# German Black Bees



## Michael Palmer

Calling the "German Black Bees" isn't really correct. They are Apis mellifera mellifera. Of course they are still being kept in some locations. The UK for example. Also the Provence area of France. Did you get to see Jamie Strange's talk on the local bees of France...in the Lavender region? Quite fascinating.

Buster told me that the swampy areas near his apiaries in the Loris area of SC had mellifera bees and gave him headaches when trying to raise queens in the area. Mean, mean, mean! You go to that area in the winter, don't you?


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## sjj

Michael Palmer said:


> Calling the "German Black Bees" isn't really correct.
> 
> They are Apis mellifera mellifera. Of course they are still being kept in some locations. .....


You can probably find the needed information with the help of this paper:

http://www.apidologie.org/index.php...ccess=dkey&dkey=10.1051/apido:2006068&lang=de

Sincerely,
Johann


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## brooksbeefarm

In 1965 they were native to St.Clair Co.Mo.( around the Big Sac river). I don't know how they got there but i got introduced to them the hard way,when i took my Midnight bees there to work the river bottoms and they mated with the german black bee drones. I remember two hives that were so mean that my uncle and i waited till dark and burned them, you couldn't walk near them, and working them was a nightmare. I still have bees up there but over the years with some beekeepers bringing in 75 to two hundered hives (Italian bees) to work the sumac, the wild bees i see now look like a small dark banded italian bee, but not near as mean. I don't miss them. Jack


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## sqkcrk

Michael Palmer said:


> Mean, mean, mean! You go to that area in the winter, don't you?


Yes, but I thought that "Engelhardt's yellowjackets" came from splitting and letting them raise their own queens year after year because they couldn't afford to buy queens. I haven't noticed that my open mated queens raised in the south produce mean bees.


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## Michael Palmer

sqkcrk said:


> Yes, but I thought that "Engelhardt's yellowjackets" came from splitting and letting them raise their own queens year after year


Now you have two questions for Buster.


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## Skinner Apiaries

I have 10 boxes of mellifera mellifera and one that is most... pure... teh rest are clearly hybrids to some degree and are workable... but the one full breed is entirely unworkable, 5 boxes tall, and brood out the wazoo. Good bees by a brood nest standpoint. Low mite counts, no beetles, big honey, until big bees eat it... But even with smoke in perfect daylight they act africanized after opened, boiling over and following for 40 yards, relentless. Need I mention their ability to sting through gloves and suit where other bees have had much less work... needless to say I have isolated them. I am tempted to requeen, but the biologist in me wants to leave them untreated and stationary, and see where they go... given they were off a stationary box that wasnt treated for 7 years, I expect these are some serious genes... maybe if I can cross out the trait using drone mothers and excluders I can try to extrapolate the useful genetics... but thats alot of time and work...


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## ga.beeman

I remember when i was a kid here in Ga(1980). that we had a big oak in the front yard and about half of it broke off one day. my grandfather and dad knew they where there but they never brothered us because they where up high in the tree. We called a local beekeeper and he said he would be glad to come and get them. When he arrived we showed him where they where and he got a ladder and went up and looked at them. He came back down and said that they where the little black bees and they would probably be mean but he could get them because all the comb was open. He got his stuff ready and him and another guy went up. they started getting after us so we backed way off. He came back down and said that them where the nastest bees he had seen in 50 years of beekeeping. He finally give up and they stayed in that tree until winter but they had died out by spring. I have only seen one hive of them since i started beekeeping and a man in Chatsworth Ga close to Cohutta WMA had them but he said that they where not to bad compared to what he had had in the past.


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## sqkcrk

Buster says that "Engelhardt's Hornets" were so nasty that you had to wear full protection. Nothing like today working bees in short sleeves. He says they were that way from inbreeding and from what was out in those swamps. South Carolina Swamp Bees.


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## Michael Palmer

sqkcrk said:


> South Carolina Swamp Bees.


Exactly. And I believe they were mellifera mellifera.


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## sqkcrk

Could bee. Makes sense.


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## Texas Bee

These Bees are what got me started in Bee Keeping. I cut a oak tree down to get them in march. Yeah I know to early for a cut out . LOL !!!
Anyway, like you all said they were some of the meanest honey bees I ever work with. Mowing and weedeating was out of the question if you were not in full protection gear. 

They thought a dog Killed their mama, and would sting till gone out of sight...
Yelping...

I wish I still had them , Man they were mean !!! Pulling the top off meant getting stung a half dozen time, every time..


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## brooksbeefarm

In 1965 all i had to work bees with was a straw hat with a mosquito net (from the army surplus) flannel shirt, overalls and a pair of brown cotton (jersy gloves) a smoker and a screwdriver. You learn quick what they mean by High tailing It.  . If AHB are meaner than they were i hope they don't make it this far north (SW Mo.) Jack


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## EastSideBuzz

Texas Bee said:


> I wish I still had them , Man they were mean !!! Pulling the top off meant getting stung a half dozen time, every time..



This comment makes no sense to me? Are you serious. 12 stings each time I open the box. No way I am a gluten for punishment but, everyone has to have their limits and that would be mine for sure.


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## danno1800

It's been over twenty years since I had a hive of German black bees. I got stung through bee suit & gloves so many time my wife stopped counting when she reached 100.
I do not miss them...


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## mythomane

I worked on a cotton farm in a very isolated area in the desert around 95. Mainly went to work there because the old coot that ran it was born in the house, and said I could have the bees in the barn, which had been there as long as he could remember. They were black and strange looking to my young eyes. There were no other beekeepers within 200 miles. The rotting brown barn was punctured with a hundred entrances. They seemed a little testy, but nothing too bad. When I went inside to look for the hives I found entire horse stalls 10ft high spilling out. The hive looked like it was made in outer space -- like 30 or so jellyfish plopped on top of one another and cast in wax. A few weeks later I took a shovel to it...and then decided to leave them there. Always wanted to go back and check on them, but I cannot remember which twisting dirt roads would lead me back there.


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## mythomane

Michael Palmer said:


> The UK for example. Also the Provence area of France. Did you get to see Jamie Strange's talk on the local bees of France...in the Lavender region? Quite fascinating.


Where was this talk? Is it available somewhere online?


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## Michael Palmer

mythomane said:


> Where was this talk? Is it available somewhere online?


I tried to find it once. No luck.


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## Wee3Bees Apiary

I started beekeeping with 4 hives in 2005 which were gentle Italians. A "buddy" of mine did an cut-out of honeybees that ended up being the apis mellifera mellifera (little black honey bee). This "buddy" of mine was able to remove the bees with comb and brood by throwing all of this with bees, queen and all into a deep box with bottom and lid (then running like he!! out of the area).

He told me that they were mean and if I wanted them then I could have them equipment and all. Of course, I had need for a 5th hive! I thought why not, How bad can they really bee? Listen, those bees attacked me from 75 yards away before I ever even walked up to the hive the first time. It was an ordeal getting them back to my vehicle for the short journey to my apiary (this was early June 2005).

They wouldn't tolerate you being in the apiary with them (sending scads of bees after you). To make a very long story short, I never was able to work them (go into the brood chamber or anything like that...). The queen must have been killed during the cut out as they calmed down considerably after about two months, but that only meant you could walk near them being fully suited up (forget trying to open the hive up).

This hive crossed with some Italian drones and two of my other hives crossed with the german black bee drones. At the end of 2005, I had two gentle hives, two mostly pissed off hives and one plain nasty hive (much less testy from extremely nasty original cut-out hive). I fed all four of my "original" hives to make it through the winter, but I didn't feed this "german" hive because it was still to nasty to work. My logic was that if it made it through winter then I would try to suck it up and work them in the spring as they "deserved it". 

They absconded during early Spring 2006. I wished that I had more sense to try and keep them in a managed hive instead of wild in the area where my bees are... 

My observations:

I have noticed that the colonies which have more of a darker bee (German hybrid) produce considerable more honey and don't have the hive beetle or mite problems. I have been selecting the more aggressive colonies and making splits from these bees since 2006.

I have never treated my hives with chemicals for varroa, tracheal mites or for hive beetles. They are thriving. The one regret that I have is that I didn't know better as a first year beekeeper and didn't try to preserve the genetics.

They were mean as hades!


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## WI-beek

"Where was this talk?"

You may find some good info here
http://www.sicamm.org/


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## WI-beek

Go to the links page and look at some of the member websites for more pics and info. They are fantastic looking bees.

If you use Google chrome (like me instead of the horrible internet explorer) browser it asks you if you want the websites translated into English. I recommend everyone make the switch for faster browsing and less bugs (my experience).

But anyway here are a couple great pics of these beautiful or mean looking bees depending on how you look at them. 

http://www.dunklebienen.de/
http://www.gde-stveit.salzburg.at/dunklebiene/seiten/rasse.html


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## Michael Palmer

Michael Palmer said:


> I tried to find it once. No luck.


His presentation was about local bees in France. He showed that the mellifera bees had a brood rearing spike just before the Lavender flow. It was as if they "knew" that the flow was coming. The Buckfast bees that were brought in by migratory beekeepers had a brood rearing spike on the Lavender flow...as a result of the flow. 

The local French beekeepers want the Buckfast bees out of their territory as they feel that the Mellifera bees are better suited for the area. Jamie's study showed that they are different and are in tune with their local climate.


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## Michael Palmer

WI-beek said:


> "Where was this talk?"
> 
> You may find some good info here
> http://www.sicamm.org/


I've seen it twice. Once at the Vermont winter meeting, and once somewhere else...either Southern Adirondack or Empire State.


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## mythomane

Just thinking about the hype over AHB, when these bees are probably just as mean.


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## Kingfisher Apiaries

I think I have seen these bees around here, could someone post pics?


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## Kingfisher Apiaries

Are they smaller than your average Italian? I have seen bees similar to those around. Also, can they have totally black abdomens? I see a lot of bees like that. 

Thanks 

mike


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## WI-beek

The black bees were supposed to be bigger.


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## WI-beek

I guess I should have found data to back up my statement before stating it but Im pretty sure that apis m. m. is larger than her southern cousins. I will try to find something on the net and will post it when I do.


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## Dancing Bee Apiary

I have some bees that are pure black in colour. Very gentle though. Mellifera carnica, they get very dark looking . Or so I believe, since I don't have access to a dna lab.


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## josethayil

hi, As far as i know Pure A.M.M are larger than italians and carniolans and are gentle. Only when they hybridise they become agressive like any other race. 

If you are finding small black bees which are very aggressive they are probably cross with africanized bees because as far as i know A.M.Scutellata has both light and dark varients which were brought to the U.S. So all the dark bees you find maynot be hybridised A.M.M


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## WI-beek

I dont really know anything for sure but from what I have read even among a.m.m. there are many different strains that evolved in many different areas and micro climates. One strain that evolved on an island with no predators like wasps, bears, moths or whatever may be very gentle. Another strain 100 miles away could be vicious. 

I read into some of the websites through links given on the SICAMM website
http://www.sicamm.org/Links.html
and it is amazing the read that among a.m.m. there are strains that have evolved 100 miles or less from one another that developed totally different brood rearing routines to follow the flows in their given location. I imagine predators or lack of them can change just as easy in short distances and therefor the temperament of the bees. This is one area that man has screwed everything up by moving bees all over and losing all the potential that once existed. No im not trying to hug a tree here but its just to sad. I am in favor of protecting areas that still have near pure strains of a.m.m. or other a.m.?. from loss due to importing and raising others.


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## brooksbeefarm

From what i've read honey bees were not native to Americas, that the Europeans brought them over by boat. With my experience with those german black bees, i wouldn't want to be on the same boat that brought them over. Jack


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## Justi

Skinner Apiaries said:


> I have 10 boxes of mellifera mellifera and one that is most... pure... teh rest are clearly hybrids to some degree and are workable... but the one full breed is entirely unworkable, 5 boxes tall, and brood out the wazoo. Good bees by a brood nest standpoint. Low mite counts, no beetles, big honey, until big bees eat it... But even with smoke in perfect daylight they act africanized after opened, boiling over and following for 40 yards, relentless. Need I mention their ability to sting through gloves and suit where other bees have had much less work... needless to say I have isolated them. I am tempted to requeen, but the biologist in me wants to leave them untreated and stationary, and see where they go... given they were off a stationary box that wasnt treated for 7 years, I expect these are some serious genes... maybe if I can cross out the trait using drone mothers and excluders I can try to extrapolate the useful genetics... but thats alot of time and work...





Skinner Apiaries said:


> I have 10 boxes of mellifera mellifera and one that is most... pure... teh rest are clearly hybrids to some degree and are workable... but the one full breed is entirely unworkable, 5 boxes tall, and brood out the wazoo. Good bees by a brood nest standpoint. Low mite counts, no beetles, big honey, until big bees eat it... But even with smoke in perfect daylight they act africanized after opened, boiling over and following for 40 yards, relentless. Need I mention their ability to sting through gloves and suit where other bees have had much less work... needless to say I have isolated them. I am tempted to requeen, but the biologist in me wants to leave them untreated and stationary, and see where they go... given they were off a stationary box that wasnt treated for 7 years, I expect these are some serious genes... maybe if I can cross out the trait using drone mothers and excluders I can try to extrapolate the useful genetics... but thats alot of time and work...


Do you still keep bees


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