out completely so that is has had it every chance possible to overcome the problem, thereby proving it did indeed have the right stuff?

is it usually in the late fall or winter when they collapse, thereby making it difficult or impossible to requeen?

is there another reason i haven't considered?


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## Stonefly7

Sol, illustrious huh! Sometime I will share with you my chasing of genitics with my Rhode Island Reds and New Hampshire Reds. All for the bloody egg.

SK, I am glad you are back at it. Are you going to attempt any management changes this time. We have all been there. I try not to allow any supersedure or do walkaways. After gleaning from MP, KW and Br.A, I want to control that process as close as I can. I believe queen source may play a large part in the demise of many of our hives. Top three selection traits, 1. Fecundity 2. Survivability (same as resistance to disease) 3 Production. If you have the first two, the third will fall in place unless darth of flow or weather snaps.

I don't do mite counts either, not interested. The weak ones are weak for a reason. Don't care, squish and back to the nuc yards.

Kind regards


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## Solomon Parker

taydeko said:


> I suppose if I breed from other hives, the drones from the hot hive will continue to pass on some of their characteristics.


I was concerned about that with my hot hive this spring. They were exceedingly good at producing drones.



squarepeg said:


> is the hive allowed to die out completely so that is has had it every chance possible to overcome the problem, thereby proving it did indeed have the right stuff? is it usually in the late fall or winter when they collapse, thereby making it difficult or impossible to requeen?


Yes to both. Now that I am producing a significant number of my own queens, any requeening is done in the late spring in hives already not having brought any honey in and/or failed to build up. I didn't used to do requeening at all, only splitting and dying.

I see your point though, it's less utilitarian, and I'm doing it less. But going into fall, there's just nothing to be done.


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## Solomon Parker

Stonefly7 said:


> Sol, illustrious huh! Sometime I will share with you my chasing of genitics with my Rhode Island Reds and New Hampshire Reds. All for the bloody egg.


I would love to hear that story, I'm a hobbyist chicken farmer myself. Perhaps in a different thread, in a different forum. :thumbsup:


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## squarepeg

Solomon Parker said:


> I was concerned about that with my hot hive this spring. They were exceedingly good at producing drones.
> 
> 
> 
> Yes to both. Now that I am producing a significant number of my own queens, any requeening is done in the late spring in hives already not having brought any honey in and/or failed to build up. I didn't used to do requeening at all, only splitting and dying.
> 
> I see your point though, it's less utilitarian, and I'm doing it less. But going into fall, there's just nothing to be done.


got it, thanks sol.


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## taydeko

squarepeg said:


> i am still trying to understand the reasoning behing letting a hive completely die out.


I have no intention of letting colonies die completely if I can help it. I intend to requeen my hot hive as soon as possible. I would think that identifying hives that are not performing in an acceptable manner and requeening them as soon as possible would be preferable to letting the colony die completely if possible.

Ted


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## D Semple

squarepeg said:


> is the hive allowed to die out completely so that is has had it every chance possible to overcome the problem, thereby proving it did indeed have the right stuff?
> 
> is it usually in the late fall or winter when they collapse, thereby making it difficult or impossible to requeen?
> 
> is there another reason i haven't considered?


Here, my July mite count's are sometimes pretty high (5 - 10%), but then our hot summer 2 - 3 month dearth hits with it's 100 + degree temperatures and the ferals I like shut down brood production and by September often look like they are going to completely die out, but then when our fall flowers come on and they build back up quickly going into winter. And, September mite counts I find to be back below 3%. 

I do get a few that don't recover, but I don't let them completely die out (like you and Ted suggest), but just combine them with strong hives after killing the queen and making sure there are no other deseases involved.

I read something by I think either Ross Conrad or Sam Comfort, that said the late summer die back was important. Dee calls it "the fall brood turnover".

Don


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## squarepeg

sorry fellers, perhaps i took 'live and let *die*' too literally.


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## Solomon Parker

Kevin, as with many labels and assumptions made about TF, those doing it probably didn't come up with them. I don't think I had ever used the term "Treatment-free beekeeping" just a couple years ago. We used to use organic, but then they codified organic in law, then we used natural (My previous website was allnaturalhoney.com) and then somebody came up with Certified Naturally Produced or something like that, then came treatment-free. Then somebody came up with benign. I'm sticking with treatment free for the time being until somebody messes that up too.


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## squarepeg

maybe they won't mess than one up sol. 

you may have blown my cover, most assumed 'peg' was a she!


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## sqkcrk

Solomon Parker said:


> One benefit of you much more experienced beekeepers is great stories of old so-and-so's who did things you ought not to do. Your experience as an inspector provides plenty of those.


I'm glad to see how much you appreciate reading about how things were done back in the olden days.


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## sqkcrk

Specialkayme said:


> But I always selected from my "best" colonies, placing an emphasis on 1) survivability,


How are you determining survivability?


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## Solomon Parker

squarepeg said:


> you may have blown my cover, most assumed 'peg' was a she!


I have made such a mistake more than once. Don't worry about it. TFB traffic isn't as high as you might think.


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## Beelosopher

deknow said:


> ....I also highly recommend this video, from the same conference. Kerstin Ebberston on sustainable breeding practices.


Thanks for the videos - I checked out the Michael Bush video on your site too. Really good stuff.


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## squarepeg

>>We are not talking about natural selection At least I am not . I am talking about breeding. they are not even close to the same. I don't consider the bond method natural selection. I do consider it a selection method and it is almost entirely selection by survival. that is not natural. 

hmm, not sure most would agree with that one either dan.

i think the phrase commonly cited is 'natural selection by *survival* of the fittest'


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## Solomon Parker

squarepeg said:


> i think the phrase commonly cited is 'natural selection by *survival* of the fittest'


Yeah, exactly what is natural selection if not selection for survival? Really, it's more like *survival until reproduction* but still.

All bees are selected by survival naturally, but many are treated to help them with it. Selection by survival is natural. That's the way it works. It's not the only survival criteria (mating, assuring progeny survive as well, etc.) but neither is Bond Method beekeeping. If you (Dan) are not sure, ask a Bond Method beekeeper because you seem to be a bit misinformed, even after 200 posts in which the issue has been informed many times.


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## deknow

Daniel, you don't need an account to view either of the videos I've posted here.

I know you were asked to repost your response....when you do, please consider the following that you said:


> If there are 19 genes in each drone that determine sex. and the queen mates with 10 drones. this means there is a pool of 190 possible genes that determine the sex of every fertile egg in the hive. The chance that a drone will result from a fertile egg is almost impossible.


There are not 19 genes in each drone that determine sex.....there is one allele of one gene in each drone that is the sex determination gene. When you make a mistake in paraphrasing, it is not the fault of the work you are paraphrasing.

deknow


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## Oldtimer

Seems to me the definition of the Bond method is being changed of recent times.

Years ago, what I was reading about on the TF forum, was pretty much leave it alone beekeeping. Any hives that couldn't make it were left to die. Replacements were made by doing walkaway splits from the survivors. This method was regarded as the ultimate, buying in outside bees and queens was frowned on, although through necessity, many did it. The great majority had no interest in raising queens, other than by splitting hives and letting them raise their own.

But this year, Sol discovered how to raise queens, and has realised what a greaty stride forward this is in terms of making increase, or maintaining hive numbers, and even actually selling bees. So now what seems to be getting discussed is deliberately raising queens from a selected breeder, to requeen hives instead of letting them die. So if I've understood that correctly, the Bond method is moving a lot closer to traditional beekeeping, and it's great to see people learning more and using new skills. If the knowledge level in TF beekeeping continues to increase, with people learning and teaching new skills, there will end up little difference in management between the Bond method, and what many commercial beekeepers do.


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## squarepeg

good point oldtimer! how's your spring flow this year?


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## Oldtimer

Well pretty good, although each site will be different to another just a few miles down the road, that's because of the hilly country, various different farming methods used, and the amount of unbroken native bush still in an area.

This year I've been under a lot of pressure with big orders for bees and queens which has stretched me to the limit. But I'm now totally caught up and supplying pretty much on demand, and feeling pretty pleased with myself! 

And oh, I've always known you are a guy!


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## squarepeg

oh well, it appears the cat is out of the bag..... 

congrats on your success mate. (hopefully nz's use that term)


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## Daniel Y

deknow said:


> Daniel, you don't need an account to view either of the videos I've posted here.
> 
> I know you were asked to repost your response....when you do, please consider the following that you said:
> 
> There are not 19 genes in each drone that determine sex.....there is one allele of one gene in each drone that is the sex determination gene. When you make a mistake in paraphrasing, it is not the fault of the work you are paraphrasing.
> 
> deknow


19 genes in each drone was a mistake and should be. 19 possible genes for each drone. sorry I don't have the benefit of an editor. I promise that if I ever write anything official on the subject to employ one. possibly you.
At any rate this entire subject is falling well off the map of this topic. We can beat exact word around to death. either you get the point or you don't. You either agree with it or you don't it really doesn't matter. If you are in fact right and i am wrong then get busy about breeding the better bee. that will matter.

If what I have said is said in such a way that it is nothing more than confusing. that is my lack of ability to make myself clear. So be it. I took my shot at it. 

I don't in the end think that any bond method will result in a better bee, and even if it dose you will know nothing about how to do it again. so why be using it in the first place. I can break that sentence down into a very long complex reason I have it. but then nobody would want to take the time to read it anyway. my time will be better spent assessing the link you have provided and gaining some information. Maybe i will be able to apply more of the basics I already know about genetic to the information that is already known about the bee. That is after all what I am really interested in.

In all I am interested in all the confusing stuff. I think I have said that. and I think some of you have provided some sources of that information. I thank you and I ask your forgiveness if my comments in the process have been distracting and confusing.


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## Daniel Y

Okay my comments are obviously not welcome in this conversation anymore. I have far better things to do with myself than spend time writing comments that will just be deleted.

Best of luck getting your better bees through random chance.


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## Adam Foster Collins

Oldtimer,

I suppose I should not have used the "Bond Method" in the thread, as I guess there is some confusion. In truth, the 'real' Bond Method involved, as you say a totally 'hands off' approach. And even if it were practiced, I doubt it would have much effect on the gene pool, as there are usually enough other bees and beekeepers in a given area to keep most of the local genetic material afloat.

With the confines of this thread, or at least my thinking on the subject, I see more people applying a 'live and let die' philosophy to the mite issue alone, and otherwise selecting and breeding and bringing in new queens like anyone else might. And in that sense, I guess you're right. There's little difference between that and what a lot of other operations.

The core difference is just the "letting die" part.

Adam


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## Oldtimer

Yes true.

Just when I first read about the live & let die approach (a few years ago), I was appalled, as in my country hive losses are very low, for me, I wouldn't let any hive die. When I suggested trying to save the hive, and requeen it, I got shot down in flames and some suggested I shouldn't even be on the forum. So that type of thing has kind of shaped my understanding of what people on the TF forum are about. 

But wow, how time changes things. Now requeening is the thing to do.

Or maybe now some people have been around a bit longer and learned a bit more.

I'm also beginning to ponder the following of fads. Until recently, small cell was THE way to go. I had my doubts but eventually decided to try it, also applying the (then) favored method of not requeening but just splitting survivors. I had to breed some queen initially for the SC hives, just to get numbers to a poiint where I could start applying the Bond method, as I understood it at that time.

But Whoa! Right about when I'm set up with enough SC hives, suddenly small cell is not nessecarily the way to go now, natural cell is, something I'd already tried and not continued. And walkaway splits is not really the way to go any more, queen breeding is being promoted.

So looks like my viewpoint is right, or wrong, depending which year I held it! 

But anyhopw, I'll be staying with my small cell hives, and the bond method in it's pure form, until I get a reasonable conclusion. Can't really keep changing to the latest theory or my results won't be valid.


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## Adam Foster Collins

Well, I'm still in a somewhat "non-committed" stage, when compared to what you are doing/have done with small cell. So musing on philosophically is still easy to do.

I am at least committed to the point that all my bees are clustered up for winter without any treatments...

We shall see...

Adam


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## Daniel Y

Deknow, Just to let you know I did finally view the video of Randy's talk of what he was involved in doing. Simply far to many things I saw in it. that it is not anything I am talking about. I won't take the time to elaborate but wanted to thank you for the sources of further information.


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