# Successful Treatment Free BeeKeeping = Breeding from Survivor stock



## Yvesrow1 (Jan 27, 2013)

(First Year Beekeeper)
I have started a small 4 hive apiary this year and I have decided to practice the "Treatment free approach". I have a neighbour, less than a quarter mile up the road who has a 15 hive apiary who practices the “treatment approach”. I suspect our bees will mingle & my queens will potentially breed with his drones… Will his “treatment bees” significantly affect my efforts to succeed at Treatment Free Beekeeping? :scratch:


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## khicks12 (Feb 28, 2012)

I'm not an old-timer who's been at this forever, or an expert on treatment-free bees, or on bee breeding, so take this for what it's worth. The premise of your approach is that over time, your bees will develop their own natural resistance to mites and other problems, correct? So, drones contribute 50% of the genetic material for any worker or queen that is raised by your bees. As a result, any drone that is not kept in a treatment-free scheme will 'dilute' your efforts, but not prevent you from getting where you want to go. It will just take longer than if all bees in a 5 mile radius were treatment-free.

You might want to try 'drone-flooding' by putting a frame of drone comb in each of your hives, greatly increasing the effect of your bees on the local drone population.

I'll be waiting to see what others think about this.


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## justusflynns (Aug 2, 2012)

I'm no expert either, but I'm interested in what those that are have to say. My understanding is that queens come about through parthenogenesis (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parthenogenesis), and I think that makes the drone issue irrelevant. Also, my understanding is that drones and queens fly different distances to mate, so it wouldn't be drones from nearby hives that you'd need to be concerned about. Curious to read any corrections to that.

Edit: I reviewed that again - it's the drones that are produced through parthenogenesis - so that at least was wrong.


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## JRG13 (May 11, 2012)

I don't consider drones true parthenogenesis. Drones are haploid. You need to look a your 'breeding' practices and determine what you want to get out of it. Most people assume treated bees have inferior genetics but I'm betting most treatment free bees came out of treated stocks at some point.


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## deknow (Jul 17, 2006)

well, polar bears came out of grizzly bear stock, but if you want the characteristics of a polar bear, you don't pick a grizzly bear.

If you are going to puchase queens, then the drone supply in your area has no bearing on anything...the queens will come already mated, and you will replace them purchased queens if they superced in a way you don't like.

If you are going to make "progress" with breeding bees that don't require treatments, then you need to be doing some kind of selection. If you are raising queens, you might as well raise enough for your neighbor as well....select what queens you give him/her based on what you want for drones (ie, not closely related to the queens you want to have mated).

deknow


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## rhaldridge (Dec 17, 2012)

I'm a beginner, so I might be wrong, but my research and thought on the matter has convinced me that even treated bees are responding to evolutionary pressure from mites. Mites still kill treated bees. You can't breed from dead bees. So even treated bees should be getting slowly more resistant to mites. My personal feeling is that the process would move along a lot faster if no one treated, but obviously that is not a choice that someone dependent on bees for his livelihood is likely to make.


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## RiodeLobo (Oct 11, 2010)

khicks12 said:


> You might want to try 'drone-flooding' by putting a frame of drone comb in each of your hives, greatly increasing the effect of your bees on the local drone population.


As an alternative you can run some or all natural comb. Natural comb will have much more drone brood than standard foundation. Personally I use a combination of NC and small cell with a approximate ratio of 1:2


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## crofter (May 5, 2011)

Depends on whether you are thinking of effects from his bees genetics altering that of your bees. Are your bees from tested hygenic or mite resistant stock? Will you be bringing in new queens from such stock or plan to grow from open mating of your present stock? Unless there is significant genetic difference between his and your bees I think they will not change the outcome from the genetics angle. His bees will certainly rob out any hives that get weak though! You will have to be on top of any thing that is a drag on your bees.


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## JClark (Apr 29, 2012)

Good luck w/ that. I'd suggest you treat a few and not treat a few. Chances are you will be fine this year if they are first year colonies but next winter you will be wishing you treated for mites. Just because bees are treated does not mean that their drones don't have good alleles to offer the population. Treating does not select against more robust treatment free traits, just allows inferior traits that require periodic treatment to remain as well.

With four hives I don't think you have enough to try to go 100% treatment free. If you had 100 then maybe you'd have a shot at having a few starters that can make it through. Better approach is to treat a portion and then try to wean off over the course of a few years once you have hives surviving PAST two years. I have 4 too and treated one. One hive is supposed to be mite resistant but they have quite a few mites so we'll see how resistant they really are.

Queens are not produced via parthenogenesis. They are diploid, 50% related to their queen and 50% to a drone sperm. Same with all workers. Males are haploid so are 100% related to their queen. As a result, workers are more related to their sisters than their own offspring (average 75% vs 50%)--except for males. This is why nature has "allowed" them to raise sister queens as opposed to raising their own daughters and also leaves an incentive for laying drone eggs--hence drone-laying workers if not suppressed. This is at the heart of one theory as to how sociality evolved in bees, ants, and wasps.

Anyway, I'd worry less about mating right now and more about varroa because there is some pain ahead.


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## deknow (Jul 17, 2006)

JClark said:


> Just because bees are treated does not mean that their drones don't have good alleles to offer the population. Treating does not select against more robust treatment free traits, just allows inferior traits that require periodic treatment to remain as well.


Most traits that provide for resistance of any kind (chemical, parasite, predator) are metabolically more expensive (requires more energy). If you start with a mixed population (some resistant, some not) and treat them all, the resistant individuals are at a disadvantage because they are expending the energy to maintain these traits, but gain no advantage over non-resistant because the threat is chemically eliminated. Those expending less energy (the non-resistant individuals) have a clear advantage in either natural selection or beekeeper selection.

deknow


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## deknow (Jul 17, 2006)

Ray, I think that is like saying that humans are becoming less dependant on eye glasses over time because people who need them to see well have access to them.

deknow



rhaldridge said:


> I'm a beginner, so I might be wrong, but my research and thought on the matter has convinced me that even treated bees are responding to evolutionary pressure from mites. Mites still kill treated bees. You can't breed from dead bees. So even treated bees should be getting slowly more resistant to mites. My personal feeling is that the process would move along a lot faster if no one treated, but obviously that is not a choice that someone dependent on bees for his livelihood is likely to make.


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## Rusty Hills Farm (Mar 24, 2010)

deknow said:


> Ray, I think that is like saying that humans are becoming less dependant on eye glasses over time because people who need them to see well have access to them.
> 
> deknow


That's about as ridiculous as suggesting that people are seeing better over time because those who need glasses are not getting them! Neither argument holds water and both have absolutely nothing to do with treating or not treating. All we really know for sure is that bees died by the millions when varroa first arrived and now not so many are dying. Is it because we are treating or is it because we are not treating? I don't think anybody on this board can prove it either way. The best we can do is take other people's word on the matter. But whose? There in lies the crux of the matter. 

JMO

Rusty


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## deknow (Jul 17, 2006)

If no one had glasses (or some way to compensate for poor eyesight), people with poor eyesight would be at a competitive disadvantage (as far as survival and reproduction). Giving people glasses significantly narrows this gap in survival and reproduction.

deknow


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## deknow (Jul 17, 2006)

Also, save for an attempted treatment after "the point of no return", mites don't kill treated bees if the treatments are effective at killing the mites.


rhaldridge said:


> I'm a beginner, so I might be wrong, but my research and thought on the matter has convinced me that even treated bees are responding to evolutionary pressure from mites. Mites still kill treated bees. You can't breed from dead bees. So even treated bees should be getting slowly more resistant to mites. My personal feeling is that the process would move along a lot faster if no one treated, but obviously that is not a choice that someone dependent on bees for his livelihood is likely to make.


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## stan.vick (Dec 19, 2010)

This spring will make me five years treatment free, but I think a big reason is there are almost no other hives in my area, so I don't get a lot of cross-contamination. If I had a neighbor that had fifteen hives I may have lost all mine already. I am hedging my bets by keeping one yard that I treat and one that I do not treat. The bee inspector just gave me a clean bill of health on the treated yard and knows that I keep a yard where I do not treat about eight miles away. If you can, you may try placing two of your hives in another location, that way you will have some live bees to borrow brood, stores or whatever from in case the mites start winning. Just saying might not want to put all your eggs in the same basket.


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## JWChesnut (Jul 31, 2013)

I was involved in an effort to breed an improved avocado (as a supplier of the pollinator). The project is 15 years old. Selected crosses were planted at 5x10 spacing on 80 acres (>60,000 sports). Sports were grown to evaluation (freeze tolerance, fruit quality, resistance to armored and soft scale insects), plowed under and reselected against the qualifying F2. We are now at F4 with 60,000 sports per generation. When the selection is made, it can be propagated ad infinitum clonally. (Hass avocados are famously a backyard sport).

I tell you this because a backyard beekeeper with four hives is not going to affect honeybee genetics. Queens are obligate and wild outcrossers. Hygenic behaviour is associated with 17 trait loci. The swarm queen (F1) from a "selected colony) will breed, and 50% of those trait loci will carry on to the F2 workers of the new hive. She will breed with 20 fathers. In 17 Traits that are heterozygous, 1 in 131,000 F2 queens will have the same as the F1 combination from the mother. And any two queen cells have only a small chance or sharing the same father, so the liklihood of any two F2 daughter queens being the same genetic combination is small (on the order of 1 in 2 million). The epigenetics (the combination of the 20 fathers) that yields the most diverse and appropriate combination of worker types within the hive (only partially related to the mother queen) must be optimal. That involves the selection and reselection of 20 haploid (drone) resortments of the genetics of queens from a community-wide scale.

A backyard beekeeper could have a perfect hive, but will not be able to reproduce that genetic line under any realistic scenario. A Treatment-Free colony is very likely to suffer higher mortality and higher supersedure, so the likelihood of death of the genetic line is very high, making all previous effort for naught. If you could "clone" your queens the possibility of genetic improvement at the backyard level might be considered, but (as per the real-world avocado example) the effort and scale of a directed selection when the colony fitness is expressed in community scale epigenetics of an F2 is massive and decades long. 

The claim by some of the forum participants that they can create Treatment-Free lineages in three years is ludicrous. The more documented efforts are now entering their 2nd decade with only marginal shifts in fitness (per isolated Swedish experiments) and the constant need to combat inbreeding depression with the addition of fresh genetic material. As anyone who has purchased the highly selected hygenic races knows, these rapidly revert to the wild type norm when allowed to naturally supersede.

Selection of highly modified bees runs counter to the primary honey bee evolutionary inertia. The breeding system produces a generalist bee and resists fractioning into types with incompatible modifications. The marked inbreeding depression (eg. shotbrood) and mating system has huge emphasis on reverting the honey bee to generalist type.

The adaption to Varroa that does seemed to have fixed into the wild is the aggressive desert bee (AHB?) of Arizona and Texas. These swarm frequently, seem to maintain multiple queens in reserve, and have other relatively simple trait responses. They overwhelm Varroa (and other bee genotypes) with fecundity: swarming, multi-queen brooding, and willingness to divide and abscond.

These desert bees are being mailed all over the US as an 'improvement'. I'm not certain this is a good thing at all.


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## JWChesnut (Jul 31, 2013)

Researchers that have compared the honey bee genome with other insects remark that the HB DNA is much simpler than those they contrast it with. 

This make perfect evolutionary sense --- instead of the genetic overhead and fragility of depending on multiple alleles and loci; the honey bees depend on social organization and polyandry. The social parallel to multi-alleles are found in the mating system that emphasize multiple father (half-queens) contributing to a super-organism of half-sister worker bees. The particular fitness of these half-sisters are equivalent to multi-allele expression in a more conventional mating and solitary living system.

Most insects are specialists -- they have co-evolved with their host-plant or prey into very elaborate and specific, very local and calendar limited lifeways. Honeybees are broad generalists-- they resist specialization. Rather than pollinating special flowers like night-blooming cereus which requires a moth tongue 20 cm long on a single night of the year, they pollinate flowers (and ensure the plants competitive advantage) that are basic, open and of a general design. The genetic basis of this resistance to specialization is the outbreeding system. 

The effort to "specialize" the bee by inbreeding a mite-resistant race is mitigating against the bees own evolutionary pattern. It will tend to produce an inbred, and hence vigor impaired colony. Bees will tend to have the highest fitness when they are in dense breeding aggregations -- the more fathers the better the colony. The better the colony, the more dense the natural population was -- a virtuous cycle. Isolating your bees is the wrong evolutionary decision.


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## David LaFerney (Jan 14, 2009)

rhaldridge said:


> I'm a beginner, so I might be wrong, but my research and thought on the matter has convinced me that even treated bees are responding to evolutionary pressure from mites. Mites still kill treated bees. You can't breed from dead bees. So even treated bees should be getting slowly more resistant to mites. My personal feeling is that the process would move along a lot faster if no one treated, but obviously that is not a choice that someone dependent on bees for his livelihood is likely to make.


Well said. Very pragmatic.


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## rhaldridge (Dec 17, 2012)

deknow said:


> Ray, I think that is like saying that humans are becoming less dependant on eye glasses over time because people who need them to see well have access to them.
> 
> deknow


Somewhere there is a flaw in this analogy, Dean.


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## jim lyon (Feb 19, 2006)

I am neither going to comment on the eye glass analogy or the math laid out by CWC which went over my head. I will comment, though, about my experiences. I see bees now that are far less prone to collapse than when varroa first impacted us over 20 years ago. I like to think its because there have been incremental improvements in bees tolerances to varroa together with a greater understanding of treatments and IPM methods by beekeepers. This year we ended up with close to 20% of our hives that have essentially not had a treatment in over a year due to the fact that they have been treated with thymol in less than ideal treatment temps. As a group they are clearly poorer than our earlier treated bees but still lots of good hives among them. In the early 90's such hives wouldnt have had much of a chance.


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## rhaldridge (Dec 17, 2012)

JWChesnut said:


> The adaption to Varroa that does seemed to have fixed into the wild is the aggressive desert bee (AHB?) of Arizona and Texas. These swarm frequently, seem to maintain multiple queens in reserve, and have other relatively simple trait responses. They overwhelm Varroa (and other bee genotypes) with fecundity: swarming, multi-queen brooding, and willingness to divide and abscond.
> 
> These desert bees are being mailed all over the US as an 'improvement'. I'm not certain this is a good thing at all.


I'm not certain you have any credible evidence for these assertions.

BeeWeaver bees do not seem to exhibit the behaviors you claim, in general, according to those who have reported their results with this line of bees.


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## heaflaw (Feb 26, 2007)

JWChesnut said:


> A Treatment-Free colony is very likely to suffer higher mortality and higher supersedure, so the likelihood of death of the genetic line is very high


JW: I don't understand why this is true. Please explain to someone like me who knows little about genetics.


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## clyderoad (Jun 10, 2012)

JwChesnut--thank you


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## JClark (Apr 29, 2012)

deknow said:


> Most traits that provide for resistance of any kind (chemical, parasite, predator) are metabolically more expensive (requires more energy).
> deknow


Interestingly, this is the general paradigm but there is little actual evidence, and some evidence against, this hypothesis. May be true in some cases but what about behavioral resistance, e.g. avoidance or, in the case of bees, altered grooming behavior. 

I'm actually in the process of wrapping up my dissertation on this topic but with mosquitoes (actually how diurnal temperature fluctuations during immature development influence insecticide susceptibility and expression of life history traits in susceptible and resistant populations) and have found some unexpected trends--like risistant mosquitoes living longer--and this is a metabolic resistance to carbamates and organophosphates.


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## JWChesnut (Jul 31, 2013)

heaflaw said:


> JW: I don't understand why this [*TF lineages die off/blink out at higher rates*] is true. Please explain to someone like me who knows little about genetics.


Fitness traits are not binary, but represent proportionally and marginally better survival. For example, a constellation of traits might confer 3% better year-over-year survival -- all other factors being equal. That 3% would represent a nearly unprecedented quantum jump in typical evolutionary fitness.

We have been conditioned to think of all traits like GMO-injected Round-up ready corn -- a binary state, this is not true of whatever the mechanisms are for genetic resistance to parasite vectored disease.

Various traits have been proposed:
Hygenic removal of diseased larvae in both the Minnesota and Louisiana lineages.
Grooming behavior (may be a single loci) in AHB influenced genotypes
Leg-biting behavior observed in Indiana and Mexican bees.
Swarm rate / Supersedure at 3 months (maintains young healthy queens)
Russian-style strategic brood breaks when disease levels peak
Enhanced immune response to virus (multiple loci involved)
Reduced development days. (AHB trait)
Multiple queen maintenance (AHB trait)
Direct resistance to particular virus.
Change of pheromone odors reduce mite homing and mating
Life history stage changes in bees (increased nurse, reduced foraging).

The selected trait(s) confer the narrowest margins of improved survival in a system of natural selection. In an evolutionary time-scale (where hundreds of thousands of years blink by) these razor thin margins can establish new genotypes, where an accident of isolation permits a local population to "fix" the genotype without dilution.

In a treatment-free apiary, 30-90+% of the trialed hives die. This includes the vast majority of colonies with marginally "improved" genotypes, they are good, just not perfect, and the mites overwhelm them despite their marginally better fitness. These lineages are now dead, extinct, unable to contribute to the next generation. The lines that survive are accidents of fate.

In a directed selection model, the best examples are preserved, treated and promoted as the progenitors of the F2 generation. Their lineages are intact and able to contribute genes.


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## Barry (Dec 28, 1999)

deknow said:


> Giving people glasses significantly narrows this gap in survival and reproduction.


Not to get off topic here, but this is the first time I've ever heard that eye glasses up the odds of reproduction!


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## Paul McCarty (Mar 30, 2011)

My "desert" bees don't swarm any more than regular bees, nor do they keep multiple queens. The worst attacks I have experienced have come from domestic stock. So the points said about "desert" bees are not accurate. Mine do not seem to be as affected by varroa as the domestic bees I have gotten (which do not seem to survive). I prefer a little wild in my bees because I KNOW they will survive. Traits I HAVE observed include seeing them groom mites off each other (yes, I have sat and watched them). They do have them, but it never seems to reach a point where it causes issues.

I don't mail my bees around, because in my opinion, they need to stay regional or we end up with no regional adaptations. Nor will I ever buy a queen from outside my region ever again.

Now by "desert" bees, you need to be specific about that which you are speaking of - are these Texas bees, or true desert bees? I am sold on the wild bee you get from high altitude where I live here in NM, but the ones down in the flats, not so much. And TX bees - well not sure I care for them either. Most I have ever had were not a lot better than the others, and sometimes had an attitude.


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## JWChesnut (Jul 31, 2013)

I have experience with Arizona/Sonora desert bees. This type has been imported and spread into Southern California. I have direct experience with Michoacan and Oaxacan bees post AHB replacement (also Guatemalan and Costa Rican). The Texas bees I generalized from the detailed descriptions of genotype studies on the invasion of AHB types into southern TX. 

I think your theory of a NM refuge for Spanish colonial bees is interesting and compelling. Iberian bees are genetically distinct from the rest of Europe. Their mitochondria links them to North African races. The North African (and by extension Iberian bees) were able to fix genotype differences due to the "island" oasis effect in a drying Saharan desert during the post-glacial period.

The Arizona bees from low desert (the type that has spread into Ca by direct importation) don't resemble your descriptions of Spanish colonial-NM bees. They are ground nesting, small-colony, multi-queened, defensive and mean as no-tomorrow, and willing to abscond at the drop of a hat. In August, we saw migratory swarms that attacked and robbed fixed colonies, before moving on. This same "migratory" pattern has been described from East Africa. Nests are not permanent, but are temporary and seasonal.


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## Paul McCarty (Mar 30, 2011)

Yes, we do have bees somewhat matching that description in the southern low deserts. They like to nest in the old pack rat burrows under the mesquites. They are not common. but you do see them every so often. Most of the bees from the low desert here are way too runny and annoying for my taste. Their aggression levels vary, most are not that aggressive. There is a definite difference in them once you cross about 6000' in elevation. Can't prove anything, but they are definitely different. If I were a scientist, I would be investigating it, but alas, I am not. Most of my speculation is based on anecdotal evidence and a couple of genetic studies done by Roxane Magnus.

Now, mind you, I do not think that it is the same for the entire state. Those areas where there have been lot's of beekeeping are not so much this way, but areas like the Gila region and parts of the southern Sacramentos, most definitely. Beekeepers, even in the old days, are few and far between here. The little town I live in HAD a beekeeping industry way back in the 1940's/50's, but it collapsed when the apple industry collapsed shortly after the railroad pulled out. Whatever was left from that has most likley been homogenized with the preceding feral stock. The old timers, like Les Crowder, do mention having seen Arabic type bees in the Southern NM area back in the 80's. Who knows? All I know is that here in NM, our honeybee genetics seem the most varied in african influences, more so than anywhere else. probably because we are somewhat remote, somewhat cold, and the "sky island" ecology dominates.

Now I did a removal a few months back that had some of the most aggressive bees I have ever seen. They were almost totally dark black, and the queen, when I found her, was jet black with brightish (almost flourescent) orange speckles and spots. Some of the strangest I have run across. Totally runny, and when you smoked them they all came out of the hive and sat in a big buzzing ball on the ground. What they could have been, I have no idea. Not at all like the ones I am used to seeing. Maybe they were a pure Brazilian?


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## Mr. C (Oct 27, 2011)

rhaldridge said:


> I'm not certain you have any credible evidence for these assertions.
> 
> BeeWeaver bees do not seem to exhibit the behaviors you claim, in general, according to those who have reported their results with this line of bees.


I will start by saying that I have heard others with very good reports also and qualify that this was a few years back her I had even less experience but I had four packages from there. One absconded, one usurped its neighbor which killed them both in the end (too weak too late) and one that overwintered but was hot from 100 yards out. They were even hot when in bivowack after swarming. Felt pretty Africanish to me, but like I said lots of people had great luck and I was inexperienced.


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## rhaldridge (Dec 17, 2012)

I queened a split with a BeeWeaver queen this summer. She did well for about 2 months or so and then was superceded. Her daughters were peaceful and did well, and the supercedure queen continues to be productive. Can't yet say if they have any mite resistance, but I saw none of the behavior attributed to Africanized bees. That said, the company offers to replace any queen that make aggressive bees. Some of them must be hot. So were the black bees of Europe, I understand, so aggression is associated with other lines.


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## Paul McCarty (Mar 30, 2011)

People worry too much about "african" - they are out there yes, but so are other mean bees.


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## JWChesnut (Jul 31, 2013)

Paul McCarty said:


> People worry too much about "african" - they are out there yes, but so are other mean bees.


I object. I attended funerals of long-time beekeepers in Costa Rica and Mexico who succumbed to Africanized attacks while tending their apiaries. There is a distressing casualness about the impact of the AHB traits on this forum.


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## Paul McCarty (Mar 30, 2011)

Not to discount anything especially their lost lives, but that is in Costa Rica and Mexico where the bloodline is full strength. Totally different situation. All bees are dangerous - even the "nice" ones.

A lot of recent research is starting to point to these bees adapting to a temperate climate and expressing more of the AMM side of their nature. And yes, they are dangerous too - but that sort of bee has been around for years. I think a lot of the dark feral bees we see nationwide are these bees that have adapted to a temperate climate and homogenized with the locals - sort of a mutt with the genetics of all of our bees, including AHB. 

The full strength Scutellata should not be the same in a temperate climate, as they are a tropical bee. I doubt they will live long except in places such as the ones they currently inhabit along our borders that resembles their habitat. They will have to adapt to move into the other areas - such as the bees I described above. I would not be surprised if people tested these dark ferals and they came back African - an MtDNA test,not a nuclear DNA test. They can be African and not express African nuclear DNA. Does that make them bad?


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## WLC (Feb 7, 2010)

I have recently posted a link to a Master's Thesis showing that A. Scutellata isn't as big of an issue in Florida as some would have us believe.

Let's not assume that all ferals are 'Africanized', even the mean ones.

It's clear to me that mistakes have been made in this regard. So, it's important to remain objective.

PS-The faculty adviser for the thesis is featured in a video link on the 'Treatment-Free Dilemma' thread.


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## Paul McCarty (Mar 30, 2011)

I agree, I think the term "Africanized" is overapplied. Not only that, the testing is suspect. Few of the current test methods give accurate results alone. Like I said, just because the maternal DNA points to Africa it does not mean it is "Africanized".


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## rhaldridge (Dec 17, 2012)

JWChesnut said:


> I object. I attended funerals of long-time beekeepers in Costa Rica and Mexico who succumbed to Africanized attacks while tending their apiaries. There is a distressing casualness about the impact of the AHB traits on this forum.


Were they not wearing protective gear?


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## WLC (Feb 7, 2010)

JW:

I'm sorry for your 'Living Nightmare' experience. I truly am.

However, AHB seems to be in the SW rather than in Florida, etc. .

Delaney has done the work examining ferals in NC, etc. .

They are different than AHB.

So, the 'Hybrid Swarm' isn't the same in all parts of the country.

I, for one, would like to know what's here in the North East.


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## beemandan (Dec 5, 2005)

JWChesnut said:


> The claim by some of the forum participants that they can create Treatment-Free lineages in three years is ludicrous.


For the greater part of a century the ‘Bond method’ was unintentionally administered to bees in eastern Russia. Equally unintentional was the fact that the available drone pool was controlled as well. Consider the isolation of this area from any ‘nonsurvivor’ stock. And yet, in spite of the Russian Queen Breeder’s claims, all the anecdotal evidence is that they aren’t truly ‘mite resistant’.

I will accept that drones requiring and fitted with eyeglasses did and continue to have a competitive disadvantage to those with uncorrected, perfect vision….but must submit that contact lenses may have leveled the….ahhhhh….playing field.


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## WLC (Feb 7, 2010)

I would like to mention the 'Reproductive Isolation' hypothesis at this point since we're on the topic of drones.

I found it fascinating that Dr. Delaney mentioned that drones are produced with different timings depending on the stock, feral/domestic.

I can swear that I've seen a difference in early (April) vs late (June) queens from the same open mated, queen breeder.

There's something to that hypothesis, IMO.


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## Paul McCarty (Mar 30, 2011)

We definitely need more true research on our current feral population - what it is, what it does, traits, etc. and not just a generic study like the USDA did with "AHB". Their study is quite flawed and paints the picture that they are all the same, when we actually have many different populations of distinctly different genetic descent. I would love to find out "what's in" all the other feral bees - especially the northern ones. 

I feel the USDA did beekeeping a grave dis-service when it basically reinforced all the stuff that the Brazilian government said to discredit Mr. Kerr for his social activism.


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## WLC (Feb 7, 2010)

Uh, Huh.

I'm waiting for the day that everything is 'illuminated' regarding the issue of genetic diversity in feral Honeybees.

Paul, while I'm kinda busy right now, I do similar work regularly.

So, while I'm working on plants, I can do work similar to Dr. Delaney's.


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## jimsteelejr (Sep 21, 2012)

As a Florida bee keeper we get constantly bombarded with questions about Africanized bees. Some literature from the state claims that over 70% of our bees are Africanized. And unless they have changed if the last year or so the Pinellas county powers that be don't call for a bee keeper when a feral hive is discovered-they call an exterminator. We do bee removal as a part time job and we have yet to find a hot hive here in the county.I think that the genetic influences may account for more hives being found out in the open (under overhangs, on an window sill etc) and maybe a little more willingness to swarm if things are not exactly to the bees liking but I don't think that we are experiencing any full on Africans. By the way we have a couple of feral hives that are fantastic honey producers. We also see fewer mites but that may be because most of the ferals we have are less than two years old.We do keep records so maybe in a year or two I can say with more certainty that the ferals are more mite resistant.


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## Paul McCarty (Mar 30, 2011)

I really think by killing them off we are cutting ourselves off from future options to cure some serious issues. The study shows that we are killing lot's of swarms unnecessarily. We have taken the opposite approach in NM, and have had the exact same results. Most hives are pretty well behaved except for the few mean ones - I would say about 1 in 6 in my area. And the mean ones are really not much different than any other bees. The typical feral hive I remove is usually not aggressive at all- at least no more so than my regular Italians. Side by side other than some different survival traits, and the fact that they are somewhat runny, you would not be able to tell the difference. They can be somewhat unpredictable, because they are wild, but they make a hella' big amount of honey and they seem impervious to most bee ailments. Around here they are just wild bees. I like to compare them to the difference between hereford cattle and wild longhorns. 

I don't care if they are African or not if they:

1. Survive.
2. Make a stupid amount of honey.
3. Are docile enough to handle without special precautions.
4. Not excessively runny.
5. Not overly swarmy.

I toss out the queen if they don't pass those tests. They used to genetically test them here for free, so I used to test all my bees to see what they were. About 1/2 my removals came back as African, so I religiously re-queened them. Then I sent in some samples from my purchased domestic queens, and about 1/2 of them came back as African. I gave up and started just selecting by behavior. The sequestration cut all funding for genetic testing, so all we really have is behavior. At this point, I have been growing my own long enough they seem to be pretty good bees, and I no longer do so many removals. I import a few queens from other beekeepers every so often and raise a few open mated queens from them to keep the inbred factor down. Like I said, I am quite happy with them, and most of the locals seem to like them. I do not plan to sell to people outside my region. These are Southern NM Sacramento Mountain bees, open mated at high altitudes. I do not normally make queens from lowland desert bees. Those don't usually pass the test. They are usually too runny and a little unpredictable. Too much effort to weed through them to find a decent queen, though they are out there. 

A curious note - the bees from up here high in the mountains are by far more aggressive more often than the desert bees - but most of them tested out as European.

So, we are obviously dealing with multiple populations of bees that have differing traits. A generalized view of them - African or European - is not accurate. The African traits I see are pretty "watered down". So much so that unless you really know what to look for you would hardly be able to tell them apart from domestic bees. there is one difference though - toss two of them in an empty hive boxes in the desert side by side and the wild bees here will still be alive after several years, while the domestic bees would have long perished. I have one hive of them currently in it's 4th season with no feeding or treatments. They are a little wild, but holy cow can they pack away some honey! They are from a removal I did a long time back. That hive was HUGE! and had been there for at least 15 years. True to form, they are doing the same thing in my hive. They can be a little feisty, but my Italians are actually more defensive.


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## mike bispham (May 23, 2009)

JWChesnut said:


> The claim by some of the forum participants that they can create Treatment-Free lineages in three years is ludicrous.


That isn't the claim. The claim is: given already resistant starting stock and a strong effort to maintain that resistance, tf is possible. That effort does depend on keeping resistant input going strongly through the drone side. So unless you in a locality where ferals are thriving you need to raise large drone population from your (resistant) stock. The more treaters are around, the greater that effort will have to be.

If you are going to accuse people of making ludicrous statements try to get the facts straight.

Unless you have feral 'survivor' stock around you, 4 hives, as you say, probably aren't going to cut it. 

Keeping bees tf isn't about 'creating lineages'. I've never seen anyone claim it is. Its about having a _permanent process_ that is designed to raise and maintain health and vitality through selective propagation. The process must be sufficiently intensive to combat the equally intensive dilution that will occur. The more such dilution is of a treatment-dependent sort, the more intensive the _ongoing_ selective propagation process has to be.

The approach benefits from good initial (and incoming) genetics, and reasonably skillful selection and propagation - its husbandry not rocket science. 

The depth and intensity of genetic management is entirely dependent on local conditions, especially with regard to density of treated colonies. Because of that little in the way of further generalisation is possible. 

Without artificial insemination the very notion of 'lineages' in bees is in my view a nonsense. In my experience very few tf keepers are interested in AI. 'Lineages' is a straw man. 

Mike (UK)


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## mike bispham (May 23, 2009)

JWChesnut said:


> The effort to "specialize" the bee by inbreeding a mite-resistant race is mitigating against the bees own evolutionary pattern. It will tend to produce an inbred, and hence vigor impaired colony.


As you say outside material will keep coming in. The trick is to try to minimise genetic material that contains little or no conditioning to mite presence due to treating, and maximise its opposite. That means bringing in plenty of feral, preferably local material, and keeping plently of hives.

Commercial beekeepers have always maintained large drone hives as a deliberate policy to maintain the characteristics they desire. As and when inbreeding has shown up, they buy in a few unrelated queens. 



JWChesnut said:


> Bees will tend to have the highest fitness when they are in dense breeding aggregations -- the more fathers the better the colony.


That is one account: the study we saw recently about the genetic origins (and the two distinct parallel populations) by Dr. Deborah Delaney of US honeybees didn't reinforce it. Another study by the same researcher centred on the quality of commercial queens shows it to be incorrect. 




JWChesnut said:


> Isolating your bees is the wrong evolutionary decision.


In nature the resistant colonies are rapidly and comprehensively isolated - by the death of the non-resistant. And the population rebuilds, now (largely) resistant to whatever the problem was. That's the bit to emulate.

Mike (UK)


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## mike bispham (May 23, 2009)

JWChesnut said:


> The selected trait(s) confer the narrowest margins of improved survival in a system of natural selection. In an evolutionary time-scale (where hundreds of thousands of years blink by) these razor thin margins can establish new genotypes, where an accident of isolation permits a local population to "fix" the genotype without dilution.


Not so. A single change can make a 100% difference. And it can happen almost overnight.

In Africa there are no longer any large tusked males. In the early to middle parts of the 20th century all the large tusked males were hunted out. The genes for large tusks were removed from the population. 

Hunters weren't interested in small tusked males: for the population the problem was fixed.

I don't know how many years elephants take to become fertile, but they do need to be large enough to defend a harem. We're not taking about rapid turnover here. Simply the excision of those genes that caused a problem (being hunted)

Evolution works in many different ways simultaniously JW, and your analysis misses some of the most essential, most relevant ones.



JWChesnut said:


> In a treatment-free apiary, 30-90+% of the trialed hives die. This includes the vast majority of colonies with marginally "improved" genotypes, they are good, just not perfect, and the mites overwhelm them despite their marginally better fitness. These lineages are now dead, extinct, unable to contribute to the next generation. The lines that survive are accidents of fate.


Accepting, for a moment your figures (which are ill-founded because circumstances are different everywhere according to prior conditioning, and because your premise, as I've shown above, is also ill-founded...)...

...What has died are not 'lineages' but individuals. And that happens all the time in nature - to a small degree in some species, to a vast degree in others. Its a normal and beneficial part of the process of conditioning an existing population to the environment. It doesn't significantly reduce genetic diversity. 

In nature somewhere in the region of 80% of swarms don't make it through their first winter. They simply don't establish. Those that do, however, are the best suited to that locality/climate. And it is from them that the next generation is made.

Of course, as you say, there is of course an element of fate; but that can be discounted on the basis _ceteris paribus_ ('all else being equal') As somebody who dabbles in scientific reasoning you really should be familiar with that concept.

Somehow, in your interest with detail, you seem to me to miss the beautiful simplicity and elegance of natural selection for the fittest strains. It is very very simple - breathtakingly so - and in that simplicity is its explanatory power. You're somehow looking at the trees and missing the wood - and your explanations as a result are fundamentally wrong. 



JWChesnut said:


> In a directed selection model, the best examples are preserved, treated and promoted as the progenitors of the F2 generation. Their lineages are intact and able to contribute genes.


Now you are giving us a good summary of how nature works, as outlined above, and a model for us to follow. And its simple... However, in tf beekeeping 'best' for selection means those that thrive without treatments. You don't keep lame cattle alive to breed from - you send them to market pronto. Individual terminated. 

Mike (UK)


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## beemandan (Dec 5, 2005)

JWChesnut said:


> There is a distressing casualness about the impact of the AHB traits on this forum.


Fortunately none of those with the casual attitudes are responsible for public safety in any official capacity. One need only view the video from Dee Lusby's Arizona beeyard to appreciate what keeping Aricanized bees in the southwest US is all about.


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## jim lyon (Feb 19, 2006)

Agreed Dan. It's easy to tout the positives of scutellata from afar but my personal experiences with them up close and personal have been downright scary and I have dealt with a lot of mean bees through the years. I continue to believe, though, that some level of "Africanization" whether by chance or design may well have a positive impact in the battle against varroa.


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## Rader Sidetrack (Nov 30, 2011)

mike bispham said:


> You don't keep lame cattle alive to breed from - you send them to market pronto. Individual terminated.


The decision is _not nearly as simple_ as you make it out to be. :no:

From the University of Minnesota _Beef Center_:


> If a bull is chronically lame, his semen quality will continue to deteriorate over time and should be considered for culling. A bull that *has been acutely lame, and has recovered,* may need a period of sexual rest (45 days) before he will be able to breed cows again, because, as with cold injury, he will need to be allowed some time for the development and maturation of normal sperm cells, after the injury or insult has been resolved. Other factors that require consideration are eye health, libido, and anticipated work load.
> 
> ....
> 
> ...


:gh:

.


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## Paul McCarty (Mar 30, 2011)

BeemanDan - I AM a public safety official. I am a county fire chief. They are not an issue here other than basic safety as would apply to any wild beehive. I don't believe the bees we see in the temperate regions are anything near like the originals - maybe someplaces like Florida or Southern California, but not where I live. You can't paint them with a broad brush because they are not all the same. The rest of the world has gotten over them, how come the US can't? I think there are some in the bee and pest control industry that profit from the fear created. We should be researching them and using that research to make our bees better instead of destroying them indiscriminately.


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## beemandan (Dec 5, 2005)

Paul McCarty said:


> BeemanDan - I AM a public safety official.


Heaven help 'em......


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## JWChesnut (Jul 31, 2013)

- Paper on genetic diversity of domestic honey bees promoted by husbandry -
http://bama.ua.edu/~lreed1/paperforPopGenomics/Harper et al. (2012) popGenomics_beeManagement.pdf

Management increases genetic diversity of honey bees
via admixture
BROCK A. HARPUR, SHERMINEH MINAEI , CLEMENT F. KENT and AMRO ZAYED
Department of Biology York University, 4700 Keele Street, Toronto, Ontario, Canada M3J 1P3
Abstract
The process of domestication often brings about profound changes in levels of genetic
variation in animals and plants. The honey bee, Apis mellifera, has been managed by
humans for centuries for both honey and wax production and crop pollination. Human
management and selective breeding are believed to have caused reductions in genetic
diversity in honey bee populations, thereby contributing to the global declines
threatening this ecologically and economically important insect. However, previous
studies supporting this claim mostly relied on population genetic comparisons of
European and African (or Africanized) honey bee races; such conclusions require
reassessment given recent evidence demonstrating that the honey bee originated in
Africa and colonized Europe via two independent expansions. We sampled honey bee
workers from two managed populations in North America and Europe as well as several
old-world progenitor populations in Africa, East and West Europe. Managed bees had
highly introgressed genomes representing admixture between East and West European
progenitor populations. We found that managed honey bees actually have higher levels
of genetic diversity compared with their progenitors in East and West Europe, providing
an unusual example whereby human management increases genetic diversity by
promoting admixture. The relationship between genetic diversity and honey bee
declines is tenuous given that managed bees have more genetic diversity than their
progenitors and many viable domesticated animals.


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## WLC (Feb 7, 2010)

While there certainly are scutellata derived stock in the SW U.S. regions bordering Mexico, from what I've been reading in the scientific literature, much of the survivor stock that we're referring to aren't scutellata derived stock. You may as well call them Black Bees.

In fact, I was astonished to find from the work of Delaney and one of her grad students that they may very well be chasing a phantom in Florida and much of the South.


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## Paul McCarty (Mar 30, 2011)

We have more problems with rattlesnakes and black widows.


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## Paul McCarty (Mar 30, 2011)

The research is out there WLC - just have to read it. But the stuff that is 20-30 years old is not accurate any more for us. Some of the research even suggests these African types are slowly changing into a form of "black bee" as they move into the temperate zones - if they in fact did not exist here already from past importations. So in essence it seems - they are becoming "mutt" bees like everything else wild.


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## rhaldridge (Dec 17, 2012)

beemandan said:


> Fortunately none of those with the casual attitudes are responsible for public safety in any official capacity. One need only view the video from Dee Lusby's Arizona beeyard to appreciate what keeping Aricanized bees in the southwest US is all about.


They do appear to be aggressive. However, in other respects, they don't follow the oft-repeated description of Africanized bees. How do you get Africanized bees to fill 3 deeps? How do you keep them from constantly swarming? How do you get high honey production from them? Other than the aggression, how do Lusby's bees fit the description?


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## beemandan (Dec 5, 2005)

rhaldridge said:


> They do appear to be aggressive.


You’re referring to Lusby’s bees? Indeed. If you kept those bees in any sort of urban or suburban setting you’d be creating an absolutely unacceptable risk to your neighbors….in my opinion.



rhaldridge said:


> However, in other respects, they don't follow the oft-repeated description of Africanized bees.


Again…Lusby’s? In what respects don’t they? I have no real inkling of her production or swarming. Do you?

I believe that anyone who propagates and sells bees with the level of aggression that I’ve seen in the Lusby videos is a threat to all hobby and much commercial beekeeping. The only place those bees are even minimally acceptable are in the most remote beeyards….far from humans or livestock. Again…my opinion only.

Are you proposing that spreading those genetics should be encouraged?


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## JWChesnut (Jul 31, 2013)

I think much of the "he said-she said" discussion here is due to the confusion of Sonora desert bees and New Mexican desert-steppe bees. 

Genetic typing of NM bees supports Paul's assertion that NM bees are Iberian in origin and occur in equilibrium (the Hardy-Weinberg hypothesis) with many other races.

Sonora desert bees (S and W of Tucson to Yuma and into California) are 80-90% African by nuclear and mito-type analysis. South Texas bees share the genotype of the Sonoran (with some additional "M" race (German Black) component), so are 75% African by mitotype. (There is a recent paper that gives this data and has a great graphic with pie charts by region, but seems to have been misfiled on my computer, I will edit this comment when I unarchive it).

The Sonora desert bees are African in aggression, swarm behavior and every other metric.

It is an open question as to how far the AHB will spread into California, and whether the always rumored "hybrid limit" will materialize. In the meantime, a cautious approach to spreading the Sonora desert bees is the only prudent course.


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## Paul McCarty (Mar 30, 2011)

You are correct JW - All I ask is more research as we seem to have more variation than is currently accepted. As for Steppe bees - yes, that is exactly what they are. I guess that is a better way to look at it. I know they seem far different than either Texas or California feral types. Well, I won't say far different, but they are definitely not the same critter though technically they ARE african.


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## rhaldridge (Dec 17, 2012)

beemandan said:


> Again…Lusby’s? In what respects don’t they? I have no real inkling of her production or swarming. Do you?


I've seen the video. Africanized bees are notorious for swarming. How do you get a bee like that to fill 3 deeps, as can be easily seen on the video?


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## deknow (Jul 17, 2006)

A couple of thoughts...

1. With the exception of a couple of hives in her most remote yards (which are a bit "feisty"), both Michael Bush and myself have had the same experience...if the hives are smoked properly (and I'm not talking about a smokeout with a giant AHB smoker...a couple of puffs in the entrance, under the cover, and as needed) and worked like any unknown bees, they are completely manageable. The exceptions are a few hives in _really_ remote places.

2. Ray, note that those videos were in April, before any kind of major "flow".

3. Dee's bees were considered a separate population _before_ AHB moved into Arizona...documented as having a higher rate of thelytoky (high enough to be able to produce it on demand).

4. AHB are supposed to swarm, not fill 5 deeps. 

5. There are a lot of good reasons to keep feisty colonies in the desert. Lots of hungry illegals in the area, not uncommon to find a box tumbled and a few frames missing. All this area is open rangeland for cattle. It's a daily sight to see cattle with cactus hainging off their mouths or any other parts...hives are a pretty handy scratching post (except for the bees).

It is really the lack of smoke that makes these videos so "dramatic"...Dee's way of keeping the nurse bees on the brood for making splits. It's often remarked that this isn't necessary by other beekeepers (other beekeepers who are always thrilled to be told that what they are doing isn't necessary)...but Dee's bees are a bit runny on the comb, it may well work better than anything else. Can you argue with the results?

deknow


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## Barry (Dec 28, 1999)

I'm curious, how do the AHB influenced bees of Florida compare to the AHB influenced bees of Arizona? I've experienced the Arizona ones firsthand and wonder if the same behavior is seen in Florida.


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## WLC (Feb 7, 2010)

Here's a link to the thesis I referred to:

http://udspace.udel.edu/bitstream/handle/19716/12667/Katherine_Darger_thesis.pdf?sequence=1

I wouldn't be surprised if some of the same behaviors were present.

Regardless, should we really refer to the bees that came up positive in Florida, using morphometrics, as AHB?


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## Paul McCarty (Mar 30, 2011)

WLC - that is my point. They are obvious separate populations. As far as someone mentioning bees with African traits not filling 3 deeps - don't believe that for a minute! Some of the removals I have done have filled 4 deeps prior to my re-queening them. They reproduce so fast it only takes about a month or so. The swarming comes from the high reproductive rate and the space available. A 4 deep hive of them makes for a lot of unpredictable runny bees, but they also drag in a ton of honey because they forage for things the average domestic bees don't. The domestic bees like sweeter nectar. These feral bees are totally awesome in that regard.


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## Michael Bush (Aug 2, 2002)

>1. With the exception of a couple of hives in her most remote yards (which are a bit "feisty"), both Michael Bush and myself have had the same experience...if the hives are smoked properly (and I'm not talking about a smokeout with a giant AHB smoker...a couple of puffs in the entrance, under the cover, and as needed) and worked like any unknown bees, they are completely manageable. The exceptions are a few hives in _really_ remote places.

Agreed. They still follow further than I would want, but they are not attacking en mass even when Dee is tearing through a yard with no smoke and throwing boxes around. The meanest bees I've seen are usually F1 crosses with AMM or F1 crosses with AHB. I've seen a lot of bees in a lot of places that are supposed to be 100% Africanized such as the Virgin Islands, Florida, Arizona etc. and never found bees as mean as some of those AMM or some supposed EHB from Texas...


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## Paul McCarty (Mar 30, 2011)

I really respect Dee, but she can be pretty rough with her girls. Time is money I guess.


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## mike bispham (May 23, 2009)

Paul McCarty said:


> WLC - that is my point. They are obvious separate populations. As far as someone mentioning bees with African traits not filling 3 deeps - don't believe that for a minute! Some of the removals I have done have filled 4 deeps prior to my re-queening them. They reproduce so fast it only takes about a month or so. The swarming comes from the high reproductive rate and the space available. A 4 deep hive of them makes for a lot of unpredictable runny bees, but they also drag in a ton of honey because they forage for things the average domestic bees don't. The domestic bees like sweeter nectar. These feral bees are totally awesome in that regard.


There an obvious language problem here. The habit of describing all bees with an African genetic component as 'Africanized' has led to the expectation that all such bees with exhibit identical traits. That's plain daft.  They are, to a greater or lesser degree mutts with Scutella genetic components. 

As and where particular African traits have conferred an advantage at the expense of older subspecies/mutts those genetic components will have remained in the population - perhaps been accentuated. As and where they haven't conferred any advantage they will have diminished.

In different places different combinations of African and local bees will have resulted in good survival and reproduction levels. Natural selection will have, and will continue, to bring to the fore those genes that best suit the current environment - according to the bottom-line rule: most effective conversion of available energy sources into viable offspring. Its nothing but good old straightforward natural selection for the fittest strains. Where the fittest individuals are locally adapted older strains the African gentic components make little headway. 

'Africanized' has little scientific meaning beyond 'having an unspecified Scutella genetic component'. 

To anyone who thinks otherwise, try asking this question: where does the line lie? Does a single genetic component make a bee 'Africanized'? Two. Nine? A thousand? That question is unanswerable, and that demonstrates the problem.

It would be a good idea to try to talk in ways that avoid the crazy oversimplification 'Africanized' represents. US feral bees are locally adapted mongrels that draw on whatever genetic component work best regardless of their origins. In each generation the fitter combinations supply the greater proportion of the next, perpetuating those individual genes. 

Mike (UK)


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## Michael Palmer (Dec 29, 2006)

deknow said:


> Ray, I think that is like saying that humans are becoming less dependant on eye glasses over time because people who need them to see well have access to them.
> 
> deknow


No, it's more like saying that if you feed your bees that are in jeopardy of starvation, you are selecting for bees that will require feeding.


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## Mr_Clean (Aug 31, 2013)

Yvesrow1 said:


> (First Year Beekeeper)
> Will his “treatment bees” significantly affect my efforts to succeed at Treatment Free Beekeeping? :scratch:


This thread has been hijacked to different topics. I have four hives and decided to go treatment free with natural cell sizing. About half a mile from me is a beekeeper with about fifty hives; he does bee removals, but I don't know his requeening plan. There will be cross breeding, but why worry about it? You can't control it. I try to only worry about the things I can control. Good luck!


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## Paul McCarty (Mar 30, 2011)

Yeah, I always wonder why people who aren't interested in treatment free beekeeping styles want to voice their opinions on treatment free stuff.


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## mike bispham (May 23, 2009)

Mr_Clean said:


> I have four hives and decided to go treatment free with natural cell sizing. About half a mile from me is a beekeeper with about fifty hives; he does bee removals, but I don't know his requeening plan. There will be cross breeding, but why worry about it? You can't control it. I try to only worry about the things I can control.


The thread is about breeding from survivor stock. 'Breeding' is entirely an activity in which you take steps to control parentage.

_You_ can't control (male side) parentage because you're outgunned. Others can. Every site is different. 

The important thing is to know what makes a difference, and how to go about making use of it. Not worrying about it will, in most cases, lead to failure. You say your neighbour does lots of removals - that could well be a good sign...

Apart from natural cell sizing, what other things do you do by way of control? Where did you source your bees? How long has treatment-free worked for you? 

Mike (UK)


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## rhaldridge (Dec 17, 2012)

Paul McCarty said:


> Yeah, I always wonder why people who aren't interested in treatment free beekeeping styles want to voice their opinions on treatment free stuff.


It's an interesting question. But I suppose one thing more mysterious than bee nature is human nature.


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## mike bispham (May 23, 2009)

rhaldridge said:


> (" Originally Posted by Paul McCarty
> Yeah, I always wonder why people who aren't interested in treatment free beekeeping styles want to voice their opinions on treatment free stuff.")
> It's an interesting question. But I suppose one thing more mysterious than bee nature is human nature.


I'm curious to know who you two have in mind? I thought this thread had been pretty clean...

Mike (UK)


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## beemandan (Dec 5, 2005)

Barry said:


> I'm curious, how do the AHB influenced bees of Florida compare to the AHB influenced bees of Arizona? I've experienced the Arizona ones firsthand and wonder if the same behavior is seen in Florida.


Depends on what triggers them, I'm guessing.
http://usnews.nbcnews.com/_news/201...l-injure-another-in-florida-neighborhood?lite
One difference might be that in those isolated beeyards the beekeepers are heavily protected and the bees find it difficult to set many stingers. As we've seen in Dee's videos they're going hard for a target...in one case the camera. But what happens if those same bees begin to set stingers in flesh...in quantity. Once the air is filled with those pheromones does the colony's behavior ratchet up?


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## Solomon Parker (Dec 21, 2002)

Yvesrow1 said:


> Will his “treatment bees” significantly affect my efforts to succeed at Treatment Free Beekeeping? :scratch:


In my experience, I don't find it to be a problem. There's going to be a certain expected loss each year anyway. I have found that despite having several beekeepers in the vicinity, I don't have any excessive loss rate, and in fact have lower than anybody I know of. 

Don't be afraid of it. It's not like there is one single trait that allows bees to survive treatment-free and that every queen who mates outside your genepool loses that trait. That's not how it works. His bees are dying just like yours will. You just have a bit of a stiffer final exam.


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## mike bispham (May 23, 2009)

Solomon Parker said:


> In my experience, I don't find it to be a problem. There's going to be a certain expected loss each year anyway. I have found that despite having several beekeepers in the vicinity, I don't have any excessive loss rate, and in fact have lower than anybody I know of.
> 
> Don't be afraid of it. It's not like there is one single trait that allows bees to survive treatment-free and that every queen who mates outside your genepool loses that trait. That's not how it works. His bees are dying just like yours will. You just have a bit of a stiffer final exam.


Its going to be different wherever you go, whatever your starting material, your circumstances vis a vis feral survivors and what you do. What works for you Solomon isn't necessarily going to work for someone else.

To some degree neighbour's treated bees will have an undesirable effect. Acting to counter that effect will increase the chances of success.

In the beginning a lot depends on the source of the bees. Are they likely to possess any mite management traits at all? What makes you think so?

In subsequent generations much will depend on any feral population. If you have survivors around your chances of success are much greater. If you don't you will improve your chances by acting firmly and quickly to raise resistance traits and push them into the local breeding pool. You should do that anyway. Maximise your chances by taking particular steps - bringing in bees likely to be resistant to some degree, making rapid increase to protect yourself against losses, and making those increases informed by mite-resistance evaluations. 

I'd make the working assumption: I have to breed well or will likely fail. Then work hard at finding out how best to go about it.

Mike (UK)


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## Oldtimer (Jul 4, 2010)

I don't think any of that applies to Solomon and his success because his neighbour is a commercial queen breeder whose drones hugely outnumber Solomon's.

Could it be something else?

Michael Bush has a different view.


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## charliesbees (Dec 13, 2013)

I don't know what all the rest of you have experienced, but with no treatments (on large cell size) I lost all my bees whenever I wouldn't treat for a couple of years. But finally I lost them even after treating with Apistan. It was obvious that the mites had built resistance. I've heard of big outfits losing their entire operation WHILE treating with Apistan or CheckMite. So we have reached the point where whether you treat or not, they all die anyway quite often. I think the problem here comes down to us not wanting to "do nothing". We want to attack the problem and so we do whatever the experts tell us because we are desperate. But what they are telling us is failing anyway. Once I lost them all AFTER I treated them, I could no longer see any reason to treat them. Treating only perpetuates the problem. It breeds bees that can't survive whatever you are treating for, contaminates the comb and upsets the whole balance of the hive......http://www.bushfarms.com/beesfoursimplesteps.htm


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