# survivor stock commercial option?



## Allen Dick

I guess we all wonder about this. As someone who gets around, I have yet to come across anyone who has been able to do this over a period of time, and that is the real question. 

In my experience, beekeepers can reduce their reliance on treatments if they monitor their bees and in some cases, in some localities, they may go an extended time without need for treatments.

Nonetheless, it seems that in most commercial situations if the economic threshold is estimated too high, unacceptable losses result.

In commercial beekeeping, the goal is to maximize profit and minimize losses and risk in the present, so when getting close to the line or where that line is indistinct, the tendency is to treat if there is a cost effective solution at hand.

In recent years, the threshold for varroa treatment has actually been reduced in Alberta due to escalating losses in recent years. Maintaining varroa at lower levels has apparently reduced the losses back to normal.

Are the bees in use commercially "survivor" bees? Yes and no. Over time, such stock has been increasingly incorporated into the commercial stocks, but I know of no one who is running exclusively a pure survivor stock on a large scale.

I'd like to see that happen, but it seems that most commercials prefer other stock. Additionally it seems that just because a stock of bees does not succumb to AFB or mites or show overt symptoms does not mean that the stock flourishes under challenge.

I have noticed that HYG stock under challenge from AFB has spotty brood and smells of AFB, even though not a cell can be seen. This burden surely reduces productivity.


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## mythomane

It comes down to money for commercial producers. Their stock is bred to make honey. That comes first. Also, as Allen said, it is easier to treat than to keep your eyes on them and micro-manage. That said I know a few producers with 2500+ hives that keep bees without treatments (or at least say they do.) The added burden comes from the addition of pollination. Guys with 20,000+ hives take the large checks, suffer the losses (5,000+ per year) and just buy more bees/split. I will not buy their honey, but Sue Bee will. Treatment free beekeeping involves not cutting corners, and this costs money -- This means A LOT of money in a large volume operation.


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## golddust-twins

Thank you for this info everyone. This is very enlightening.


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## jean-marc

Mythomane:

So are you saying 20 000 hives and losses 5000 every year b/c he does not treat for mites? If that's the case I figure he's doing pretty good. I figure a person losses 40% a year alone if you don't requeen or make splits to make up that loss you are going downhill.

I agree with pollination being a burden. We spend our time feeding bees to get their strength up so we can make nucs , the we make nucs, then pollination season starts and we still have nucs to make and the time required to moves bees into pollination prevents us from feeding bees at a critical time. Maybe a couple of extra guys would help.

I suppose if one really wanted to go the "survivor" route the most sensible approach would be to try it on a limited scale say 10 % of the outfit. With the pollination though it would get complicated to keep track of things. However the "survivor stock" has to be put thru it's paces to see if it has any value. What's the point of having bees if you can't collect a pollination check, assuming you are in a marginal honey producing area?


Jean-Marc


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## mike bispham

Allen Dick said:


> In commercial beekeeping, the goal is to maximize profit and minimize losses and risk in the present, so when getting close to the line or where that line is indistinct, the tendency is to treat if there is a cost effective solution at hand.


The problem is the fact that treating causes future generations to be more vulnerable to whatever it was that caused the need for treatment (generally in beekeeping these days we're talking about varroa). Treating today almost inevitably means increased treament tomorrow. It amounts to the opposite of selecting for health, vitality, resistance. The origins of the stock (survivor or bred resistant) is only part of the story - husbanding the genes through the generations is what really counts. 

There will always be beekeepers who keep bees in such ways in order to maximise their profits, and the rest will continue to have to try to mop up their mess. 

Mike


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## mythomane

Commercial producers are not the enemy here. We need to eat, and many commercial pollinators provide a necessary service. To keep the wheels rolling, however, with the bees in endless summer, stressed, sprayed on, supersized, and starved, heavy treatments are used to close the gap. Given the choice, I eat organic.


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## fish_stix

Well Mr. Bispham; just how many 100's of thousands of years are you willing to wait for bees to evolve varroa resistance? Sure, it can happen faster with selective breeding, but you won't see totally resistant bees in your lifetime. In the meantime, people who have chosen beekeeping as their occupation have to make a living. Maybe you don't have to do that in the UK.


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## Countryboy

I think it depends on what your goals as a commercial operator are.

Fresh young queens will lay more brood than older queens that are wearing out. That costs you honey if you are a honey producer. If you want to run run fresh young queens, but also run survivor stock, then you need to raise your own queens too. However, queen rearing and honey production schedules can be conflicting. (But is it really survivor stock if you are requeening, even with your own stock?) Also, what good is a survivor hive if it doesn't produce honey?

If you are a commercial queen producer, I think you have a reasonable chance of producing survivor stock.

If you produce nucs, I think it is possible to use commercial stock.

With nucs and queens, even if you have losses, it should be possible to produce enough surplus to replace those losses, and still have surplus left to sell. Also, due to the faster hive reproduction, resistance should breed in faster. (Supposedly, ****roaches could survive nuclear fallout because they reproduce fast enough to adapt to it. You can develop resistance if you can breed faster than the problem slows you down.)

It all boils down to $$ for a commercial operator, and it all boils down to philosophy for survivor stock. It can be difficult to do both at the same time.


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## mike bispham

fish_stix said:


> Well Mr. Bispham; just how many 100's of thousands of years are you willing to wait for bees to evolve varroa resistance? Sure, it can happen faster with selective breeding, but you won't see totally resistant bees in your lifetime. In the meantime, people who have chosen beekeeping as their occupation have to make a living. Maybe you don't have to do that in the UK.


The resistance of any bee population can be raised to the point where treatments are unnecessary after just a few generations (see the work of, i.e. Marla Spivak and others for my links page) That is, a few years, not several thousands - your notion of the timescale involved is misconceived. I don't think 'totally resistant' bees have ever existed - nor has any other living organism ever been 'totally reistant. So that is another misconcenption.

Those beekeepers who understand that the resistance of their bee stock can be raised by selective methods, and that treatments will always be addictive and a dead-end will tend to flourish commercially - they already are. Imagine you needed no treatments. But those who choose to go on treating will - as long as they survive - make things a lot harder every time their bees come into contact. That is just a fact. Imagine you were a pedigree dog breeder, and your neighbours kept on cutting holes into your fences and letting in mongrels. 

Medicating means the pests and diseases will alway be with you. Every time you treat a hive, it sends its unfit genes into your own future stock. No other form of organic husbandry does this, for the simple reason that it is economic suicide.

Mike


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## beemandan

The BWeaver's in Texas say they are treatment free. I'd call them a fairly large operation.


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## mike bispham

Diseases are always around, and yes treatments can and do offer both relief and can even permanantly erase them.

However: in all areas of organic husbandry it is well understood that if you replicate sickly stock what you get is... more sickly stock. Like makes like, if you like.

Now; if you buy (or find) what you describe as 'survivor stock' (which is not I think what you really mean, but I understand you) you have choices. You can treat this stock carefully, to preserve the qualities that you want (mostly resistance to varroa and other pests and diseases); or you can treat it as you treat non-resistant stock (i.e. medicate regularly, and fail to be selective about reproduction) In the first case you can have stock that doesn't need treating for as long as you like. In the second case you'll be back where you started in just a couple of generations.

I wonder if that has helped?

Mike


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## Allen Martens

Mike

For the most part you are providing a philosophical perspective. This is a good starting point that now needs to be substantiated with anecdotal and empirical evidence. Anecdotal accounts appear to support your thesis but empirical evidence from controlled experiments have not been conclusive IMHO. You need to move from the theoretical to the practical. I'm looking forward to following your journey using real bees in the real world.

A realistic look at a no treatment approach leads to two possibilities. Stronger, healthier bees that can withstand the new diseases and parasites they have been exposed to. OR extinction. Throughout evolutionary history by far the most common outcome has been extinction.


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## wdcrkapry205

I'm still waiting for someone to reply to beemandan...


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## Allen Dick

Yeah. I recall Danny Weaver mentioning that back as early as Apimondia in 2000. I was quite impressed. A lot of people did not believe him, but he recounted a story about a drone hive loaded with mites recovering after being requeened as I recall. Sounds as if they have some good stock. So we have one report. Is Weavers a typical commercial operation? I don't know. Do they never treat for anything? I don't know. Are their bees considered 'survivor' stock? I don't know.

As far as the original question is concerned, though, here it is again:



> I've been wondering for a while now about the whole survivor stock question.
> Often there are posts on here that say "I haven't treated my bees for years"
> I have a couple of questions I hope someone can answer for me.
> Is this something that can be done when you are running thousands of hives? Is anyone doing it on a large scale?
> If you are how where you able to make a living and honour pollination contracts while your bees where dying from PMS and other nasties?
> last of all are these survivor stock a particular breed of bee, Italian? Russian? or is it just any bee.?


I understand it as being strictly about the practicality of running a commercial operation on a reasonable scale with normal commercial activities, only using survivor stock, posed to anyone with knowledge of such an operation. There was no request for hypothetical discussion of theory, philosophy, rumour or the usual distractions. Just verifiable and believable facts about a commercial-scale operation.

It seems we got sidetracked again into hypothesizing and possible libel.

I'm interested in an answer to those exact question, too, since I think that some are getting close to doing so, so I hope we don't get too far off on a tangent.

So far we have one well-known operation suggested. Does it qualify? Come close?


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## DRUR

beemandan said:


> The BWeaver's in Texas say they are treatment free.


Yes, and I have one of their queens, she is one of the few from last year that has not swarmed and is currently working on medium honey super #3 although the first one is only about 1/2 capped and the 2nd one is only starting to cap. This colony is producing almost as much as my double strength colony [2 colonies combined].



beemandan said:


> I'd call them a fairly large operation.


Nah, just a small operation here in Texas. I have read they are only running about 8,000 colonies :lpf:, just ask any Texan, everything is bigger and better in Texas.

Kindest Regards
Danny


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## beemandan

By the way Danny, at the risk of hijacking this poor thread further, when did BWeavers go small cell?


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## mythomane

Allen, if you are going to start listing, you are going to have to qualify what you mean by commercial. 500+ hives? Pollination? Bee sales only? Honey producer? Also: Another vote for BWeaver stock. The SMRT bees were pretty good, and what happened I think was enough were open-mating and surviving/Buckfast went downhill, and they just combined everything into their new breed, which is pretty good, at least in my area (just about the same as theirs)...I used to think their prices were high, but you get what you pay for. Having to buy junk bees this Spring to make up for losses I realize the extra money you pay for them is probably worth it. I guess I should know this, but how much (if any) of Weaver stock goes to the almonds? Is it kept separate from their breeding stock? Splitting is a big tool against both disease and varroa. Their two frame splits don't stand much of a chance of becoming infested with varroa.


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## honeyshack

In answer to the original post.
I consider myself a small commercial producer. It is part of our Ag farm. We sell honey bulk, mostly.
Here is my experience on survivor stock

We treat, I will be open about that. We treat, but we also monitor the bees for levels of nosema and varroa

That said...
We bought bees from a friend. In the same area as us. We bought him out due to financial trouble.
These bees in the summer and fall of '08 were pretty much left to fend for themselves. Out of 120 hives, 40 survived, After spring 38 were total left.
Spring of '09 we took them over. In the spring, we saw mite loads high, and DWV in some of the stock that survived. Brood hatching out with the Virus. We also noted nosema levels a bit higher than normal. Since we have a small window of a flow in our area, and since we needed these bees to build, we tossed the book at them. Formic for the mites and fumagillin b for the nosema. As well, syrup and pollen patties...several pounds infact. And requeened.
Come the end of summer, honey production for those bees was well below the average for the farm. Bee population was well below the farm average aswell.
We fought with mites throughout the summer. Their levels were higher come September than the rest of the yards. The other yards at Sept 15 were at 6% and this yard was at 10% They did not take in the fall feed that the other yards took in
Fast forward to spring of 2010. Nearly all died. Out of 16, that were checked, 5 lived, three had the queens pinched and combined with another hive since there was barely a 1/2 of bees.
From the looks at the dead outs, the clusters were too small. There was still feed in the hives, Nosema present. And after some talks with "professionals" the consensus was virus overload.
As a commercial producer, if this was the norm for all my yards due to not treating...i would go broke, and i would be introuble with my banker.


There are alot of variables when it comes to business. Commercial or not. Every action has to be pencilled out to keep afloat. Even in real life we need to budget....no way i could budget for a 86% loss and still be a beekeeper. There is not a one size fits all in any business. We need to be open to other ways of doing business...this is directed at Mike Bispham


On a side note, the other hives have yet to be inspected since it got to cold...will hopefully have those results in the comming week


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## Ian

Im starting to believe viral infection takes more hives than the mite themselves. I had alway blamed the mite outright. In turn , its the mites thats providing the vector into the bees.

It would be interesting to have some sort of a vacination we could provide the hives to counter the viral infections. Controling the viral infection might prove more useful than trying to control the mites themselves.


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## honeyshack

off topic and hijacked...sorry
I too think that the viruse are what are hurting our hives. But i think that is secondary to the mite pressure. If it were not for the mites, the virus pressure would be lessened.

on second thought, since we have all these diseases and viruses in the hives already, and the bees keep them undercontrol, maybe the mites are the secondary infection....ya no...thinking it out, mites are primary, viruses are secondary... Because without the mites, the virus load stays undercontrol. Mites attack the nurse bees and then the larva. They take down two to three cylces of bees in quick double time, throwing the life cycle out of balance with the hive.


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## Allen Dick

mythomane said:


> Allen, if you are going to start listing, you are going to have to qualify what you mean by commercial. 500+ hives? Pollination? Bee sales only? Honey producer? ... I guess I should know this, but how much (if any) of Weaver stock goes to the almonds? Is it kept separate from their breeding stock? Splitting is a big tool against both disease and varroa. Their two frame splits don't stand much of a chance of becoming infested with varroa.


True. I guess we are exploring the limits here as to what to include under 'commercial' and what to consider as treatments. 

I think many commercials are into IPM, which as an end point may result in zero treatments for extended time periods. Keeping the options open is important where losing one's hives might result in bankruptcy. Some were saying comparing treating sick bees is not the same at all as treating a sick child. I'd like to point out that for some, if their sick bees die, they may not be able to afford health insurance to guarantee treatment if needed for a sick child.

Honeyshack gives a good description IMO of the burden that some treatments place on our hives and the costs in terms of honey production and bee health in areas unrelated to the pest being treated. Treatment damage bees to varying degrees, even if done correctly. That is why treatments should only be used where the pest damage is expected to be greater than the damage from the selective poison employed.

All other things being equal, robust, tolerant (survivor?) bees pay off in reduced treatment costs and produce better because they are not treated, but where risk of big losses cannot be accepted , and occasional intervention may be prudent. Additionally, the jury is still out as to whether the survivor bees can meet commercial standards of production, etc.

The fog is clearing, though.


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## mike bispham

honeyshack said:


> There is not a one size fits all in any business. We need to be open to other ways of doing business...this is directed at Mike Bispham


I appreciate this completely Honeyshack. I don't think I've ever said there was. How to move over from treatment-based management to selection-based management is the Big Conversation without loss that should be occurring. This would look at the several key factors that affect different operations, and supply the necessary understanding to be able to plan successfully - and have backup where it goes wrong.

The single thing I say is this: treating bees leads to similarly weak bees in the next generation. It undermines the emergence of resistance that would otherwise occur. I know that is an inconveinient statement; but it IS a fact. I don't mind anyone telling me they don't want to hear it. I only argue when people claim it is untrue - because it isn't. 

The point is - there is a path out of this problem of continuous crisis, and another that condemns us to go round and round for ever. The fork comes when you decide whether to continue on the treatment road, or get off it. We'd all like to get off it - so why not call it for what it is and talk about it?

Mike


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## HarryVanderpool

*Survivor bees, or survivor beekeepers?*

Placing serious focus on stock selection and treating hives for pests and diseases are not exclusive of each other.
Thanks to Marla Spivak, Sue Cobey, Weavers, etc I am able to PURCHACE the traits that are important to me and still be a good beekeeper and address whatever issues that arise in my hives.
As a commercial operator, I will allow my queen producers to let their many hives perish to select for traits, not mine. I figure that those loses are figured right into the price of good queens. 
My job in the process is to give feedback to those producers.
If my queen producers climb a tree to retrieve the original swarm that came up the James River, I'm sure I'll hear about it.
And if those bees express resistance to certain pressures, that will just mean less work on my end.
Support your favorite queen breeders!


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## mike bispham

honeyshack said:


> I too think that the viruse are what are hurting our hives. But i think that is secondary to the mite pressure. If it were not for the mites, the virus pressure would be lessened.
> 
> [...] ya no...thinking it out, mites are primary, viruses are secondary... Because without the mites, the virus load stays undercontrol.


Causal order is an interesting thing. Mites create wounds that open the bees' bodies to infection, and this is a massive thing for bees to overcome - they don't have a complex immune system like mammals.

But you can take a step back and say: if breeding is correct the mites and bees live in equilibrium. (Wild/feral bees seem to have far less voracious strains of mites - because vicious mites kill their hosts - and thus themselves). So failure to breed well becomes a cause that is prior to mites. Whan a virus takes a hive the causal order is: 1) poor breeding, 2) presence of mites, 3) presence of virus (/bacteria/fungal agent).

Looking at it this way both mite problems and virus problems are symptoms of failure to breed well.

Mike


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## Ian

>>Looking at it this way both mite problems and virus problems are symptoms of failure to breed well.


No, its just a matter of disease pressures.


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## Allen Dick

Please guys let's not get trolled off topic again, and please do not quote off topic comments from people on everyone's ignore list. 

I would really love for this topic to be discussed without it going into the ditch again. It is a very important question.

The fact that it has not been completely discussed due to interruptions every time it is raised is one of the reasons people are afraid to use survivor or tolerant stocks, and, by combining that with IPM monitoring methods to prevent trainwrecks, reduce treatment to low or ultimately zero levels.


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## DRUR

beemandan said:


> By the way Danny, at the risk of hijacking this poor thread further, when did BWeavers go small cell?


I don't think they have, but I guess that is why the only have 8,000 colonies in, I guess the rest have died off:lpf:


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## WI-beek

I am far from experienced enough with honeybees to weigh in with much weight but maybe the mites themselves can answer this evolution question. Every beekeeper in the country was playing exterminator with apistan and check mite strips. If you were raising mites instead of bees in this situation you would throw in the towel. But the pesky little suckers evolved somehow and a population grew resistant. Why would bees not do the same if everyone stopped treating? Maybe it would be that one percent that would come back and laugh at the mite the way some populations of mites laugh at apistan and check mite strips.

Of course someone who make a living from bees can not play this game but I think its a good idea if breeders want to try.


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## honeyshack

WI-beek said:


> ... Maybe it would be that one percent that would come back and laugh at the mite the way some populations of mites laugh at apistan and check mite strips....


We are forgetting though, that the mite latches on to the bee, breaking it's skin. This allows the viruses a way to enter the bee....making the nurse bee sick.
A sick nurse bee can not do her job of feeding the brood properly
A poorly nourshed brood then has to grow to a healthy bee...not likely...since the varroa will now enter that cell and feed off that bee that is mal nourished...

Then previous mentioned nurse bee who is sick will not make it to the normal end of her life cylce. The normal end is a forager. She will be unable to forage for her normal time....this in itself throws the hive off balance. She dies before the other bee to take her place is ready to. The other bee who was to take her place either takes it early...shortening her life span, or if the infection has gone far along, will be unable to fly because she is a victim of DWV or some other virus due to being fed on while at larva or brood stage.

Varroa's cycle starts with the nurse bee and continues right through the whole process in the hive. If allowed to unbalance the hive enough...death of the hive occurs.

Maybe products like apistan and check mite were not the best choice...however hindsight is 20/20. How many desicions in our own lives would we change given the chance. All we have to work with is the here and now. Different products are on the market that have less of an impact on the hive and the wax and the bees. Other alternative methods are out there...


kiwiBee said:


> .
> ...I have a couple of questions I hope someone can answer for me.
> Is this something that can be done when you are running thousands of hives? Is anyone doing it on a large scale?...


But can a commercial producer survive on the alternative methods alone? Honestly...not in my area. Not in my winters. Not when so much is riding on a honey flow that is 4-6 weeks long. Not when you have a short 8 week period to get the bees ready for flow. And not when you have 6-8 weeks to prepare for a 6-8 month winter.
Varroa is a wild card. And i choose to even the odds with some things at my disposal. Varroa brings with it a whole host of problems that we have no way to fight. Viruses have to run their course. But in our short seasons, that virus load and that mite load will define the winter outcome...and is rarely a good outcome. Kudos to the hobbiests who can do it. Kudos to the commercial who can do it. But not everyone can fit that mold.


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## JohnK and Sheri

Danny, you talk about the Weaver queen's honey production and low swarm tendency but no mention of mite tolerance or 2nd year survivability sans treatment. Can you comment on how your experience with these queens might relate to large operations.

Again, any general commercial keepers out there with colony counts in the thousands successfully running these or other "survivor" queens for several years without treatment? 
The silence when this question is asked seems very telling. I wish otherwise, but so far we aren't convinced a true survivor queen exists. If she were out there wouldn't we all know by now?

We have heard the sales spiels and would love to hear confirmation that they are well founded, but our experience and those related to us from others has been disappointing. When challenged with real world commercial conditions on a large scale, it seems that much of the 'survivor' stock needs to be propped by greatly increasing nuc production to make up for low survivability and eventual emergency treatment is needed to save the farm. While this may be a necessary step in _developing_ 'survivor' bees, they seem far from survivor bees by any reasonable definition. 

We are a small operation when compared to some mentioned here. Bees are our entire livelihood. We would love to be able to buy queens that stood up under the conditions our bees routinely experience without treatment, but we couldn't absorb the losses we hear about, year after year, from those trying to develop resistant bees or those betting the farm on promises. 
I am with Harry on this one. Developing queens is not our job, we will leave that to the experts. Kudos to those working on these issues, we are all hoping for their success. Meanwhile, our job is producing honey and pollinating almonds, and we can only do that with healthy bees, which to me means having the pests and pathogens that kill bees under control. 
Sheri


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## mike bispham

Ian said:


> >>Looking at it this way both mite problems and virus problems are symptoms of failure to breed well.
> 
> No, its just a matter of disease pressures.


A simple denial is just that - what matters is whether you can substantiate your claim. Biology, taught animal husbandry, and the activities of many 'natural beekeepers' and professional breeders are not on your side. Well bred bees are more resistant to the disease environment than poorly bred brees. This is also common sense.

Mike


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## mike bispham

*Re: Survivor bees, or survivor beekeepers?*



HarryVanderpool said:


> Placing serious focus on stock selection and treating hives for pests and diseases are not exclusive of each other.
> Thanks to Marla Spivak, Sue Cobey, Weavers, etc I am able to PURCHACE the traits that are important to me and still be a good beekeeper and address whatever issues that arise in my hives.
> [...]
> And if those bees express resistance to certain pressures, that will just mean less work on my end.
> Support your favorite queen breeders!


An understandable approach Harry, but if you just requeened those hives that show a need for treatments, and made splits from the best only, you might find after a while that there was no need to buy in. You'd be in the game, and part of the solution we'd all like to see. After a while you might find you could sell your own resistant queens and packages.

Mike


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## mike bispham

JohnK and Sheri said:


> Again, any general commercial keepers out there with colony counts in the thousands successfully running these or other "survivor" queens for several years without treatment?
> 
> The silence when this question is asked seems very telling.


Hi Sheri,

It might mean that no-one has succeeded in this business model - but that might be that no-one has given it a proper try. It may be that this beekeeping model is one in which the advantages of more reliable bees are outweighed by the strategic needs of the business - and so there is no incentive to try. If buying in i.e. Aussie bees simply gets the job done, and makes a profit reliably, the big truckers will go with that. 

That doesn't make that a good thing from everyone else's point of view. We all need strong broad-spectrum resistant drones flying as much as possible, not Aussie bees that have had no exposure to varroa and thus have no resistance whatsoever. That just makes things harder for those whose bees your drones ome into contact with. (That said some - not all - Australian breeders are making an effort to raise resistant bees.)



JohnK and Sheri said:


> I wish otherwise, but so far we aren't convinced a true survivor queen exists. If she were out there wouldn't we all know by now?


I find it curious that on this thread the term 'survivor' is used to indicate specially bred bees. Everywhere else I've come across the term it is used to indicate wild/feral bees that have survived alone (due to natural selection for the fittest strains). Specially bred queens are usually referred to as 'mite-resistant bees' or by the name of their breeder, or 'hygienic', VSH and so on. It seems to me that this has introduced some confusion into the discussion. The whole notion of 'Survivor stock commercial option' - the name of this thread - indicates, under well accepted use, a commercial stock rasied from captured wild bees. I don't think that is what we are talking about here? 

Glen apiaries give maps showing the locations and details of mite-resistant bred queen suppliers:

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

If you look for evidence of mite-resistant queens it is plentiful. But they are not generally sold to you with the same kind of force that ordinary (i.e. mite-vulnerable) queens, or the general treatment model of management is sold. There are big bucks behind the chemical approach, and they advertise hard. Many of the bee magazines are effectively in their pockets. Those trying to improve the genetic stock and free us from the chemical treadmill can't afford to compete, and their voices tend to be drowned out.



JohnK and Sheri said:


> We are a small operation when compared to some mentioned here. Bees are our entire livelihood. We would love to be able to buy queens that stood up under the conditions our bees routinely experience without treatment, but we couldn't absorb the losses we hear about, year after year, from those trying to develop resistant bees or those betting the farm on promises.


Why not ask a specialist to come and consult with you to get an expert view of what might be possible, and instruction on the best way to go about for your specific operation? You may find you can go a long way without taking very much risk at all, increasing the strength of your stock through buying in bred specially bred queens and then maintaining their strength through selective reproduction. And you'll learn and save money on treatments as you go.

Mike


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## WI-beek

Ian said:


> Im starting to believe viral infection takes more hives than the mite themselves. I had alway blamed the mite outright. In turn , its the mites thats providing the vector into the bees.
> 
> It would be interesting to have some sort of a vacination we could provide the hives to counter the viral infections. Controling the viral infection might prove more useful than trying to control the mites themselves.


Vaccination sounds great in theory but how do you keep it up to date when a generation only last five or six weeks. Unless the vaccine could be passed from the queen to all offspring it would not be be practical. And what will you vaccinate for? They dont even know what CCD is. If a vaccine did actually pass from generation to generation the mites would eventually still overwhelm the colony. Larva can only handle a so many mites before its will die.

I think if there was enough money thrown at the mite problem and profit from solution was not the motive behind the treatment, enough viable treatments would be available to keep mites in check.

Also, from what I have read, pure VSH bees meaning the queen is pure VSH and Drones are Pure VSH that they will control the mites and the mite population will not grow. The problem is that they have to be 100% to be effective at controlling mite population. This is impossible in open mated situations and is only possible through inbreeding and thus you have to be focused on one trait. Pretty hard to keep honey production, wintering ability, and other desirable traits in the bag. If you water down VSH at all you lose there ability to control mites. At 50 percent VSH they will slow mite growth population compared to average bees but they will still need to be treated eventually. M-Hygienic will only keep mites from reproducing as fast and still will have to be treated as well. If there will be a bee that can keep mites in check it will have to have a mixed bag of tricks in my opinion or mutate. I believe if you took humans out of the equation, between hiding genetic traits and some genetic mutations they would somehow survive. Either the mite would evolve, the bee, or both. Look at the Galapagos islands and you will see how things co-evolve with each other. There are also more than one example of genetic mutations in the last 100 years which have allowed species to survive when a new predator/pest arrives thanks to man or otherwise.

Dont go crazy on me now!!


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## mike bispham

WI-beek said:


> Also, from what I have read, pure VSH bees meaning the queen is pure VSH and Drones are Pure VSH that they will control the mites and the mite population will not grow. The problem is that they have to be 100% to be effective at controlling mite population. This is impossible in open mated situations and is only possible through inbreeding and thus you have to be focused on one trait. Pretty hard to keep honey production, wintering ability, and other desirable traits in the bag. If you water down VSH at all you lose there ability to control mites. At 50 percent VSH they will slow mite growth population compared to average bees but they will still need to be treated eventually.


There is a lot of attention being paid to these kinds of problems, and the solution is for beekeepers to raise mite-resistant bees from among their own local stocks for local climate traits and preferred beekeepers tarits, and blending in specially bred bees to help get the best resistant genes in place. If there are wild/feral bees ('survivors') around so much the better, since they also have what it takes to fight mites, and aid genetic diversity. If you are around apiaries that medicatate heavily life will be harder, since their drones will constantly downgrade your stock.

It isn't true that anything less than 100% effectiveness means you are back to square one. If you start with a fighting fit queen, then at the next generation those subfamilies that result from matings with sound drones will remain sound, those that result from matings with poorer drones will be weakened. The colony will be weaker than it would have been had all matings been with sound drones, but how much depends on the matings - and who they were with. Sperm from drones from colonies that have required medication are likely to downgrade queens in the next generation.

Mike


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## DRUR

JohnK and Sheri said:


> Danny, you talk about the Weaver queen's honey production and low swarm tendency but no mention of mite tolerance or 2nd year survivability sans treatment. Can you comment on how your experience with these queens might relate to large operations.


Sheri, I would suggest that you go here and read about their queens:
http://www.beeweaver.com/Bee-Weaver-Breed.html

Sheri as you well know one queen does not make for a study. I ordered this queen last April so she has been through a full year without treatments. I have spoken and corresponded by email with Laura Weaver on several occassions and found them to be very open, and the Weavers are leaders in the industry. 
They produced more brood, earlier than any other colony. I used them to make splits the first week in March, and we had colder weather than normal including 3 good snowfalls [3-6"]. They were still able to build up and have a large population for our honey flow which begins in earnest the middle of April.



JohnK and Sheri said:


> Again, any general commercial keepers out there with colony counts in the thousands successfully running these or other "survivor" queens for several years without treatment? The silence when this question is asked seems very telling. I wish otherwise, but so far we aren't convinced a true survivor queen exists. If she were out there wouldn't we all know by now?


It is my understanding that the Danny and Laura Weaver have a commercial operation where they are running about 8,000 colonies, or so I read in an article about them sometime back. 
Again, Sheri, go to their site and read about their queens first, then if your questions aren't answered email them. As far as queens go they are at the upper level for expense, but saving a dollar in the short term often costs you in the long term. My Weaver queen now has a med. honey super 1/3 capped, 2nd med. super starting to cap, and several frames drawn and filling with honey on a third super. An exceptional queen?, maybe and I am sure I could have gotten a dud but I didn't.


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## jim lyon

This is not to discredit Beeweavers who certainly have a long history of being a reputable producer of quality bees for many years, my only question is just what constitutes a "chemical". Not sure that they are claiming to be free of any types of treatments which would lead one to wonder if treatments of such naturally occurring compounds such as oxalic, formic, or thymol may still allow them to claim to be chemical free. If so then I want to join that club as well.


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## Nick Noyes

Mike,


Do you have someone in mind to finance this project? I think it would take $10 million a year for 10 years and you would see results like you are talking about. 
It would take 2 large outfits working together along with a large scale queen rearing outfit to raise the queens. One outfit would have to go through the same routine just without treatment and hopefully have enough good hives left to pick breeders and supply drones. The other would have to supply pkgs. headed by the survivor queens to keep the numbers up for testing purposes. The outfit raising the queens would have to be isolated.
Very little income would be realized from these ventures for 10 years therefore the needed funding. It would have to be private funding to keep the red tape to minimum.
These bees would have to travel to almonds and other pollination to give this project any merit. I do believe it can be done.





This specialast would be a handy guy to have around also. Were is he or she located so I may contact them?


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## honeyshack

Mike Bispham,

How much actual experience do you have in beekeeping...not book related, actual rearing of queens, raising bees and producing honey.
Is this experience hobby related or commercial related?
Is this experience obtained while owning all equipment out right or with the bank as a major stake holder?


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## Ian

>>And what will you vaccinate for

specific viral infections that are most commonly found.
DWV specifically,

DWV is observed to transfer infection well after mite populations are controlled. To be able to break its progression would certainly help to relieve its presence


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## mike bispham

Ian said:


> >>And what will you vaccinate for


Is it actually possible 'vaccinate' bees? Don't vaccines work by raising antibodies to specific predator organisms in ... those organisms that have antibody defence systems? Do bees actually have such defence systems? 

Mike


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## mike bispham

Nick Noyes said:


> Mike,
> 
> Do you have someone in mind to finance this project?


What project? Have I proposed a project? Could you tell me what it entails? 



Nick Noyes said:


> This specialast would be a handy guy to have around also. Were is he or she located so I may contact them?


From what Danny has been saying it sounds like Weavers might be a good place to start. Or Glenne Apiaries. If they didn't want to get involved in consulting, I'm sure they could direct you to somebody who would. 

Mike


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## mike bispham

honeyshack said:


> Mike Bispham,
> 
> How much actual experience do you have in beekeeping...not book related, actual rearing of queens, raising bees and producing honey.


Not much. 



honeyshack said:


> Is this experience hobby related or commercial related?


Hobby



honeyshack said:


> Is this experience obtained while owning all equipment out right or with the bank as a major stake holder?


Owning. 

Mike


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## honeyshack

mike bispham said:


> Not much.
> 
> Mike



Please, if you would, quanitfy what is "not much"....


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## beekuk

Honeyshack
maybe able to help here,Mike had bee's around 18 years ago until varroa killed them,not had any since,well apart from a swarm that arrived last summer and lived 15 feet up in a tree,this is from our UK forum.But his husbandry theories seem sound enough at times.


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## honeyshack

ok then, thank you


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## Ian

>>Is it actually possible 'vaccinate' bees?

Yes. Work is being done on exactly that, and proven sucessful. Ill try to dig some info up on it.


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## Allen Dick

> >>Is it actually possible 'vaccinate' bees? Yes. Work is being done on exactly that, and proven sucessful. Ill try to dig some info up on it.


Is it like vaccinating turkeys? I've done that, and it went pretty quick, but my guess is that vaccinating bees is going to be a long, slow job.

Ooops! Sorry. This thread is so OT, I had no idea we were still talking about survivor bees! (But I just can't help myself).


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## Nick Noyes

I proposed the project. I just thought maybe you had the means (money) to give it a proper try.


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## WLC

You are talking about survivor bees.

He's likely referring to RNA interference.

Bees have a built in RNA silencing system.

Survivor bees can have integrated virus fragments in their genome which can then silence a viral infection by RNA interference.

There's a company that's selling Ds RNA that can silence viral infections.

No kidding.


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## Countryboy

_Also, from what I have read, pure VSH bees meaning the queen is pure VSH and Drones are Pure VSH that they will control the mites and the mite population will not grow. The problem is that they have to be 100% to be effective at controlling mite population. This is impossible in open mated situations and is only possible through inbreeding and thus you have to be focused on one trait. Pretty hard to keep honey production, wintering ability, and other desirable traits in the bag. _

The problem with 100% VSH bees is they want to tear out all the brood. They are that darn hygienic. They are every metabolically expensive to the hive. Yes, they may be able to resist mites by not having enough brood for mites to be able to reproduce very fast, but it also means the bees are reproducing slowly. Your colony may dwindle, and good luck on maintaining an adequate population to gather that honey crop.

_When challenged with real world commercial conditions on a large scale, it seems that much of the 'survivor' stock needs to be propped by greatly increasing nuc production to make up for low survivability and eventual emergency treatment is needed to save the farm. While this may be a necessary step in developing 'survivor' bees, they seem far from survivor bees by any reasonable definition. _

Is surplus nuc production really raising survivor stock bees, or are you simply trying to outbreed the mites? (and hoping the bees develop some kind of resistance during the nuc breeding program)

Personally, by producing extra nucs to cover losses, I believe you can go treatment free, but I would have a hard time calling it survivor stock.


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## mike bispham

Marla Spivak is trying to make her understanding of what is required to produce healthy bees that need no treatments and produce well widely available. Some of courses - including on-line course - and a manual here:

http://www.extension.umn.edu/honeybees/

http://www.extension.umn.edu/honeybees/components/healthybeesonline.htm

Queen rearing manual
http://www.extension.umn.edu/honeybees/components/manuals.htm

Mike


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## mike bispham

Countryboy said:


> Personally, by producing extra nucs to cover losses, I believe you can go treatment free, but I would have a hard time calling it survivor stock.


As I've noted above, most people use the term 'survivor stock' to describe wild/feral bees that have come to an accomodation with varroa - co-evolved such that they can thrive despite infection. I suppose if a beekeeper does nothing but house and crop such strains it's fair enough to continue to call them 'surviver stock' though 'from survivor stock' might be more informative. Such bees would not disrupt local wild/feral bees, meaning there would be a constant interchange of genetic material between apiary and wild bees (wherevery wild bees have sufficient habitat). That too would reinforce the description 'survivor bees' or 'surviviver genetics'

But as soon as the beekeepers starts deliberately selecting (for whatever - broad traits like health and vitality, productivity, or narrow traits like hygienic behaviours or handling qualities) the resulting colonies would be better described as 'bred from survivor stock'. 

The more bought bred-resistant bees, Russians etc., or local home-made healthy bees are added, then such bees might be best described as 'my bred bees'. They will survive and thrive whether you select or not - though if you don't select nature will do it for you - and you will experience losses. If you try to avoid those losses by treating, then pretty soon they won't survive alone - they'll rapidly become 'addicted' - genetically dependent on treatments.

Personally I think the term 'survivor stock' is best reserved for stock that has raised its own resistance and vitality by adaptation by natural selection in the wild. That way we can have clear conversations about the different genetic origins of stocks.

Mike


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## mike bispham

beekuk said:


> Honeyshack
> maybe able to help here,Mike had bee's around 18 years ago until varroa killed them,not had any since,well apart from a swarm that arrived last summer and lived 15 feet up in a tree,this is from our UK forum.But his husbandry theories seem sound enough at times.


Thank you Pete. If anyone wants to know more I recently made detailed explanation of my background here: http://www.beesource.com/forums/showthread.php?t=240489&page=12 Post #114

Mike


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## JohnK and Sheri

Countryboy said:


> Personally, by producing extra nucs to cover losses, I believe you can go treatment free, but I would have a hard time calling it survivor stock.


Exactly! I don't call them survivor bees either, but some have. If one were breeding exclusively from overwintered survivors and keeping the stock strictly segregated, one could perhaps increase resistance from the breeding program plus maintain commercial viability by maintaining numbers with the generic production of nucs. To call them survivors they need to stand unpropped. I haven't heard of anyone with consistent survivability to year 3.

The term "survivor" historically might have primarily referred to feral bees but the term as the OP used it will suffice. It seems quite fitting in the current context as we are all talking about bees able to survive over time without treatment. Ultimately, source is irrelevant. 
Most commercials have a good concept of the issues involved here, we have been on the front lines, not just reading about the war in academic journals. We, better than most, have seen up close and personal, the devastation caused by introduction of a pest to an organism not adapted to it. Those of us that have survived are the ones who have adapted, by doing what needed to be done to save our bees, most certainly not waiting for 'consultants' to come to the rescue. At the end of the day, when another beekeeper is bankrupt, consultants express their regrets and move on to the next client. Beekeepers learn best from each other how to keep their bees alive, although, like evolution, it can be an up and down proposition. 
First and foremost, we have learned not to jump on the most attractive, and/or best advertised bandwagon, nor bet the farm on the latest greatest face on the lecture circuit, despite the knowledge we glean and selectively apply. We see what can happen to those that gamble too much. Breed from the survivors? Well, I will again point out the obvious. Ya gotta have survivors to breed from, not to mention enough bees to keep the lights on so you can see to graft.

Please, devastating the commercial beekeeping industry, not to mention the world's food supply by a live and let die approach is not on the table. 
So, enough of theory, the original question remains. 
Does anyone know of any commercial beekeepers who have either developed and uses treatment free bees on a large scale or is using other's developed treatment free stock in a large commercial operation?
Is anyone close? If not treatment free, what is their next best thing, while considering application time, efficacy, and cost?
Sheri
<jk>PS, also off the table is the vaccination program. Like Allen, I know first hand how impractical that is from my ill fated branding program.<jk>


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## mythomane

JohnK and Sheri:

You are one of the few posters on this forum who I actually listen to. That said, I have been running bees for 15 years without treatments. I am far from a "commercial" producer though -- just a sideliner. My experience with BWeaver queens is that they are excellent stock and survive, at least in this area, without treatments. You say there is a crash after year 3? Weavers have been running for 7? years without anything. There is Chris Baldwin down here running Russians without treatments, also Kent Williams in Kentucky. Lusby has 600 hives and does not even feed sugar. Round Rock honey here has 2500+ hives and does not treat. This is off the top of my head. You say the "silence is telling." Most beeks I know do not have the time or inclination to post on here. I can name about 10 or so I know personally that run over 200 without treatments and have not had a crash "after year 3." I think the reason more large producers do not go treatment free is because it costs money, and is more labor intensive. Large outfits are worked mostly by manual laborers, not beekeepers. Hiring and holding experienced beeks is not easy. Also, a treatment free system entails starting over with new equipment, comb, management, etc. otherwise you are just recycling old problems into the new. It is like washing your clothes and then putting on dirty underwear. They are not willing to take the pay cut and hit to their pocketbook. Also, I do not know how many of the bees would fair if they were pollinating year-round. I do not know how any bees would survive long term under those conditions.


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## Nick Noyes

What are the techniques involved to going treatment free on a large scale?


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## honeyshack

Does anyone know of any commercial beekeepers who have either developed and uses treatment free bees on a large scale or is using other's developed treatment free stock in a large commercial operation?
Is anyone close? If not treatment free, what is their next best thing, while considering application time, efficacy, and cost? 
...end quote Sheri

I agree with the whole post. To answer these questions:
I know of know one, but being relatively new to the commercial side of things...limited knowledge of others
I my operation for me the next best thing is to keep monitoring what is going on in the hives, and apply treatments when thresholds (both health and econimic) are close to being breeched. Applying proper treatments in the proper time frame with proper doses, remembering the proper withdrawal times.


Mythomane , when you talk of large operations not treating and making it work....I have a question....

1. How do they make up the losses. Enveitably there are losses. Do they buy? do they split and recover that way? How do they maintain their numbers?


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## Skinner Apiaries

Nick Noyes said:


> What are the techniques involved to going treatment free on a large scale?


A healthy dose of alcohol, and no debt. lol j/k


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## jim lyon

I wish someone would define "treatment". Does drone comb rotation qualify or how about brood interruption via requeening. I assume to most people it means no "chemicals" though to some it may mean no "compounds" while to others it may mean no beekeeping practices of any kind that would help the hive gain an advantage over varroa that they wouldn't normally have if left to their own devices.


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## honeyshack

my definition of no treatments, how i choose to view no treatments is:

Something that is not found in the same quantitive measurement in a hive...and is not feed related

So:
Icing sugar, essential oils, formic acid, "chemicals", antibiotics, drone removal, screen bottom boards are all treatments. They are things we do to a hive to reach a certain result.

Going broodless for a time...that is up in the air since this does happen in a hive. However, the bees do not say to themselves, out mites are high...prevent the queen from laying or "kill the queen" "off with her head" so to speak.
The supercede to replace a sick queen, swarm to reproduce.

Feed, be it sucrose, HFCS, pollen patties, pollen sub, i do not class as treatments since the bees need food to survive.

I keep the same idea with cows. Feed is not a treatment, hay even though we cut and bale is not a treatment. Mineral is not a treatment...it is part of the live giving of a cow...the necessity so to speak. However, any antibiotics, vaccines, dewormers, are treatments.


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## JohnK and Sheri

mythomane said:


> JohnK and Sheri: You say there is a crash after year 3?


I am saying they crash year 2, never make it to year 3. Any exceptions to this I'd like to hear about.
You name some as exceptions. The majority of your examples are smaller than the scope of the question, but Weavers and Red Rock seem to fit in a "thousand" category although I am wondering about Red Rock. I want some of whatever Round Rock is taking to allow the time and energy for their constant promoting, making videos, teaching beekeeping classes and doing cutouts, let alone sitting at a farmer's market and delivering honey, all while keeping 2500 hives. I can't imagine having time for all this, unless they have a ton of cheap labor doing the actual beekeeping. If they don't treat it may be because they don't have time, lol. I wanna be them when I grow up!
But I could find nothing about their treatment policies online, I am wondering if they are really treatment free or are doing drone removal or sugar dust or whatever (wherever would they find the time for this too?)

As Nick asks "What are the techniques used on a large scale?"
"What is treatment" is a very good question really. Is powdered sugar, which is never found naturally in a hive, better than Formic Acid, which is? 
FGMO seems like a yucky thing to put on bees, imo, but seems to fall into the "natural so acceptable" class. Or doesn't it? How bout Thymol and other EOs? 
All the above are treatments in my eyes.. 
So, are your examples really treatment free or can we assume the "management" you mention entails oneor some of the above? Something else?

You speculate on why more commercials don't go treatment free.
I agree cost IS a factor: in colonies and production lost. We're trying to make a living here. 
Comb recycling is commonly practiced by commercials so that doesn't seem to be an onerous deterrent. 
Few beekeepers stress their bees by pollinating year round. Many only go to almonds, when nothing is happening back home anyway and the balance of the year is in honey production. Some commercials don't pollinate at all, but move their bees from forage to forage. The travel might be stressful but so is sitting in a desert in the summer or in a snowbank in the winter. Some commercials are solely in honey production at their home locations and winter there as well. The stereotypical cliches of commercial beekeeping don't always conveniently apply. Personally I think commercials treat because they want to keep their bees alive. They want to stay in business and that is how you do it.

The thing that stands out to me in the named examples is that they have the advantage of living in an area of the country where they have down time with warm temps and a cheap labor pool, so maybe these labor intensive nontreatment treatments are more doable than for those of us in northern climes where we might have a window of mere days from when the temps warm enough to work bees and the supers need to be put on. Consider that with thousands of hives you can't go out on a weekend and get them all on, you need to start early before they are really needed or not get them on in time. Same with taking them off. If you need to make up losses you need to sacrifice honey, when every pound of honey counts.
I think the answer to the question asked by Honeyshack "How do they make up their losses?" we can safely assume is with splits. You can easily split everything once, most twice and not suffer any crop loss. Those losses are so easily made up in TX. If you can't raise bees in Texas you just aren't trying very hard. 
I'd also want to know the percentage of loss they have. An acceptable percentage in TX might not be feasable to us northerners. 

I'm convincing myself that we better set up somewhere warm for the winter.
Maybe we should move to TX too, eh honeyshack? Maybe next door to Weavers? I hear they give their queens to the neighbors to keep the drones to their liking. 
Sheri


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## HarryVanderpool

JohnK and Sheri said:


> Personally I think commercials treat because they want to keep their bees alive. They want to stay in business and that is how you do it.


And there you have it in a nutshell.
It could not have been said better.
Most, if not all of the artsy-fartsys with the elaborate websites, and the bloggers and keyboard commandos that have never signed a payroll check, or a check for thousands of dollars for queens and fuel, etc, want to argue to the bitter end about things they simply are clueless about.

Sheri said:"Personally I think commercials treat because they want to keep their bees alive. They want to stay in business and that is how you do it."

She has the last word because she knows what she is talking about and is correct.
When anyone has as many bees, placements, and employees as John and Sheri and never treats, please let Sheri know. I'm sure she will be glad to listen to your ideas.


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## mike bispham

HarryVanderpool said:


> Sheri said:"Personally I think commercials treat because they want to keep their bees alive. They want to stay in business and that is how you do it."


It seems to me to be interesting to look at this from a slightly different perspective and say: "treating seems to supply a commercial advantage over non-treating."

Most commercials treat because they understand that route to supply more control over their stock in the short term. This control allows them to supply pollinators and crop honey more efficiently, and at a larger scale than they could if they were taking the selective/no treatment route.

Whether this will remain true for long might be thought to be questionable. A new generation of beekeepers is growing up on selective beekeeping, and some may find ways to expand their operations to the 1000+ level that you find necessary for commercial viability. They will have an added advantage over the old school in being able to sell healthy queens and packages. 

Mike


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## Michael Bush

Whether a treatment is contaminating or not, a treatment is still interfering with the survival of the bees and NOT allow selection to take place for bees that can survive on their own.

My definition would be anything that is expected to increase their ability to survive the pests you are trying to breed resistance for that wouldn't be happening naturally in a tree... as long as you are "enabling" bees to not deal with their problems you are "treating" them.


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## kiwiBee

I would have thought if there were truely varroa resistant stock out there that it would be shouted from the roof tops,
Why is it being kept so quiet? 
If there are queen breeders out there that have resistant queens why isn't there a huge campaign to get them into as many hives as possible?
So how do you do it?
do you have 1000 hives and put aside 100 and never treat them and then breed from the survivors? how many survivors would you have in the first year? 2nd? and so on.
How many years do you have keep a hive with no treatments ( by no treatments I also mean no nucs taken off and no sugar dusting or anything of that kind) before you can call it resistant?
I could think of nothing better than being able to turn back the clock and be in a place where we didn't have to do anything about varroa so if there's a breeder out there with truely resistant stock dont keep it a secret!
kiwi


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## kiwiBee

Just another thought to add.
Here in NZ we only have Italian and just recently carniolan(sp?) bees. The carny semen was allowed in because they were deemed to be more resistant to varroa does anyone have any opinions on this?
Also we have a highly regarded bee scientist here who has been working very hard on a couple of projects to do with varroa one of them involves trying to breed open mated queens with resistance, he has been doing this on an island with no other bees within flying distance.
He has yet to breed any that are resistant.
I'm surprised that if there are already resistant bees he didn't get some semen imported and give himself a head start.
kiwi


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## Allen Dick

> She has the last word because she knows what she is talking about and is correct. When anyone has as many bees, placements, and employees as John and Sheri and never treats, please let Sheri know. I'm sure she will be glad to listen to your ideas.


Sheri and Harry summed it up, then we began drifting OT again. Why do these threads always get hijacked, and with the same old hobby horses? 

We're trying to think here, and such interruptions are distractions from the topic at hand. This thread is about _commercial beekeeping_ and whether there are credible commercial beekeepers who can be considered shining examples for those wishing to reduce or eliminate expensive and sometimes hazardous treatments to prevent or reduce bee diseases without risking their livelihood or reducing their standard of living for some quixotic and semantic goal.

We have a few candidates, but are unsure how "treatment-free" they are and if there are special circumstances, like stock, location, or activities like heavy splitting, which protect them from what commercial beekeepers have learned -- by hard and sometimes repeated experience -- is the eventual and inevitable result of not monitoring and "treating" proactively where indicated.

This thread is not about "natural beekeeping" or bee stocks. Natural beekeeping might be some Platonic ideal in the minds of some, but is only that from a commercial perspective. I suppose that the mention of "survivor" bee stock suggests ongoing breeding to some, but most commercials are likely to buy "survivor" stock as queens or cells on an ongoing basis and not try to develop and maintain it. 

The proper breeding and selection of "survivor" stock by definition means taking risks and accepting losses as well as keeping records that are beyond the ability or interest of most commercials. Most leave it to breeders and would at most propagate purchased stock a generation or two before replenishing the stock from a specialist.

Bee stocks _may_ enter into the question, and we know that there are indeed stocks which have proven quite robust in some situations, but we also know that all known bee stocks, challenged enough are at risk of collapse.

We know that running treatment-free is like ice climbing, driving without a seat belt or smoking a pack a day. Some people do it, but it is not considered prudent if surviving comfortably and intact long-term is an important goal.

This thread is about commercial beekeeping and whether it has been demonstrated convincingly enough, long enough and over sufficient geography that it is possible to operate without significant interventions long-term. The secondary question is then, "How do they do it, and could I do it, too?"

Even if we decide that reducing or even elimination interventions for extended periods is an option, I am sure we commercials or retired commercials are going to monitor and no matter how long we go without "treating", reserve the option to intervene and use whatever it takes to save our operation if indicated.

We also know that there is a new challenge coming which will need heroic measures to survive. We don't know what it is, or when it is coming, but when it does, we will take whatever measures we must.


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## StevenG

With apologies to the commercial beeks, as I'm only a sideliner, but I bought some queens and nucs (MnHyg) from Mark Sundberg earlier this week. Sundberg Apiaries, Fergus Falls, MN. He winters in Wiggins, MS where I met him and picked up the bees.

His father and co-driver were leaving Wed. am for the drive north, with 500 colonies and equipment. They're making their annual return now. He had colonies in almonds in CA also, but his colonies in MS were in much better shape than the ones he had in almonds. But that's another story.

Now, to the point. I asked him about treating the bees, as I don't treat, and buy bees that don't need treatment. He indicated the only treatment he gives his bees is thymol in the fall. That's all. In the conversation he indicated that he cannot afford to take any chances, even with MnHyg bees, which he uses because they don't need much in the way of treatment. So that ties in well with what Sheri is saying. I asked if I could mention him by name, and what he was doing, and he gave me permission. 

I also bought some Russians on the way back north to my home. In conversation with that breeder, he shook his head and warned me when I indicated I had some B. Weaver bees. Apparently "everyone knows" those bees are africanized. And yet, they are no more hot and certainly much more productive than my other bees. I'll be buying many more queens from them next year.

B. Weaver has been "shouting from the rooftops" about the quality of their bees via their website for several years now, and more people seem to be paying attention. Personally I'm kinda glad more beeks aren't buying from them, as it makes it easier for guys like me to get bees and queens from them.  If memory serves me right, my Weaver hives are 3 years old, never any treatment, and this year I did some walk-away splits from them to get more of those bees.

I wonder if there would ever be a commercial beek who, in the annual restocking, would put 50-100 or so Weaver colonies in one apiary as a test. Something motivated Sundberg to go to MnHyg bees, and only thymol in the fall... wish I had asked him what process he went thru to get to that point. Regards,
Steven


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## Ian

>>You are talking about survivor bees.He's likely referring to RNA interference.Bees have a built in RNA silencing system.Survivor bees can have integrated virus fragments in their genome which can then silence a viral infection by RNA interference.There's a company that's selling Ds RNA that can silence viral infections.
No kidding. 


Ya, thats what I am reffering to. 
I wont comment on it anyfurther , off topic and all


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## JBJ

"...so far we aren't convinced a true survivor queen exists." John & Sheri

Well,I wish I had time to participate in this thread, but it is nuc delivery and queen production time. Only 150 nucs next week, but it is enough to keep me from spending much time doing other things besides bee work. I will chime in more later, but I would like to say we identify mite tolerant survivor stock every year that can make the grade commercially (IE almond pollination and honey production). Does every daughter grafted from these queens turn out just like their mother? Not yet, but year to year survival without acaricide is possible and we will soon have genetic markers for the traits we are looking for. We hope to have our public stock selection program up and running by the end of the month. This will be a place where you cant document performance and statistics on would be survivor stock and help choose a round of breeder queens for all participants to receive daughters from. Should be some good observational science and queens in it for all who choose to participate. 

There is much to add to a great topic but the dandelions are blooming, the bees are flying and the nucs need a verifying... all Q+ hopefully!


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## Allen Dick

Thanks for the input StevenG. Your comments are quite to the point.

Something I should add is that the answers received are dependent on the question asked. 

When asked about treatments, a commercial beekeeper, especially one using IPM, will often say that they do not treat when he means that they do not treat _routinely_ or automatically. They may use topical treatments in cases where a hive or apiary requires it, or find need for an outfit-wide application while normally there are none.

It is sort of like asking someone if they give their kid penicillin. Most people will promptly say, no, but on reflection might say that, oh yes, our son did have an infection last year and penicillin was prescribed for a week.

I know beekeepers who have not treated for AFB for years, but are thinking they may need to this year or do so in specific situations.

The question is not cut and dried.


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## mike bispham

kiwiBee said:


> I would have thought if there were truely varroa resistant stock out there that it would be shouted from the roof tops,
> Why is it being kept so quiet?
> 
> If there are queen breeders out there that have resistant queens why isn't there a huge campaign to get them into as many hives as possible?


Yes there are such bees; yes it is shouted from the rooftops - but is drowned out by the much greater noise made by those with vested interests in maintaining profitable lines of treatment, and government regulators who fall for their intense professional lobbying.



kiwiBee said:


> So how do you do it? do you have 1000 hives and put aside 100 and never treat them and then breed from the survivors?


That would be one way - and some have gone that way - but they'd need to be isolated, and it is of course costly.

If you go to the links page at my website (from the bottom of this post) you will see some of the main players, and be able to read about what they do, and learn about how to do it yourself. 

You don't have to simply allow natural selection to run its course - to do so is expensive and unnecessary. The main things are to start to raise natural defences by reproducing from those colonies that exhibit signs of being able to handle varroa, and terminate the bloodlines of those that are most vulnerable. This acts as as a kind of accellerated natural selection, rapidly raising the numbers of the most resistant bloodlines in the population, while simultaniously reducing the numbers of the weakest. 

In the early stages you will want to save colonies by treating, and that is fine as long _as you requeen immediately to get rid of the weak bloodline_. Taking out drone brood at the same time removes the bloodline on the male side. This can be a good opportunity to bring in bred resistant queens. If you can't get hold of those then try to raise spares from your best colonies.

This, you may recognize, is mostly simply animal breeding as undertaken in all other fields of husbandry. 

Many beekeepers have reported that allowing the bees to choose what size to make their comb themselves has helped.



kiwiBee said:


> I could think of nothing better than being able to turn back the clock and be in a place where we didn't have to do anything about varroa so if there's a breeder out there with truely resistant stock dont keep it a secret!
> kiwi


Please don't take this the wrong way, but this kind of thinking displays a common misconception. It isn't the _kind of bee_ you have that really matters, it is _how you take care of its genetics through the generations_. The health of all animals will deteriorate steadily if the weak are allowed to contribute to the breeding pool in equal numbers to the strong. That is just how nature is. The key wrong step is treatment. When this mistake is compounded generation after generation, the result is organisms that can only stay alive through regular treatment; and the trap is laid: stop treating, and the stock will die. 

This of course is what the chemical companies thrive on...

Mike


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## mike bispham

Allen Dick said:


> Sheri and Harry summed it up, then we began drifting OT again. Why do these threads always get hijacked, and with the same old hobby horses?
> 
> We're trying to think here, and such interruptions are distractions from the topic at hand. This thread is about _commercial beekeeping_ and whether there are credible commercial beekeepers who can be considered shining examples for those wishing to reduce or eliminate expensive and sometimes hazardous treatments to prevent or reduce bee diseases without risking their livelihood or reducing their standard of living for some quixotic and semantic goal.


One wonders who is doing the hijacking...

The original poster asked (my italics):

"I've been wondering for a while now about _the whole survivor stock question_. Often there are posts on here that say "I haven't treated my bees for years"

I have a couple of questions I hope someone can answer for me.

Is this something that can be done when you are running thousands of hives? Is anyone doing it on a large scale?
If you are how where you able to make a living and honour pollination contracts while your bees where dying from PMS and other nasties?"

This far the poster has asked for general information, and for information specific to those running 'thousands of hives/on a large scale'. 

Now questions are asked about the bees themsleves:

"last of all are these survivor stock a particular breed of bee, Italian? Russian? or is it just any bee.?"

Finally an appeal is made for 'any feed back':

"Any feed back on this would be great as it's not something I've come across yet and have absolutley no clue about any of it!"

There doesn't seem to me to be any call, nor benefit, in limiting responses to this orginal set of questions solely to the single yes/no issue of whether of not any of the very large US outfits are successfully not treating. It seems to me that what the questioner would most like is information that helps with their particular circumstance. Am I right Kiwibee?

Mike


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## 123456789

Mike, seeing that this is the COMMERCIAL forum, I would assume the op was directing the question at COMMERCIAL beeks. The answer seems to be that there is no one on this board using survivor stock commercially.

Come on mods, every other forum turns into a treat/don't treat debate, can't we keep at least 1 forum for the bu$$ine$$ of beekeeping?


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## Tom G. Laury

Thank You 123456


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## Ian

>>Yes there are such bees; yes it is shouted from the rooftops - but is drowned out by the much greater noise made by those with vested interests in maintaining profitable lines of treatment, and government regulators who fall for their intense professional lobbying.


Give me a break. Same old argument.


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## kiwiBee

Mike in reply to the question what is it I really wanted to know and get info on this is what I was really wanting.
Firstly when I say commercial I mean anyone whos income is solely derived from beehives no matter whether it's honey, pollination or anything else but it has to be full time and able to support a family with no outside income.

I want to know if any beekeepers have bought enough resistant queens, or bred their own, to restock their entire outfit and from that moment have never used anything at all to treat for varroa, by that I mean no organic treatments no synthetic treatments no drone brood pulling no taking nucs no sugar shake, nothing, to me this is what treatment free means.

Hypothetically (sp?) if I could by 1000 queens from someone who says they are resistant and install them in my hives does that mean I will not have to treat those hives again while those particular queens are in them?
The other question is what is it about the" resistant" bees that makes them resistant? are we talking about hygenic traits or what? why dont varroa build up in the hive to the same extent?
kiwi


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## kiwiBee

Ian said:


> >>
> 
> 
> Give me a break. Same old argument.


what argument are you refering to Ian?
kiwi


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## Ian

>>Yes there are such bees; yes it is shouted from the rooftops - but is drowned out by the much greater noise made by those with vested interests in maintaining profitable lines of treatment, and government regulators who fall for their intense professional lobbying.


Argument, or maybe I meant comment.
Comments referring to corporate directing research and development of the industry. Comments referring to Big Pharma muting the real true answers to all of our problems just to be able to supply us with something to buy.

There are answere out there, and we are working on them. One sector is providing us with options, just as we hope the other sector will provide us with other options. The real trick is to invest our interest in both sectors, and control our problems economically and sustainably.


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## Ian

>>I've been wondering for a while now about the whole survivor stock question.
Often there are posts on here that say "I haven't treated my bees for years"
I have a couple of questions I hope someone can answer for me.

To comment on your original question,

Up here there is a project called the "Sackatraz" breeding project.
They are doing just as you are referring to in your question.

They have taken a bunch of bees, and selected merely on selection. Taking the best, breeding from them, and testing them, no treatments, no intervention, til they die. They select for many characteristics. Survival being one of the keys 

They have achieved great success. They are isolating many of the traits that have been discussed here. 

But one of the features of this project, is no intervention. Truely a survival test. They have been able to keep a hive going with varroa present for two seasons, then death on the third. Huge success. But as you can see, not what we think of when we talk of mite resistance. The mites still pull the hive down. Compounded with everything else we have here.

My comment on this, and your intended question.

I believe keeping bees is more than just bringing in the tolerant stock. I truly believe we have to battle bee disease problems from more than one angle. Be it breeding, treatments, management practices and techniques. We not only have to manage disease, we have to keep our business model healthy.

I know of beekeepers around here that are real progressive and innovative. They arent stuck in the same old "no treatment" box, or "treat til the hives cant take anymore" box. There are ways we can manipulate the hives to counter these pests. Many ideas, and many of them successful. These ideas counted with the ability to control the pest with treatments is making for a real viable option.

Just a few thoughts. take them for what they are worth. look at all the angles


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## Countryboy

_Does anyone know of any commercial beekeepers who have either developed and uses treatment free bees on a large scale or is using other's developed treatment free stock in a large commercial operation?
Is anyone close? If not treatment free, what is their next best thing, while considering application time, efficacy, and cost?_

Do you consider terramyacin as an AFB preventive to be a treatment?

Householder is commercial, but I don't know if you consider 800+ hives large scale. Aside from terramyacin, he doesn't use chemicals/essential oils/miticides in his hives. 

His approach is to buy package bees every spring, and install them in hives with frames spray filled full of syrup. The bees build up fast enough he can split them and still make a good honey crop. Because he is selling the blow bees (or they starve) he eliminates fighting the mites since the bees only last one season.

Honey production is what he does. He doesn't do any pollination, so that doesn't come into play for him.


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## kiwiBee

OK so am I right in saying that the bees can last 2 years without treatment then they collapse and die?

If this is the case would they not have a period of time before death that they are weak and useless for pollination or honey gathering?

Would 3 months before death of the hive be a reasonable time line for increased weakness and decreased healthy bee numbers?

Would it be fair to say that 2 years is not a very long time to be treatment free? considering if you treat twice a year then the 2 years is reduced to 18months or less is you are talking about a healthy hive.

How long has the "Sackatraz" project been running?

and the biggest problem is the end result of dead hives,
they dont produce any honey and they dont pollinate any plants 
kiwi


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## kiwiBee

Ian I like what you have to say here it's more in keeping with my view on things, which isn't to say that other views are not valid of course.
The one thing sure about beekeeping is that you learn something new every season and thst very cool.
QUOTE" I believe keeping bees is more than just bringing in the tolerant stock. I truly believe we have to battle bee disease problems from more than one angle. Be it breeding, treatments, management practices and techniques. We not only have to manage disease, we have to keep our business model healthy.

I know of beekeepers around here that are real progressive and innovative. They arent stuck in the same old "no treatment" box, or "treat til the hives cant take anymore" box. There are ways we can manipulate the hives to counter these pests. Many ideas, and many of them successful. These ideas counted with the ability to control the pest with treatments is making for a real viable option.

Just a few thoughts. take them for what they are worth. look at all the angles[/QUOTE]
The reason I first posted the question was because so many times I've read on here " I haven't treated my bees in years" 
So I'm thinking there has to be someone sitting on a gold mine if they can keep bees for 10 years and have no losses to varroa but on the other hand if that is truely possible why dont you all have them in your hives right now?

For those who say they haven't treated in years how many years is this?
and how many hives are you talking about?
kiwi


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## honeyshack

there in lies all the problems Kiwi.
"Sasktraz" boasts of high yield on the honey crops. However, if you are in isolation, there is no pressure from other bees, you are going to get good, really good crops.
I thing they would have seen a decrease in honey crop the second year by a bit of a noticeable difference, and the winter cluster the second year would be small. That means by Canada definitions, the bees would start to loose steam about July August, with Small winter clusters...September October, and death in the winter sometime. So....adding the cost of replacing bees @ Canada price of $140 - $175 for nucs (175 might be to high), add in the decrease of honey production...can buy alot of formic (MA2) for many hives at $37.00 for the treatment of 10. Can buy 1 large jar of Fumigilan and have $ to spare for treatment of 100 colonies in the spring or 50 wintering colonies.

did not even bother to add in the loss of a possible split in the spring or polllination...could be looking at total loss of $300-400 for one hive...
...how can one stay in business doing that?


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## honeyshack

kiwiBee said:


> For those who say they haven't treated in years how many years is this?
> and how many hives are you talking about?
> kiwi


How do they replace the stock that dies?
When they say they have low losses, is that because they have some hives that they split, easing the loss numbers?
Or are they treating the splits as new hives still taking in account the losses

Clear as mud?


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## arthur

I am just a rank amateur...but if you could buy from a producer who *sells* survivor stock, like B. Weaver, wouldn't you be at an advantage? B. Weaver hasn't used any chemicals in many years.

I find it interesting, this idea of a hive going for 2 seasons, without treatment for mites, and then dying off in the 3rd season, and this is a breakthrough. 

My first hive is on it's 4th season, never once used chemicals (started as a package from B. Weaver). Same with my father's hives (his all started from cutouts and swarms).


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## mike bispham

kiwiBee said:


> Mike in reply to the question what is it I really wanted to know and get info on this is what I was really wanting.
> Firstly when I say commercial I mean anyone whos income is solely derived from beehives no matter whether it's honey, pollination or anything else but it has to be full time and able to support a family with no outside income.


This it seems to me includes keepers who have fewer than 1000 hives and fewer than 500. (Pete, what would you say is the smallest number of hives supporting a beekeeper in your (UK) experience?) 

You know better than I what sort of numbers might be involved where you are. You know your local market best - whether pollination services or product sales form the larger income stream for example, and how much time you might be able to set aside should you want to explore the strategy of selective breeding. 

I'm not sure the advice about some of the US business models found here applies to you - valuable though it is. You might find that talking to the folks on the organicbeekeeping list would supply a completely different picture. Many of them are small commercial beekeepers who make a living without recourse to treatments. And we've heard from some here.

We've also heard - loud and clear - that the bigger outfits, particlarly those heavily dependent on trucking, feel this would be impossible for their operations. They simply wouldn't have the time to monitor health, keep the necessary records, and take the necessary steps to maintain health through selection.

What we're seeing I think is that for some business models - particularly the largest - the strategy of using bees and casting them aside when spent is more profitable than one of developing and holding a resistant bloodline of their own. If bred resistant bees offer better profitability then they'll do their calculations, and may buy in resistent bred bees - but may still treat to preserve any weak among them, and the weak that arise naturally. Some may still find it convenient and profitable to simply kill them at the end of each season. 

It seems that in the US a sector of the farming model has evolved that is dependent on vast numbers of bees, and that a range of beekeeping business models have evolved in response to meet their needs. In this sector the bottom line is often everything, and those whose business model is most profitable - regardless of what that means for bees - sets the pace. 

Unless you have a similar sector in NZ, and want to be a large and profitable player in that market, it would, I think, be worth looking for, and listening to, people who make a living from the bees in other ways. 



kiwiBee said:


> I want to know if any beekeepers have bought enough resistant queens, or bred their own, to restock their entire outfit and from that moment have never used anything at all to treat for varroa, by that I mean no organic treatments no synthetic treatments no drone brood pulling no taking nucs no sugar shake, nothing, to me this is what treatment free means.
> 
> Hypothetically (sp?) if I could by 1000 queens from someone who says they are resistant and install them in my hives does that mean I will not have to treat those hives again while those particular queens are in them?


Yes. Michael Bush would be a good example of a commercial keeper who has bred his own scrupulously treatment-free bees. Again the Lusbys. And yes, it should mean that.

If you want to maintain that position in subsequent generations, and want to add 'no monitoring or testing to locate the most hygienic and vigorous, no record keeping, no making splits from the best and taking out the weakest' to the list of things you won't be doing, then the answer biology gives you is: NO. There is no such bee, and there never will be. 



kiwiBee said:


> The other question is what is it about the" resistant" bees that makes them resistant? are we talking about hygenic traits or what? why dont varroa build up in the hive to the same extent?
> kiwi


Some of these questions are very much still under study, but yes, 'hygienic' traits are one of the keys. Looking up the work of Marla Spivak (from my links page) is one of the best ways to catch up on modern thinking. Michael Bush's pages are also very useful. Work your way through the top four links from here: http://www.suttonjoinery.co.uk/CCD/selected links.htm
and carry on down. 

Mike


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## mike bispham

error


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## mike bispham

JohnK and Sheri said:


> If one were breeding exclusively from overwintered survivors and keeping the stock strictly segregated, one could perhaps increase resistance from the breeding program plus maintain commercial viability by maintaining numbers with the generic production of nucs. To call them survivors they need to stand unpropped. I haven't heard of anyone with consistent survivability to year 3.


By 'consistent survivability' do you mean that the queens are good for three years, or that second generation queens are good in the third year Sheri?

I think your picture is good. Breeding from overwintered 'survivors' is exactly how to get strong replacements. But those survivors must NOT have been treated beforehand - or they won't be real survivors. That 'unpropped' of yours must go all the way back to their birth. 

The new queens heading your nucs must - as you imply - be fertilized by (a healthy proportion of) high-quality drones. 

I think it would be best to maintain the segregation through the summer months too, so that incoming blood from the inevitable supercedures and swarms is kept as strong as possible. The selecting apiary should also be remote from other treating beekeepers. 

This is effectively running two separate parallel apiaries as one business. 

Mike


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## HarryVanderpool

*Born Again stock commercial option?*

Putting the horse before the cart:
One thing we have not adressed is ones belief system.
Ok, here is a queen. It is from survivor stock.
Is it? Are you sure? Prove it!
Then after the spiel, you have to decide if you believe what you are told.
I tend to be a bit on the sceptical side as apposed to the sucker side.

For example, I live in a small community of about 12 families.
In the middle of our neighborhood is a large oak that is a bee tree.
The old timers here will boast that "Those bees have been there for 60 years!"
Reality check! They crash almost every year and are repopulated by swarms.
But I don't rain on their dream. It makes them feel good when they talk about it, and they are not even beekeepers!!

How about when some of these folks post that they don't be a good beekeeper and attend to their bees health issues when they arise and treat as nessisary; do you believe that?
Maybe they don't treat and their hives suck.
Or maybe, just maybe they do treat when nobody is looking.
It is up to each of us to decide in any event just what is believable.

Ask me about my bees and I'll tell you the good, bad and ugly.
Or as a senior beekeeper told me a few years back, "Its not perfection; its beekeeping!"


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## mike bispham

Ian said:


> Argument, or maybe I meant comment.


It doesn't hurt to point out from time to time:

a) that chemical companies are in business to make money, and you shouldn't expect them to tell you if using their products is actually harmful in the long run. Think tobacco industry for the most obvious example - but the same principle applies to both human and animal treatments. Their primary responsibilities are to their shareholders; their constraints are the regulators - and they do their utmost to reduce regulation to a bare minimum. It is their aim to get you addicted to their product, to become a long-term customer. Period.

b) that there is a conflict between the aims of research intended to supply treatments, and the aims of research inteded to raise the genetic health of bees. The more successful the former is, the harder the job of the latter becomes. The more successful the latter is, the less the need for the former.

In the very narrow confines of large operations both are undoubtedly useful, I agree. But what makes sense there does not necessarily make sense in the wider world, and we should be aware of that too. 

Mike


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## BEES4U

My supplier for I. I. queens has replaced the M. H. with a stock that's called Hygienic Italians.
:thumbsup:And, the selection was made from a *commercial bee keeper *that's very migratory.
It was explained to me that the bees were not treated for mites.
This stock is supposed to carry a higher VSH than the M.H.
I will start grafting in a few days off the new breeder queens.
Regards,
Ernie


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## 123456789

I've been using survivor stock for 30+ years. After extensive research I've found that non-survivors produce poor honey crops.


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## Ian

kiwi 

I think alot of the problems come from disease pressures. We Keep bees in concentration. Even the most tolerant stock will succumb to disease under high pressure. 
I think if we can keep our disease pressures low, with the help of treatments. We will be able to use tolerant stocks to help delay or post pone treatments. 
How many beekeepers who are making the claim of no treatments have a few hives, and are isolated from any other beekeeper around?
I bet most of them,


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## Ian

>>I've been using survivor stock for 30+ years. After extensive research I've found that non-survivors produce poor honey crops


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## JBJ

"It is from survivor stock.
Is it? Are you sure? Prove it!" HV

Harry, proof is what we are after, as well as true breeding lines. The stock selection program we will soon be launching will publicly track survivability, production, mite/disease counts, and management activities. Through documented observation we will be able to make good selection decisions and test potential survivor stock for real capabilities and measure them. So far we have several Phd types, other queen producers, and many citizen scientist beeks signing on to participate. Over time time I expect we will see queens with a range of mite tolerance and production capabilities; some will be exceptional, some may not be, but the best of the best will be chosen for further propagation and distribution.

Duty calls.. 300 ripe cells tomorrow...
JBJ


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## Keith Jarrett

JBJ;534969Over time time I expect we will see queens with a range of mite tolerance and production capabilities; some will be exceptional said:


> Yes, mabe with-in the next 100 years, but in the mean TIME treat if you want a high number of survivors next spring.
> 
> Hey JBJ, 300 thats called duty. Your killing me with this HEAVY work load talk.


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## Nick Noyes

Having purchased queens advertised as survivor stock or treatment free from several producers in the U.S. I am going to say that we are not there yet. The ball is rolling which is great but we have a ways to go before there are honeybees that require no treatments for pests and disease.
I do believe there are bees out there that can go without treatment for several years if the conditions are favorable and they are somewhat isolated.
I think JBJ's program along with others out there are an excellent idea.
Just for the record all my income comes from commercial beekeeping and I would be glad to buy anyones survivor stock to try out. Keep in mind though they will be used to pollinate almonds possibly another crop and produce a honey crop. They also have to be gentle enough to be manageable and keep me in good graces with the landowners we keep bees on.
If there are treatment free bees out there wouldn't large commercial beekeepers benifit most from this?


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## Countryboy

_Michael Bush would be a good example of a commercial keeper who has bred his own scrupulously treatment-free bees. _

Michael Bush is not a commercial beekeeper. He has a day job to support himself. I believe he has said he has around 200 hives. This would be considered a sideliner.

_Again the Lusbys. _

Are the Lusby's to the point of being commercial yet? I've never heard of Dee producing much honey, and for years the Lusby's were supported with taxpayer dollars via federal research grants. (Not the corporate model I want to see commercial beekeepers using.)

_By 'consistent survivability' do you mean that the queens are good for three years, or that second generation queens are good in the third year Sheri?_

I believe Sheri means that after 3 years of not treating a hive for mites, the hives are dead. Some of the so-called survivor stock might be able to live for 2 years with no treatments, but die in the 3rd year. Consistent survivability means they can survive after 3 or more years.


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## habutti

Countryboy said:


> _By 'consistent survivability' do you mean that the queens are good for three years, or that second generation queens are good in the third year Sheri?
> I believe Sheri means that after 3 years of not treating a hive for mites, the hives are dead. Some of the so-called survivor stock might be able to live for 2 years with no treatments, but die in the 3rd year. Consistent survivability means they can survive after 3 or more years._


Most commercial Beekeepers if not all, requeen on a yearly basis, are you really planning on keeping this queen for 3 years in your production hives, really? I'm sure a lot of commercial queen producers will not recommend that. I can see the 3 years being used for benchmarking purposes, but to keep a queen in a commercial outfit for that long may not fly with many.


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## Countryboy

I said nothing about keeping queens for 3 years. 

Can the hive survive for 3 years with no mite treatments? Requeen every year of you want. Will you still have a viable colony after 3 years of no treatments?


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## Michael Bush

>Michael Bush is not a commercial beekeeper. He has a day job to support himself. I believe he has said he has around 200 hives. This would be considered a sideliner.

True.

>Are the Lusby's to the point of being commercial yet? I've never heard of Dee producing much honey, and for years the Lusby's were supported with taxpayer dollars via federal research grants. (Not the corporate model I want to see commercial beekeepers using.)

Lusby's have done nothing but keep bees for their living for many years. They were around a 1,000 hives when Ed was alive. Dee is down to about 600 last I heard now that she has to do it all herself without Ed. If she ever got any significant amount of money for research (which I doubt) she has not taken any money for research in more than a decade. Seems to me if you make your living in bees you are commercial.


----------



## mike bispham

habutti said:


> I believe Sheri means that after 3 years of not treating a hive for mites, the hives are dead. Some of the so-called survivor stock might be able to live for 2 years with no treatments, but die in the 3rd year. Consistent survivability means they can survive after 3 or more years.
> 
> Most commercial Beekeepers if not all, requeen on a yearly basis, are you really planning on keeping this queen for 3 years in your production hives, really? I'm sure a lot of commercial queen producers will not recommend that. I can see the 3 years being used for benchmarking purposes, but to keep a queen in a commercial outfit for that long may not fly with many.


The need for such regular requeening indicates the depth of the problem; and at some point I think we will have to look at the other side of the pest-predator relation if we really want to understand what is going on and find ways of increasing resistance to varroa. 

What I mean is this. Studies of wild/feral survivor bees have indicated that an important part of what enables individuals to survive is actually co-evolution of mite and bee to a relation that suits both.[1] Those mites that are so aggressive that they kill their hosts tend to die themselves (and so not pass that trait on) while gentler strains of mite that allow their hosts to flourish tend to survive and reproduce. 

Only part of the (natural) solution therefore lies in the bee - the other half lies in the mite. 'Resistance' is a two-way street, an equation - and we're only looking at one side.

This is consistent with the standard well-established biological understanding of predator-host relations. Organisms are in a constant 'arms race' with their predators, a state biologists call 'unstable equilibrium'. Both sides constantly seek advantage - though the predator (unless it has alternative prey) cannot kill or cripple its prey without undermining its own food source.

This should lead us to ask how we can understand this relation in apiaries, and reduce the aggressiveness of apiary mites. One way to approach that question might be to ask how it is mites in apiaries get to be so aggressive, and take steps to allow gentler strains to increase their numbers. The answer is that the beekeeper protects the food source by maintaining the bees at high numbers even when under attack by aggressive mites. The beekeepers counter-attacks with bred queens and chemicals simply offers easy obstacles that the mites can pass by evolving traits that sidestep them.

If that makes sense it might be worth stepping back now and looking at what has been said. Some operations breed highly aggressive 'supermites' - far more aggressive than could occur in nature - _and this is very much part of the problem_. 

Will it ever be possible to breed queens that cope with such mites on an ongoing basis? No, biology tells us. While the mites are supplied with such queens AND given the habitat in which evolving to take advantage of this protected food source is possible, they mites will continually race the breeders. The fallout from that race will be large numbers of deaths on both sides - that is, colony failures.

The _most powerful supermites _are being incubated in large numbers in outfits _using the best queens and simultaniously treating against varroa.

This is a race to the bottom, a vicious never-ending downward spiral. 

It seems to me that the ONLY place bees and varroa can be bought into balance is the places they are kept. Outside breeders can help, but only the operaters can fix things. And the only possible way of fixing things is to systematically select against varroa-vulnerable strains bee.

There is of course another feature to this situation, as and when these 'supermites' are transmitted to other apiaries, they force them to adopt the same methods just to keep their bees alive. Those operators breeding super-mites can be seen to be making a very significant contribution to the continuing problem felt by everybody. 

Mike

[1] http://fotb.drogon.org/library/feral_bees/Seeley_Arnot_feral.pdf
See Discussion, Section 4_


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## HarryVanderpool

JBJ;534969The stock selection program we will soon be launching will publicly track survivability said:


> John, Your program sounds very interesting. I look forward to watching it progress. Maybe you will publish results from time to time?
> Just one request: Please do not breed the Promiscuity out of them.
> There are already too many breeders peddling Nervous Nellies.


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## Allen Dick

> Lusby's have done nothing but keep bees for their living for many years. ... If she ever got any significant amount of money for research (which I doubt) she has not taken any money for research in more than a decade. Seems to me if you make your living in bees you are commercial.


This is always a sensitive subject, and I usually try to stay away from discussing anyone's personal finances, but inasmuch as this particular case is central the question at hand, and comes up often as an example to follow, let me say this just once:

First, I like and admire Dee Lusby and enjoyed Ed when he was alive, so I do not wish to take anything away from them. They deserve a lot of credit and have contributed to the industry by stimulating discussion and demonstrating things others would have thought impossible. 

What I relate here, I think is _not _confidential, although it makes me uncomfortable to repeat it even though I am sure it is public knowledge, at least among their friends so I seldom say more than, "Take a closer look".

That said, when I met Lusbys, they were living in a small windowless building on an industrial lot next to the freeway in Tucson where -- as I recall -- Dee had previously had a concrete lawn ornament business and where they were currently running the bee operation. They were living and operating on a shoestring as I understood it. That was understandable, since they had been through several die-offs and rebuildings. You can read my Bee Culture article written after the first visit here on Beesource and on my own website.

At that time, Lusbys owned two properties in Tucson and Dee mentioned that she had some family money behind her. I do not know the details, but I am assuming that the sale of the properties, should have provided some considerable income, due to the phenomenal growth of the city around them and I am assuming again that this greatly assisted in the purchase of the current property at Arivaca junction. I was there when the purchase was being considered, and we went out and looked it over, but I did not ask details, of course.

I mention this background only inasmuch a major criterion for being considered a successful commercial beekeeping operation -- most of us would think -- is that an operation should generate a net profit over some period of time after calculating returns to capital and owners' labour and assumption is made that the Lusby bee operation makes money.

I see no evidence of that in the Lusby case and no proof has been offered. Therefore my admonition is that anyone wanting to follow in that path should start with an inherited bee operation, a trust fund, and several valuable properties in a fast-growing city.

As I say, this is what I know and any corrections and additions will be much appreciated.


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## Countryboy

_The need for such regular requeening indicates the depth of the problem; _

Huh? What problem are you referring to? Annual requeening has NOTHING to do with varroa.

Fresh, well bred queens lay much better than older queens. In commercial operations, queens that lay more eggs translates into dollars in your pocket. A high population hive makes you more money than a low population hive.


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## mike bispham

But if you didn't requeen annually the hive would like be dead after 3 years (if not treated)? Or the hive would perish despite requeening?

I'm trying to understand the basis on which you've written:

"I believe Sheri means that after 3 years of not treating a hive for mites, the hives are dead. Some of the so-called survivor stock might be able to live for 2 years with no treatments, but die in the 3rd year. Consistent survivability means they can survive after 3 or more years."

I'd assumed that the 'hive' you refer to would be the same colony - that is headed by the same queen. Could you clarify?

Mike


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## Countryboy

_But if you didn't requeen annually the hive would like be dead after 3 years (if not treated)? Or the hive would perish despite requeening?
_

The hive/colony would perish by the end of year 3 plain and simple. As stated before, it does not matter if you requeen or not. 

_I'd assumed that the 'hive' you refer to would be the same colony - that is headed by the same queen. Could you clarify?_

You do know what happens when you assume, right?

I believe the standard definition of a hive is a colony of bees. It does NOT matter what queen heads up the colony. I have no idea how you are confusing the queen to be the superorganism known as a hive of honeybees.

By the end of year 3, the superorganism known as a colony of bees will be dead if you do not treat. This is the experience of commercial beekeepers.


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## mike bispham

Countryboy said:


> I believe the standard definition of a hive is a colony of bees. It does NOT matter what queen heads up the colony. I have no idea how you are confusing the queen to be the superorganism known as a hive of honeybees.


It make ALL the difference if you are trying to understand the role of genetics in the health of the colony! 

A requeened colony is a different individual. This completely alters the way subsequent problems will be interpreted. When you are discussing breeding, and its effect, this is the only thing that matters. 

Mike


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## Barry

Allen Dick said:


> although it makes me uncomfortable to repeat it
> 
> [snip]
> 
> I am assuming
> 
> [snip]
> 
> I am assuming again
> 
> [snip]
> 
> but I did not ask details, of course.
> 
> [snip]
> 
> As I say, this is what I know and any corrections and additions will be much appreciated.


First Dennis, now Dee. When you don't know something to be the truth or factual, it's best not to say anything.


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## StevenG

Regarding the issue of annual requeening, that process has been done for decades, long before the arrival of varroa. The purpose of requeening is to have a vigorous queen to maintain colony populations for both honey production, and overwintering. 

The varroa mite doesn't care what queen is in the hive, they're going to breed anyway. In fact, if asked, the varroa mites would probably prefer a young and prolific queen, as that would give them more larvae/pupae to feed on.  And requeening does not break the brood cycle, unless you do that on purpose. But when going for honey production, you don't want to break the brood cycle.


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## heaflaw

It seems to me that the problem with having treatment-free colonies to survive continuously is that when they requeen themselves, the new queens may not mate with treatment free drones. The colony is no longer of treatment-free genetics. Maybe that is why many commercial and hobbyists' experience is that the advertised treatment-free colonies only survive 2 years.


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## JohnK and Sheri

To clear up any confusion, when I say the bees don't survive to year 3, I am referring to colonies started with "survivor" queens and left untreated. They may and often do survive their first winter, Year 2 shows an increase in mite loads which dooms the colony to death over their second winter, if they even make it that far. It makes little or no difference if they are not requeened at all, or requeened through reproductive swarm, with similar genetics, by supercedure or with totally different genetics. The mite load grows until it becomes terminal. If they are not supplemented with fresh bees and brood from a mite free outside source they are doomed. There seems to be no commercial stocks that are commercially viable without intervention.

When I talk of "consistant" survivability, I'm not just talking longevity, I am also referring to the ability to replicate the outcome. We have a few claiming their bees don't need treatment but when put to real world conditions, their results cannot be replicated. Giving credence to these bees having treatment free survivability should entail the results being duplicatable under normal commercial conditions, otherwise the claims, to current commercial purposes, is irrelevant. Changing the normal commercial conditions to accommodate the bees is the topic for another thread.

All this is not to say the efforts to develop more mite resistant bees isn't a worthy goal. Those breeders deserve our support, but we should remember that this is a work in progress. As of now there seems to be no "finished product" available. 
Sheri


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## heaflaw

I don't believe the treatment-free people are lying about their success and the reasoning of developing treatment-free bees makes perfect sense. And I believe the commercial guys would love to go treatment free if possible but their experiences with treatment-free has not been good so far. The problem is figuring why it works for some, but not for others. Is it the rigors of being moved about, etc? Maybe the changes in locale and climate and flows at different times upsets the balance of bees/mites?


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## Ian

>>the varroa mites would probably prefer a young and prolific queen, as that would give them more larvae/pupae to feed on

ya, except the young queen has the ability to keep laying strong and steady being able to out pace mite reproduction. 
it looks like, when we keep that old queen, we are providing an advantage to the mites. As the older queen slows her laying later in the season ( and she does) the mite reproduction keeps pace over running the hives thresholds.

The word off some of these survivor projects is that the hive is doing just that. Replacing the queen sooner. ANd one of the ways they replace that old queen in through swarming.
A swarmy hive has an advantage over varroa. Brood interuption, and queen replacement.
Might be one of the ways Africanized bees are able to tolerate mites better.

Just a thought. A swarmy bee is exactly what we as beekeepers try to eliminate.


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## odfrank

Barry said:


> First Dennis, now Dee. When you don't know something to be the truth or factual, it's best not to say anything.


I found his post to be the most informed insight into the subject that I have read and long suspected.


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## HarryVanderpool

JohnK and Sheri said:


> All this is not to say the efforts to develop more mite resistant bees isn't a worthy goal. Those breeders deserve our support, but we should remember that this is a work in progress. As of now there seems to be no "finished product" available.
> Sheri


Many of us worry that, because of all of the hype, breeders are taking their eyes off of traits that make a REALLY GOOD HONEYBEE and focusing mainly on mite resistance.
This has shown through in the recent past with ill tempered and swarmy bees.
No thanks.
Given my choice, I will take bees that require a bit of care but make beekeeping fun and profitable.
So I agree with Sheri that the work is worthwhile, IF the resultant bees are AT LEAST as good as others available.
Gentleness, strong buildup, honey production and longevity. I am not willing to give up any amount of those traits in exchange for mite resistance. Mites are just too easy to control to make that exchange.


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## 123456789

Indeed. We are told to dismiss (without explanation)anything the chemical companies say because they're in it for money. 
Yet those with a survivor stock/treatment free agenda are willing to blindly follow breeders who have carved a niche for themselves selling survivor stock queens (Weavers). Aren't they a for profit outfit?

6 hives 20 years ago huh? :applause:


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## Tom G. Laury

Very concise Sheri and to the point. Couldn't agree more.

Allen thank you for the insight makes a lot more sense now.


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## Countryboy

_It make ALL the difference if you are trying to understand the role of genetics in the health of the colony! _

I wasn't aware we were discussing that. We were discussing the period of time before the mite load collapses the colony.

_A requeened colony is a different individual. _

Yep, one bee different. When you look at the colony a week ago with the old queen, and now a week later with a new queen, any difference will likely be very difficult to quantify.

_This completely alters the way subsequent problems will be interpreted. _

I wasn't aware subsequent problems were being discussed. What was being discussed was the problems right here, right now, and the need for immediate solutions.

_When you are discussing breeding, and its effect, this is the only thing that matters. _

I wasn't aware we were discussing queen breeding. What was being discussed was how long an untreated commercial colony lives without treatment. Since requeening does not reset the mite load to zero, it is irrelevant if the colony is requeened. If a new queen is introduced, the mite pressures pick up where they left off with the previous queen.

If you want to discuss the intricacies of queen breeding to control varroa, I believe that is fodder for the queen breeding forum.


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## Barry

Allen posted his comments and I posted mine. I will not permit further discussion on assumptions and hearsay as this borders on a personal attack and invasive of a person's privacy. ("I usually try to stay away from discussing anyone's personal finances")


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## The Honey Householder

Ok. In my operation 6-7 months is the survival rating, unless shaken and taken to greener fields.:lookout:
With out treatments you are wasting your time. Which treatment I DON'T KNOW!!!!!:scratch:
I gave up years ago and just go after the Honey Money.opcorn:


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## StevenG

" >>the varroa mites would probably prefer a young and prolific queen, as that would give them more larvae/pupae to feed on

ya, except the young queen has the ability to keep laying strong and steady being able to out pace mite reproduction. 
it looks like, when we keep that old queen, we are providing an advantage to the mites. As the older queen slows her laying later in the season ( and she does) the mite reproduction keeps pace over running the hives thresholds.

The word off some of these survivor projects is that the hive is doing just that. Replacing the queen sooner. ANd one of the ways they replace that old queen in through swarming."

Hmmm I concede the point, Ian. What you say makes sense. While I have a couple of hives past the three year threshold, I'll have more in 2011, and even more in 2012. It will be very interesting to see what that brings for me.

One point I think bears understanding in this discussion is, that the bees you start with may very well determine your success. Seems like a beek has two options - buy survivor bees, or breed your own. Personally I'm not willing to go to the risk, expense, and years to breed my own. I'll buy them, and use them, and so far have been enjoying them. But time is, it seems, the great arbiter of this particular discussion! 
Regards,
Steven


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## honeyshack

I think there is one thing that we are forgetting in this whole discussion on varroa resistance.
Basically the proponents of varroa resistance support the claim that bees can live with varroa. That because they are resistant to them, we can then go about our daily lives and not worry about treating them. The bees will be majically healthier.

What we are forgetting is, we can have all the varroa resistance we want. We can introduce that into the hives, and in a perfect world, the varroa can live along side the bees...BUT what we are forgetting are the viruses that the varroa leave in their wake...and probably the reason hives crash before year three.

No amount of requeening will sustain the hive when the viruses reach the threshold

If you want varroa resitant queens, you need some way to also supress the viruses they bring with them


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## mike bispham

JohnK and Sheri said:


> To clear up any confusion [..] It makes little or no difference if they are not requeened at all, or requeened through reproductive swarm, with similar genetics, by supercedure or with totally different genetics. The mite load grows until it becomes terminal.
> 
> There seems to be no commercial stocks that are commercially viable without intervention.


Would you say Sheri that as such stock can survive under smaller apiary conditions, it is conditions found in large apiaries that are the 'survivability' factor?



JohnK and Sheri said:


> We have a few claiming their bees don't need treatment but when put to real world conditions, their results cannot be replicated.


Perhaps these 'real world conditions' are an environment under which no bee could ever have 'survived'. Modern large-scale commercial keeping may have evolved to a point where competitive economic factors force a kind of management under which no bee will ever 'survive' - and none will be put to the - true - test. No trucker will ever be able to undertake the evaluations and make the necessary arrangements to reproduce only from best, eliminate the weakest. Competitive pressure, and/or the imperative for the best bottom line will demand fresh queens - and their genetics in terms of such things as 'hygienic behaviours will remain of little importance.

Surely we have to find a way to describe this that does not include the word 'beekeeping'. It is, to put it bluntly 'bee-using'. 

I understand no why key terms mean something completely different here. This is a parallel universe to the one in which the aims of restoring broad-spectrum health to bees are one of the key aims. 'Survivor' and 'survivability' here mean something entirely different. 



JohnK and Sheri said:


> All this is not to say the efforts to develop more mite resistant bees isn't a worthy goal. Those breeders deserve our support, but we should remember that this is a work in progress. As of now there seems to be no "finished product" available.
> Sheri


There will, it seems, be two parallel efforts. Perhaps there already are.

One will aim to meet the demands of truckers, raising bees designed to be treatment-free in the trucking environment. The aim: to create queens that will perform well for one year - preferably without any sort of treatment. 

The other will aim to restore to bees 'survivability' in its fuller sense - the ability to combat the present disease environment on an ongoing basis - the ability to thrive under a selective management regime treatment-free.

What will be the effect of drones from the first group mating with queens from the second? Should this be of any concern to truckers?

Mike


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## WI-beek

One thing I think that non migratory beeks forget is that they stay in one location. Bees can survive with a higher mite loads if the mites are not carrying viruses. If you move into almonds or any place where your bees mix with other bees you can pick up viruses from transfered mites or your bees pick them up and the mites make short work of spreading them around. 

Another point to keep in mind is that as long as we keep bees like live stock, we put them in unnatural overpopulated conditions. Imagine people (Us) trying to live without doctors and medicine. Yes we could have a policy of let the tuff survive and the week parish, but in the end there would be few of us left and for good healthy survivor stock you would sacrifice everything else.

My point: I believe we should be breeding better stock through genetic selection, natural selection or what have you, but at the same time I think we should be developing new and better medicine. Oh, and dont forget, if a magic bullet (Gene) is found and everyone wants it, you will end up with even less genetic variation than we have now. What will you do when the next problem arrives and you have little genetic variation to work with.

When people start starving, Hamburger is $20 a pound, Milk $30 a gallon, you have to be rich to eat fruit, then you will see real progress made with medicine or cures for bees and beekeepers. Until then this is just an unimportant subject about bees and beekeepers. Sorry, all your tax dollars are going to get spent on sending some idiots to Mars in 20 years or..............


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## kiwiBee

I have to take issue with you on this Mike.

I can only speak for myself and the other commercial beekeepers that I know personally. 
To say that commercial beekeepers that truck their bees dont care about what bees they have and will take any queen available is just not right.
The beekeepers I know are successful because they take the time to select good breeder queens or bring in good queens from reliable and proven breeders if your livelyhood relys on your bees you are going to want the best you can get.



mike bispham said:


> No trucker will ever be able to undertake the evaluations and make the necessary arrangements to reproduce only from best, eliminate the weakest. Competitive pressure, and/or the imperative for the best bottom line will demand fresh queens - and their genetics in terms of such things as 'hygienic behaviours will remain of little importance
> 
> 
> 
> [ QUOTE] Surely we have to find a way to describe this that does not include the word 'beekeeping'. It is, to put it bluntly 'bee-using'.
> 
> I understand no why key terms mean something completely different here. This is a parallel universe to the one in which the aims of restoring broad-spectrum health to bees are one of the key aims. 'Survivor' and 'survivability' here mean something entirely different.
> 
> There will, it seems, be two parallel efforts. Perhaps there already are.
> 
> One will aim to meet the demands of truckers, raising bees designed to be treatment-free in the trucking environment. The aim: to create queens that will perform well for one year - preferably without any sort of treatment.
> 
> The other will aim to restore to bees 'survivability' in its fuller sense - the ability to combat the present disease environment on an ongoing basis - the ability to thrive under a selective management regime treatment-free.
> Mike
> 
> 
> 
> In this you are being very derogatory towards large commercial "BEEKEEPERS "and I use the word beekeepers because once again if your livelyhood relys on your bees you will look after them.
> how many times have I read on here comments like
> " I just let my bees requeen by swarming" or
> "I dont mind if my bees swarm" or
> " I've just been to look in my hive and they are all dead and stinky they were ok the last time I looked 3 months ago" or
> "It's been so cold and wet the last 2 weeks I haven't had a chance to look at my bees"
> these are comments that are posted all the time and there's many more examples but I bet not one of them has been posted by a so called "bee user trucker" because they care about their bees and need them healthy and alive!
> And just to finish my rant and get it right of my double D chest.
> 
> I would hate to have my bees near any of you guys that let your bees swarm willy nilly taking all their mites and foulbrood to be spread through all the hives in the area, not to mention having our queens mating with your swarmers.
> Guess I'm lucky I've got a couple of really good hobbyists and a commercial with bees close by and all of them are good beekeepers not bee users!
> 
> now I feel better
> kiwi
Click to expand...


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## kiwiBee

I really stuffed up the quote thingy on my previous post I dont know how to work it.:doh:
sorry for the confusion but I dont even know how to fix it!
another reason I'm a beekeeper and not a webmaster


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## Nick Noyes

Thank You kiwiBee
Couldn't have said it better myself.
If large scale commercial beekeepers didn't care there would be a lot of hungry people out there. Most don't do it for the fame and money.


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## mike bispham

Nick Noyes said:


> Thank You kiwiBee
> Couldn't have said it better myself.
> 
> If large scale commercial beekeepers didn't care there would be a lot of hungry people out there. Most don't do it for the fame and money.


Oh come off it Nick! Large-scale commercial beekeepers run their beloved bees and themselves into the ground as a charitable activity to save the world from starvation? 

The idea that the world would starve - of even go hungrier than it now is - were there no large scale beekeepers is an equal nonsense - one repeated so often its come to be regarded as axiomatic - but nonsense nontheless. Here are a few reasons why:


The proportion of food reliant on pollination is a tiny percentage of the total food requirement. 

Alternative pollinators are available to replace bees. 

Honey is a luxury item - nobody has to have honey

If large scale farms dependent on bees went out of business, the cost of their produce would rise (mimimally), and small-scale farms would become competetive and pick up the supply


I could go on. 

Mike


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## DRUR

honeyshack said:


> What we are forgetting is, we can have all the varroa resistance we want. We can introduce that into the hives, and in a perfect world, the varroa can live along side the bees...BUT what we are forgetting are the viruses that the varroa leave in their wake...and probably the reason hives crash before year three. No amount of requeening will sustain the hive when the viruses reach the threshold. If you want varroa resitant queens, you need some way to also supress the viruses they bring with them


Yes, and Weaver claims [and it has worked for me and others] that their queens are resistant to mites and the viruses and other bee pathogens.

http://www.beeweaver.com/bee_keeping_practices.html

*Comment:* I wonder if you have tried their queens. Maybe before you say it can't be done you might base that statement on experience.

Kindest Regards
Danny


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## kiwiBee

Mike,
you say that large scale beekeepers run their bees into the ground.
I dont get this? 
Why do you say it? what have you yourself observed in large scale commercial outfits that leads you to this conclusion?
It would be good if you could post some specific examples that you have come across so I can understand what you are saying because to me it makes no sense.
Ta much
kiwi


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## Keith Jarrett

mike bispham said:


> Oh come off it Nick!


Yeah Nick, come off it, BTW, what is he coming off of ? 

Yeah, lets let hobbiest & wild bees pollinate the almonds & apples ect...

Yeah, lets let the do-gooders have a shot at it.


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## DRUR

kiwiBee said:


> what have you yourself observed in large scale commercial outfits that leads you to this conclusion?
> It would be good if you could post some specific examples that you have come across so I can understand what you are saying because to me it makes no sense kiwi


I doubt that the nature of mankind in New Zealand is much different from the nature of mankind here. For many [not all] it is money that determines the managment procedures. Many [certainly not all] commercial beeks have little regard for chemical contamination of pollen and honey. Many do what they can get by with, without consideration of the consequences that their product will cause on those who consume their contaminated products. Their continuous treatments cause a population of dependant bees, dependant on man's intervention in a detrimental manner. Then our resistant drones must compete with their dependant drones, thereby hurting those who are trying to produce resistant bees who need no treatment, even though it may cause a reduction in nectar production resulting in less money, in the short term. Those of us who want resistant bees think of the long term benefits, not just of the dollar.

Sorry Kiwibee, I just don't understant your way of thinking.

Kindest Regards
Danny Unger


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## Keith Jarrett

DRUR said:


> Many [certainly not all] commercial beeks have little regard for chemical contamination of pollen and honey.
> Sorry , I just don't understant your way of thinking.
> 
> Kindest Regards
> Danny Unger


Well, I know many commercial beeks that have high regard for chemical contamination of COMB, if you think it's cheap to replace contaminated comb think again.


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## Tom G. Laury

There's them that do, and them that talk a lot.


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## DRUR

Keith Jarrett said:


> Well, I know many commercial beeks that have high regard for chemical contamination of COMB,


I also know some and if you notice I qualified my statement. But I have seen those mite treatment black corrugated strips applied in colonies during the honey flow, haven't you Keith? Isn't that a 'no no'?

Regards
Danny


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## arthur

DRUR said:


> Yes, and Weaver claims [and it has worked for me and others] that their queens are resistant to mites and the viruses and other bee pathogens.
> 
> http://www.beeweaver.com/bee_keeping_practices.html
> 
> *Comment:* I wonder if you have tried their queens. Maybe before you say it can't be done you might base that statement on experience.
> 
> Kindest Regards
> Danny


I've tried them. I'm on my 4th season with my original hive, no chemical treatment, same colony. Moreover, it's thriving, not just surviving.


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## Ian

>>Hmmm I concede the point, Ian. What you say makes sense

StevenG,

I wasnt trying to make a case against you. You are absolutly right in your point. 

>>the varroa mites would probably prefer a young and prolific queen, as that would give them more larvae/pupae to feed on

Big hives crash hard unless that queen can maintain her strong laying pace. Big hives also prey on weaker ones, usually failing to disease. Mites in many cases. These hive will bring in loads of mites which in turn sickens the hive.

>>If you want varroa resitant queens, you need some way to also supress the viruses they bring with them 

I agree with Honeyshack.


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## kiwiBee

DRUR said:


> I doubt that the nature of mankind in New Zealand is much different from the nature of mankind here. For many [not all] it is money that determines the managment procedures. Many [certainly not all] commercial beeks have little regard for chemical contamination of pollen and honey. Many do what they can get by with, without consideration of the consequences that their product will cause on those who consume their contaminated products.


I dont know where you get your info to base the above statement on but my guess is you are mixing with the wrong type of beekeepers. In my own experience the amount of commercial beekeepers that have the attitiude you describe is minimal.
Mankind in NZ is the same as mankind anywhere else but our food safety regulations wont allow any contaminated honey be sold.
Use of Terramysin ( spelt wrong) is banned if you get foulbrood you burn your hive it's also tested for in your honey and comb.
Use of PDB is banned and all honey and comb is tested for this.
All honey is tested for residues from mite treatments.

[QUOTE/] Their continuous treatments cause a population of dependant bees, dependant on man's intervention in a detrimental manner. Then our resistant drones must compete with their dependant drones, [/QUOTE]

Your "resistant" drones do not need to compete with their "dependant" drones if what you are doing is so successful why are you all not artificiallly inseminating your queens and doing it properly rather than leaving it to chance what drones your " resistant" queens are mating with?
makes no sense to me, 

[QUOTE/] Sorry Kiwibee, I just don't understant your way of thinking.

Kindest Regards
Danny Unger[/QUOTE]

Thats fine Danny because I dont understand yours either
kiwi


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## honeyshack

DRUR said:


> Yes, and Weaver claims [and it has worked for me and others] that their queens are resistant to mites and the viruses and other bee pathogens.
> 
> 
> Kindest Regards
> Danny


please note where i live...Canada...B Weaver...have yet to find them here. However i do use queens that boast of hygenic traits

Life is my experience as well as bees, cows, pigs and chickens....

If bees, as small as they are can be resistant to viruses, we as humans, as well as bovines should show resistant to several diseases that have plagued us for eons. To name just a few...the plague, small pox, black leg, roto virus, BVB, IBR, the common cold, ...just a few that we have yet to eradicate via genetics. One big one that comes to mind is the yearly flu. And for some reason, flu shots are recommended yearly, and each year the shot is slightly modified to catch the more virulent (sp) for that year. Last i heard the WHO was worried about a global pandemic, and with Sars and H1N1, we have come close to pandemics....if there was such a thing as breeding genetics, we should see some in our new born babies by now. I mean the flu and the plague and the common cold have been around sooooo long 

Oh yeah, last time i checked, and heard, diseases have a funny way of mutating when least expected.


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## honeyshack

Checked the Bee Weaver web site...no where does it claim resistance to viruses


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## kiwiBee

If I can ask again,
why are all you guys that are doing the survivor stock thing not artificially inseminating your queens?
It seems to me that would be the best way to get to the result you want quickly rather than the willy nilly left to chance products of open mating?
kiwi


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## DRUR

honeyshack said:


> Checked the Bee Weaver web site...no where does it claim resistance to viruses


:scratch: post # 132 and others also: http://www.beeweaver.com/bee_keeping_practices.html

"*.......Colonies headed by Bee Weaver queens will thrive despite Varroa mites and viruses*_"

I hope my last post here._


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## kiwiBee

DRUR
Hopefully not your last post here because I'm still waiting for a reply to my question to you about artificially inseminating your queens.
I think it deserves an answer because anyone thats doing any selective breeding never leaves the matings to chance it will always be done through artificail insemination if they are at all serious about what they are doing.

If you are a dog breeder do you let your top breeder out on the street when she is in heat or do you bring in a top breeding dog to service her?

so why on earth are you letting your resistant queens mate with all and sundery from down the road?:scratch:

kiwi


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## Nick Noyes

Mike,
Wow did I hit a nerve? 
What are these alternative pollinators that are going to replace all the commercially raised honeybees?
Were will the small scale farms get thier bees for pollination? We pollinate for quite a few as of now and get along great with them.
Also were will all the smallscale beekeepers get thier bees from? As of now most get them from large commercial bee outfits.

Back to the original topic.
If anyone knows of some promising survivor stock please let me know. I would like to buy some a give them a try. We try new ones every year with the hopes of improving our money making, get rich keeping bees venture we call commercial beekeeping.
a.k.a truckin bees for those of you in the U.K.


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## honeyshack

DRUR said:


> :scratch: post # 132 and others also: http://www.beeweaver.com/bee_keeping_practices.html
> 
> "*.......Colonies headed by Bee Weaver queens will thrive despite Varroa mites and viruses*_"
> 
> I hope my last post here._


_



I stand corrected. However, where is the evidence that backs those claims. Bees have been fighting disease since the mites entered the picture which has only been in the last two decades or so.
How is it we have been able to isolate genetics in bees for viruses and not cows who have been fighting viruses much longer, or humans whose fight with viruses has been on the pages even longer._


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## StevenG

kiwiBee, let me see if I can answer your question re: artificial insemination. I'm growing into a sideline operation, rearing my own queens, and if I'm wrong in what I say, someone else will jump in.

The majority of beeks, commercial and sideliners, do not artificially inseminate because of time, and cost. The commercial breeders I've seen and talked with prefer to flood their breeding area with their own drones. My suspicion is that they can produce more queens quicker and with less labor that way. Smaller folks like me tend to try to get away from other beeks, and flood our breeding area with our resistant drones. We realize there will be a certain amount of mating with feral drones, but we accept that. 

Personally my feeling is that when I lose a swarm, it helps improve the feral genetic stock. That's why I don't clip or have my queens clipped. 
Maybe this helps.
Regards,
Steven


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## heaflaw

WI-beek said:


> One thing I think that non migratory beeks forget is that they stay in one location. Bees can survive with a higher mite loads if the mites are not carrying viruses. If you move into almonds or any place where your bees mix with other bees you can pick up viruses from transfered mites or your bees pick them up and the mites make short work of spreading them around.
> 
> I'd like to ask Sherry, Kiwi, Ernie and the other commercial beekeepers on this thread if this could be the main reason you guys have not had success with the resistant strains. For arguments sake, if all commercial beekeepers could suddenly populate all their hives with resistant bees: BeeWeavers, VSH, Minn Hyg, Russians, VP Queens or whatever, would your hives still crash?
> 
> I'm not trying to push an agenda. You guys know a lot more than I do. I just want to understand and hopefully help problem solve.


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## kiwiBee

heaflaw,
I dont know any more than you do I just go by what happens in our own outfit.
I'm thinking that if I had resistant bees and moved them into pollination it wouldn't matter if other beekeepers had resistant bees or not because my bee are already resistant.
If I could buy here in NZ a queen that was resistant I would definately give it a go but so far no one has come up with anything.

kiwi


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## kiwiBee

StevenG
I totally understand what you are saying and in the normal scheme of things this is how alot of commercials and queen rearers do their thing but just 2 quick comments to make.
Firstly if you are doing something as important as breeding for resistance then you can't do it by chance it has to be done by artificial insemination.
If you buy a breeder queen as opposed to a mated queen you will pay thousands of dollars.
That breeder queen has been artificially insemenated with Drones chosen from the best drone mothers that carry the best genetics for the traits you want your bees to have. 
In an outfit of say 100 hives there might only be 2-3 that are truely outstanding hives in all the traits you want in your bees, there might 50 that are pretty good 20 that are ok and the rest range from below average to down right rubbish.
So when you flood an area with your own drones are you sure you are getting the best of the best? I dont think that you are.
Lastly I have no problem with people open mating their queens thats their choice but dont <complain> about "resistant" queens mating with "dependant" drones!

kiwi


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## JohnK and Sheri

mike bispham said:


> Would you say Sheri that as such stock can survive under smaller apiary conditions, it is conditions found in large apiaries that are the 'survivability' factor?


I see little evidence they survive in smaller apiary conditions either. I talk almost daily with people who have tried to go treatment free. They range from commercials to sideliners and hobbyists who have bought "treatment free" bees and then watched them die, even, in many cases, with alternative treatments. These bees are sometimes kept in conditions that are pretty much perfect, from a bee's viewpoint.
Commercials must learn to deal with conditions that can include greatly increased numbers of colonies, proximity to other colonies, and the stresses of travel, but you don't need to have large numbers or to be a migrator for your bees to be stressed or to come in contact with disease. The biggest culprits for disease spread are those who don't monitor their own colonies' diseases, thinking they can live and let die, then breed off the survivors... ...but don't sufficiently quarantine their sick colonies.
Weak treated drones contaminating resistant stock genetically? The more common experience is that those going treatment free spread their dying colonies' diseases to the healthy colonies who rob them out. (good thing they're treated!)
The fact remains that it is primarily the commercials who repopulate the nation's garden hives, hobbyists hives, and (unless you live on synthetic vitamins) pollinate the food you eat. 


mike bispham said:


> 'Survivor' and 'survivability' here mean something entirely different.


Yes, they most certainly do. Definitions do count. Placing a label on something doesn't make it so. Calling them "survivors" doesn't mean they do. You disparage commercial bees as weak and dependent, but those bees are the TRUE survivors. Most commercials (most beekeepers, in fact) strive to keep their bees well nourished and robust, monitoring their health and medicating as needed. Good husbandry allows them to annually replenish the die offs of so-called "treatment free" stock until perhaps one day they actually _can_ survive. 
Here, rather than imagining a world where beekeepers buy "survival" bees that most often die, I see a world where bees actually _do_ survive. 

Mike, you are, of course, perfectly welcome to your opinions, but the focus of this forum is clearly posted at the top of the page. Repeated disparaging remarks about commercial beekeepers and commonly accepted commercial practice are inappropriate, inflammatory and off topic. 

Sheri


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## kiwiBee

Sheri,
I love how you come in when things are getting a bit angsty and just Bam say it all in a measured and intelligent post!
What do you have with your weetbix in the morning because I'd like some of that!

kiwi


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## kiwiBee

Mike
I think you will find that Nick was very tongue in cheek

and really all I can say about your worry of damaging genetics is...

artificial insemination

kiwi


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## mike bispham

Kiwibee,

Re. AI. I take your point, but there is something missing. I'll give a short response in the following form: systematic AI is not sustainable, and is damaging to the all-important genetic diversity.

First, AI tends to concentrate the chosen genes at the expense of the much greater range available from free mating. This can lead to genetc bottlenecks, and vulnerability to other, and new dangers.

Second, systematic AI in both the commercial and selective/hobbiest areas would press toward the full domestication of the honeybee, and the likely extinction of wild or feral bees in those countries where practiced. The bee would continue on its present (forced) path of becoming dependent on the beekeeper. I imagine many in the US are completely indifferent to this - after the honey bee is understood to be an introduced species, and if it ends up like the chicken, no biggie. Nevertheless, and for reasons that you'd no doubt regard as sentimental, I think this would amount to a significant loss. Certainly here there are good conservation-based objections. But in my view, and that of many scientists and beekeepers, such a road also makes beekeeping anywhere, including the US generally more unstable - due to the genetic narrowing. Full domestication is then not a sustainable, nor, many would say, an ethical one. 

Mike


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## Nick Noyes

Would Minn Hyg,russians, and VSH be considered survivor stock?
How many wild or feral hives are really wild (lived in the same tree for 3 or more years without being replenished with a new swarm)?
Most if not all commercial beekeepers I know are working towards stonger bees that require less treatments. That is what we all want. It will not happen overnight but you can be assured it is on the minds of all beekeepers trying to make a living keeping bees.


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## JohnK and Sheri

heaflaw said:


> I'd like to ask Sherry, Kiwi, Ernie and the other commercial beekeepers on this thread if <viruses> could be the main reason you guys have not had success with the resistant strains. For arguments sake, if all commercial beekeepers could suddenly populate all their hives with resistant bees: .... would your hives still crash?


First, I'd like to clear up a couple of commonly repeated misconception.
First, not all or even a majority of commercial colonies are collapsing. Personally we have had no collapses, and many beeks we know can say the same. The losses we experience annually range in the 5-15%, what I consider normal losses due primarily to queen issues. Even at the height of the CCD media blitz it was more a story of "what if " than that they "all have" collapsed. This is not to say we are complacent about the potential.
The second misconception is that commercials are not using the queens being developed for resistance. We are. Indeed it would be tough to avoid with many queen breeders incorporating mite resistance into their traits to breed for. 
But to answer your question, yes, viruses are the culprit but mites are the vector that allows the spread of these viruses. So, short of developing a virus resistant mite, (yes, I know some would think this the answer) keeping mites not only under control but at very low levels is the only practical answer I can see to avoid/minimize the viruses. A bee weakened by mites (and let's not forget Nosema) is an easy target for the viruses we know about and those no doubt coming down the pike.
Sheri


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## DRUR

JohnK and Sheri said:


> First, I'd like to clear up a couple of commonly repeated misconception.
> First, not all or even a majority of commercial colonies are collapsing. Personally we have had no collapses, and many beeks we know can say the same. The losses we experience annually range in the 5-15%, what I consider normal losses due primarily to queen issues.


http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2010/may/02/food-fear-mystery-beehives-collapse

Kindest Regards
Danny


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## Keith Jarrett

Danny,

Those are goverment numbers, and many times are not close to reality, if those numbers were correct we would be massively short for the almond pollination every year.


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## DRUR

Keith Jarrett said:


> Those are goverment numbers, and many times are not close to reality,


Says who?

This sure gets tiring and time consuming.

http://www.beesource.com/forums/showthread.php?t=238828&highlight=almonds

http://townhall.com/news/sci-tech/2010/03/24/bees_in_more_trouble_than_ever_after_bad_winter

http://scholar.lib.vt.edu/theses/available/etd-08162007-092313/unrestricted/lmburley.pdf

http://www.beesource.com/forums/showthread.php?t=208460&highlight=Losses

http://www.beesource.com/forums/showthread.php?t=227257&highlight=Losses

http://www.vancouversun.com/technology/Vancouver+Island+beekeepers+warn+crisis/2660548/story.html

http://www.beesource.com/forums/showthread.php?t=238828&highlight=Losses


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## Roland

I agree with what Sheri posted above. Not All commercial beekeepers have crashed, that is why I still do business with her. I also have purchased "hygienic" stock in the past. Despite the opinion of others, most all of us are frantically searching for ways to reduce our dependence on hard chemicals. 
It is the small "garden" beekeeper that buys a few hives, lets them die, and then leaves the equipment in the field that causes us alot of problems. The bees rob them out and spread the diseases back to commercial or other hives. Irresposnsible! The path to reduce the spread of disease is actually the opposite of what certain individuals advocate. If all hives are kept alive and healthy, and robbing is prevented, most diseases will be contained.

Having experienced the CCD curse in 2005, and learned alot since then, I am reasonable certain that in it's present form, with out treatment , NO bees will survive. I am very confidant that the best hygienic bee of today would not last a year with what I have experienced. I can say that because I had some feral bees that where "neat freaks". If you got them dirty, they would take 30 minutes to clean themselves off, and if you dropped a dead bee on the entrance, it would be removed in 3 seconds. They are just as dead now as the rest. The point is, preach all you want, there is something out there that is very lethal. The odds of finding a hive that will survive is less than 1 in a thousand. That is NOT sustainable.

Roland Diehnelt
Linden Apiary, Est. 1852


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## Keith Jarrett

DRUR said:


> Says who?
> This sure gets tiring and time consuming.


Yes it does, your proof is mostly back yard keepers, and when you do see a commercial keeper it's the same year after year. It's like a broken record, counting the same record over & over.


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## DRUR

Keith Jarrett said:


> Yes it does, your proof is mostly back yard keepers,


I don't consider Tom G. Laury to be a backyard beekeeper, nor Roland [see above posts]. I believe these losses are real. Some have fewer, some have more, but the average loss was reckoned to be 33.8% last year. I don't have the estimated losses for the last 5 years before me, but I have read them before about 1/3 annual losses seems to be close to the norm.
I believe it when the likes of Tom G. Laury [whom I have much respect for] and other suffer 100% losses.

http://www.beesource.com/forums/showthread.php?p=503759#post503759

http://www.beesource.com/forums/showthread.php?p=503418#post503418


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## Keith Jarrett

DRUR said:


> I don't consider Tom G. Laury to be a backyard beekeeper,]


Tom losses were due to Mites, Tom, BTW was out of the country for some time and was not able to check on them. I am not sticking up for Tom, but this is not the norm, most of us don't get the chance like Tom to go over seas for a month or two during the summer, but if you get the chance, GO.


Danny, this are Isolated and not the main stream.


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## DRUR

Roland said:


> It is the small "garden" beekeeper that buys a few hives, lets them die, and then leaves the equipment in the field that causes us alot of problems. The bees rob them out and spread the diseases back to commercial or other hives. Irresposnsible! The path to reduce the spread of disease is actually the opposite of what certain individuals advocate. If all hives are kept alive and healthy, and robbing is prevented, most diseases will be contained.


This may be correct, but I know several 'garden' beekeepers', but none who would allow their equipment to sit idle. Read the posts here of those who posts threads asking for advice on what to do with equipment.



Roland said:


> Having experienced the CCD curse in 2005, and learned alot since then, I am reasonable certain that in it's present form, with out treatment , NO bees will survive. I am very confidant that the best hygienic bee of today would not last a year with what I have experienced.


Yes and last year before I got back into beekeeping I talked with a commercial beek which had the nasty stuff and lost 90% of his colonies to the stuff [that's not 1 in a thousand]. He followed all the treatment procedures and still incurred the losses. When I spoke with him last year he had gone the non treatment route, hygienic queens from BeeWeaver, MHQ, and Purvis, and has suffered no substantial losses in 3 years. But, you are right yours could be nastier stuff, but it seems to me that migratory beekeeping poses a greater threat of spread then the above scenario that you have envisioned.

Kindest Regards
Danny


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## StevenG

kiwi, you're right, when you flood an area with drones, you don't get "the best of the best," you probably get an average. Not many of us can afford $1-3,000 for a breeder queen. Heck, I can't even afford as many $25 queens as I'd like. But, probably like most beeks, I do the best I can with what I have, and with my limited resources try to get the best I can find. I think the English call it "muddling through." Fortunately a virgin queen mates with more than one drone, so I'm counting on the odds being in my favor in that respect. hmmm I don't gamble, but maybe that approach makes me a gambling man? :doh:
Regards,
Steven


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## Tom G. Laury

Keith those bees got sprayed.


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## DRUR

Keith Jarrett said:


> Tom losses were due to Mites,


Tom seems to beg to differ with you Keith.

"_*Here I am. Sheri, tell me how it's all my fault I would like to hear it.

Semi to ND, #1 bees, low to no mites. After check, same for nosema. Virtually 100% loss. 80+ lbs surplus honey. I've been sprayed so many times i can't remember them all but never seen anything like this, but I guess if SOMEONE says it's not ccd I get no help. Nothing new there.*_"

Post #8 below:

http://www.beesource.com/forums/showthread.php?p=503418#post503418




Keith Jarrett said:


> Danny, this are Isolated and not the main stream.


Surely you jest.


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## Keith Jarrett

I saw mite damage in the comb, with my own eyes.


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## Tom G. Laury

No doubt but there is more to it than that.


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## DRUR

To my Friend Mike: As it relates to my Friend Roland.

Seems like Roland was referring to some sort of CCD and/or nasty nosema as opposed to mites. Most large commercial beeks are migratory which poses an added stress to bees that those of us who are generally locally or short distance hauls do not have to deal with. 

Also, in defense of the commercial beeks [man I hate this :s] they are exposed to bees from all over in much larger populations than the us locals, which further complicates the problems.

My prior posts which referenced commercial beek who incurred 90% losses with treatments ceased traveling to the almonds. So, for me to have said that his successes are related solely to his conversion to nontreatment hygienic bees was misleading on my part. He attributes his successes to not traveling to the almond groves, and far be it from me to question his judgment.

For my part, I somewhat understand the problems, the dilema the commercial beeks find themselves in, and would help any commercial beek to any extent within my power, whether they treat or not, and without consideration to their political leanings. 

That being said, I believe it is better to not treat and use survivors, but that's just my opinion based upon much reading but somewhat limited experience.

Kindest Regards
Danny


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## JBJ

"Gentleness, strong buildup, honey production and longevity. I am not willing to give up any amount of those traits in exchange for mite resistance. Mites are just too easy to control to make that exchange." HV

From my perspective, giving up on those qualities is NOT a requirement. If one were to select a breeder to propagate it better have great production records, have economically valuable traits, and be reasonable to work with.

"All this is not to say the efforts to develop more mite resistant bees isn't a worthy goal. Those breeders deserve our support, but we should remember that this is a work in progress. As of now there seems to be no "finished product" available." Sheri

All the more reason to work even harder on mite tolerant productive stock selection. It strikes me as curious why some are so averse to the notion.

"They may and often do survive their first winter, Year 2 shows an increase in mite loads which dooms the colony to death over their second winter, if they even make it that far... The mite load grows until it becomes terminal. " Sheri

I have observed this is not always the case, there are the exceptional queens/hives that do not succumb their second winter. We sometimes get three winters out of our very best (marked) breeders before they start really wanting to supercede her. Overwintering without an acaricide and resisting PMS the following spring buildup is a good start, and if production remains good without signs of virus the subsequent fall you may have a possible survivor on your hands in my opinion.

I feel that stock improvement is always an ongoing process. Even if we did not have mites or virus there would be those who work lifetimes to improve other traits and others who would have an aversion to anything different than what they are used to. We are trying to make beekeeping easier. Wouldn't productive bees that consistently carried lower mite loads be a step in that direction? A well rounded IPM (Integrated Pest Management) approach includes genetics as well as other disease management schemes and tools. I suspect that now that the honeybee genome has been sequenced it wont be long before very useful genetic markers will be identified and more rapid advances in bee breeding will occur. Genetics and stock selection are definitely not a panacea for the industry, but they can be some of the most useful and fun tools we have we have to work with.


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## JBJ

"...there is something out there that is very lethal. The odds of finding a hive that will survive is less than 1 in a thousand. That is NOT sustainable." Roland 

Should one find that particular hive, it would be one to consider grafting off of, if it was productive and manageable. The long odds are why cooperative selection efforts will be productive. The heritability of the traits that allowed it to survive could be enhanced with II and isolated mating yards.


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## alpha6

I have found these thread interesting but I think we should return to the original question. "Survivor stock commercial option?" The simple answer is NO. This year alone in normal queen production there is a shortage or at least they are way behind. On the operation I work with we need just to fill holes, make splits and replace the normal 5-20% dead outs of winter 1400 queens. Sometimes we can take up to 2000 depending on the strength of the hives coming out of almonds. This is just one commercial beeks needs for spring who runs about 4500 colonies. SO you can see that the demand for queens in the spring is huge and meeting even one of their needs with the stringent control needed to breed from survivor stock would be an unreasonable expectation. 

Would we like to see a better stock of queens that are resistant to mites? Sure, but who can provide them? We do raise some of our own during the year to fill in which are from out best stock but they can't even come close to filling our needs. Second, we can't start breeding them until the summer because our weather does not allow for winter or spring breeding. 

Additionally, most commercial beeks I know can't allow to just let their hives die waiting for the strongest to emerge. Remember, this is their lively hood. They need every colony to produce. They do all they can to get colonies to be strong, healthy, and productive. Most I know practice best practice methods, mainly because it is in their best interest to do so. I think where many commercial beeks get a bad rep is that they won't take time to baby weak or unproductive hives. Ok, guilty as charged but that doesn't mean that I or we don't give all we can to our bees. 

Would I buy queens that are touted as survivor stock with mite resistant bees? You bet. Hopefully we can look forward to better stock from the breeders in the future.


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## JBJ

Alpha, scale of production is an issue, but that can be overcome with time and participation (and a few thousand more mating nucs+crew). To your point "...Additionally, most commercial beeks I know can't allow to just let their hives die waiting for the strongest to emerge." Agreed, and clearly that is not a sustainable method to identify the best stock. There are other more sophisticated and economically safer ways, and if one were to test for mite tolerance why would you risk your whole operation? Why not start with a couple hundred hives for intensive screening, and propagate from the best of the best year to year and incorporate those daughters into the rest of the operation over time?

Commercial beekeeping feeds the world and is a necessity with our current agricultural system. That does not mean we can not strive to change certain aspects. I would postulate that bees with consistently lower mites loads (via VSH, SMR, allogrooming, pupal period, or whatever mechanism) would tend to have lower viral loads over time and be easier to manage. There are those that would argue bees selected for mite tolerance = bees that are mean and unproductive. This could be true if you start with mean unproductive stock, but why would one start there? Even unruly stock can be improved over time, look to the AHB in SA for an example; however we like to start with the most productive bees we can get our hands on and vet them from there. Stand on the shoulders of giants as they say.


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## Ian

Honeyshack<<>>where is the evidence that backs those claims.

Performance in their operation doesnt mean it will translate into the same performance in our operations.


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## Roland

DRUR, how about a third choice? How about ATTEMPTING to reduce the treatments to a level that losses(30 percent?) are incurred, but only at levels that are recoverable with remaining stock. Yes, it is risky, and yes, I missed BIG TIME last year. Diligence in inspections is important also(to detect trends in behavior).

JBJ, How is your queen supply looking? I could evaluate a couple of yours. PM me so Sheri does not banish me for provoking advertisement.

Roland Diehnelt


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## mike bispham

JBJ said:


> Why not start with a couple hundred hives for intensive screening, and propagate from the best of the best year to year and incorporate those daughters into the rest of the operation over time?


This would have the added advantage that you are selecting bees that thrive in your own particular environment. 

Mike


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