# For Treatment Free Beeks only



## Rusty Hills Farm (Mar 24, 2010)

snl said:


> I'm guessing to call yourself treatment free, you must have a definition in mind as to what that is. It seems that TF folks cannot among themselves agree what it is. If you sugar dust, are you still TF? If you use FGMO, are you still TF?
> 
> What is treatment free?


The definition is in the first post at the top of this forum.

HTH

Rusty (who is NOT treatment free)


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## Fusion_power (Jan 14, 2005)

The official forum definition is referenced in the sticky at the top.

My definition is a bit simpler. I do nothing at all to prevent varroa mites killing my bees. It is entirely survival of the fittest. My bees are thriving since 2005, therefore it must be working.


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## Kofu (Jan 26, 2011)

"Unique Forum Rules... Discussions of the definition of 'Treatment-Free' will be deleted."


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## Oldtimer (Jul 4, 2010)

The forum rules define it as per this forum.

But other than that, common sense would dictate that a person is treatment free if they do not treat their bees. Hence, if they treat their bees with, say, sugar dust, they are not treatment free.

However there is no reason for anyone to get hung up over it. Being TF is great, but if someone wants to be "mostly" treatment free but maybe use organic ones, or whatever, so what, their choice, no dramas.


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## Michael Bush (Aug 2, 2002)

The definition for the forum is so we can define the topic and not waste time with off topic suggestions, e.g. you ask a question and 20 people pipe in that you need to treat...

From the logical point of view, though, how can you say "I'm treatment free, I only treat with ______" and not be contradicting yourself?


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## snl (Nov 20, 2009)

Michael Bush said:


> From the logical point of view, though, how can you say "I'm treatment free, I only treat with ______" and not be contradicting yourself?


_*Exactly! So if you treat with anything ...... you're not treatment free.....
*_


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## Kofu (Jan 26, 2011)

snl said:


> _*Exactly! So if you treat with anything ...... you're not treatment free.....*_


There are lots of contradictions (ironies?) here, starting with someone selling Oxalic Acid treatments in his signature line who starts a thread titled "For Treatment Free Beeks only."

But I guess marking off a space where treatments are off-topic is too tempting for those who disagree.

The only reason I can think why the whole thread hasn't already been deleted, is that maybe the moderator hasn't read the sticky either. Another irony.


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## snl (Nov 20, 2009)

Kofu said:


> There are lots of contradictions (ironies?) here, starting with someone selling Oxalic Acid treatments in his signature line who starts a thread titled "For Treatment Free Beeks only."


Just because I sell OAV does not mean that I'm not interested it what others have to say on this topic. Should I have removed my signature line before posting? Would that have made a difference? I think not....


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## bluegrass (Aug 30, 2006)

I can't wait for all the treatment free bee people's bees to die so we can get rid of this whole topic and it's definition


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## Fusion_power (Jan 14, 2005)

I've been trying to get my bees to die since 2005. I must not be doing something right. lol Rofl


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## bluegrass (Aug 30, 2006)

Fusion_power said:


> I've been trying to get my bees to die since 2005. I must not be doing something right. lol Rofl


Mine died at year 9 so yours should be soon.  My oldest current hives are 3 years in without treatment... I don't consider them treatment free, and the reason I don't treat is because I am cheap, not trying to save the world... bees are free.


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## Paul McCarty (Mar 30, 2011)

My oldest is hanging in there at 4 years. Don't like them though, about to split them up. Just had one die at 4 1/2, didn't really like them either though. 

FYI - I am cheap too.


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## Kofu (Jan 26, 2011)

snl said:


> Just because I sell OAV does not mean that I'm not interested it what others have to say on this topic. Should I have removed my signature line before posting? Would that have made a difference? I think not....


Well, the irony is the 'subject header' says it's "for" TF beeks *only*, and not only are you posting in the thread, you're the one who started it! The signature only accentuates the point. Maybe if you had titled it "For Treatment Free Beeks (and other inquiring minds) only." So for me, that's a funny.

Personally, I don't object (very much). In my posts here I've tried to stay within the boundaries, even though I'm not "treatment-free" yet (see my profile for details). The sticky does allow for me to participate, as long as I'm _trying_ to head in the TF direction, which I am.


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## RiodeLobo (Oct 11, 2010)

snl said:


> What is treatment free?


Isn't this horse dead enough?


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## So_Many_Hats (Mar 6, 2014)

Newbie here who *just* read the special forum rules, then read this next. I literally laughed through it - glad I got to read it before it gets deleted. :applause:


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## Barry (Dec 28, 1999)

Did you find it useful?!


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## senilking (Mar 8, 2014)

So_Many_Hats said:


> Newbie here who *just* read the special forum rules, then read this next. I literally laughed through it - glad I got to read it before it gets deleted. :applause:


Lol, I'm glad I'm not the only one. Do we get a t-shirt for seeing it?


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## So_Many_Hats (Mar 6, 2014)

senilking said:


> Lol, I'm glad I'm not the only one. Do we get a t-shirt for seeing it?


We should! I think it should say "OxaVap: for treatment-free beeks only" :lpf:


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## mitchgobears (Jan 26, 2014)

As a new-bee in this arena, I have taken the time to peruse many threads on this forum. There appear to be many times when there have been passionate statements made by "treatment-free" and "treatment" individuals that have been inflammatory. Rather than try to decide which side wins and how to define terms, we should all learn from each other's success and failure and decide which options are best for us individually and our bees. I would be happy to debate anyone, if they wish, that providing an artificial home is a treatment. While practicing medicine, there are many patients who choose treatments I do not recommend. They are still my patients. Hopefully, through this process, we all learn what works, and what is best for the bees. 

“As a general rule...people ask for advice only in order not to follow it; or if they do follow it, in order to have someone to blame for giving it.” 
― Alexandre Dumas


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## So_Many_Hats (Mar 6, 2014)

mitchgobears said:


> As a new-bee in this arena, I have taken the time to peruse many threads on this forum. There appear to be many times when there have been passionate statements made by "treatment-free" and "treatment" individuals that have been inflammatory. Rather than try to decide which side wins and how to define terms, we should all learn from each other's success and failure and decide which options are best for us individually and our bees. I would be happy to debate anyone, if they wish, that providing an artificial home is a treatment. While practicing medicine, there are many patients who choose treatments I do not recommend. They are still my patients. Hopefully, through this process, we all learn what works, and what is best for the bees.
> 
> “As a general rule...people ask for advice only in order not to follow it; or if they do follow it, in order to have someone to blame for giving it.”
> ― Alexandre Dumas


The point is this is the "treatment-free" forum. The term has been defined for use in *this* forum. The rules have been laid out. If a person doesn't want to follow them, this isn't the place for him or her. No biggie. But it's not a place to debate what treatment free is or isn't of why it's good or stupid or whatever. I only know this because I read the post stickied at the top of the forum. Because I'm a good girl and follow rules.


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## senilking (Mar 8, 2014)

If it was called minimalist treatment, would it make people happier? I think they understand that they aren't completely chem free. Heck, there's chemicals in the air giving people lung all the time, and the bees spend their time flying through it. They just don't want to keep putting chemicals/whatever in over and over. Everyone would benefit from them breeding for resistant bees, everyone benefits from them killing more of their hives than the average person, if that is true.

I just now a second year keeper, and I'm more of a moderate person. Do as little as possible to accomplish what you want to accomplish. Everyone's got different goals. Technically I was treatment free just because I was too busy to do the normal stuff with them, much less treat them. And they both made it through without much of my help. But I wouldn't be afraid to try some stuff if I felt it was needed. Of course, the thought of putting chemicals directly into something I'm eating kind of worries me, but I'm also the one that tries to not take too too many medications for silly stuff either.

As far as I know, there are no rules against posting an anti-treatment free thread every day on the main forums. (I skimmed the rules there, I just happened to read these really well because it was a unique situation.) They just wanted somewhere to talk about treatment free without having to argue with folks all the time, and I'm starting to feel kind of bad for them. Makes me want to go sugar dust my bees, just to see what happens. Maybe I'll go treatment free (minimal treatment) on half of the hives and not on the other half?


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## WLC (Feb 7, 2010)

If snl were to ask, "Where is the 'front' in treatment free beekeeping?", I would say that it's most likely in the deep South.

That's where I'm picking up on a lot of new/useful information, some of it backed up in the scientific literature.


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## Solomon Parker (Dec 21, 2002)

WLC said:


> Of course, that never made it into the 'special' forum rules.


Yeah, that was awesome. I'd like to think I had a hand in keeping that particular bit of ignorance out of any official document.


This has been done to death, and the very fact that the forum rules have been up for years proves that this thread is trolling.


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## mike bispham (May 23, 2009)

snl said:


> I'm guessing to call yourself treatment free, you must have a definition in mind as to what that is. It seems that TF folks cannot among themselves agree what it is. If you sugar dust, are you still TF? If you use FGMO, are you still TF?
> 
> What is treatment free?


For me 'treatment free' is giving no treatments (substances) and making no manipulations (like 'artificial swarming' or (beekeeper-made brood breaks) to help your bees survive/thrive. 

They survive/thrive because they have what it takes to successfully manage varroa - as well as any other predator/micropredator/pathogen.

This is for me the very definition of health. 

In my view a creature that has to be helped to be 'healthy' isn't truly healthy at all. (Randy Oliver defines such bees as 'domesticated')

The only way to keep bees like this without suffering extensive sickness/large losses is by learning from Nature and practicing (unnatural) propagative selection - unless you are lucky enough to have a thriving local resistant feral population. 

From this perspective, _any act that tends to undermine a bee population's ability to thrive unaided comes under the heading 'treatment'_. 

It is undesirable precisely because it leads toward greater human dependency ('domestication') and away from independent, self sufficient health.

There are good arguments to support the further contention that methods that lead toward human dependency are, in an open mating setting, only little short of suicidal. Certainly they are absolutely 'addictive' - the more you treat, the more you need to treat. Certainly they dramatically inhibit the co-evoltion of bee and mite (adaptation) that would supply the ideal solution. Certainly they 'poison' (in a genetic sense) any nearby ferals.

That supplies my account of not just what t/f is (for me) by _why_ the t/f stance is a great improvement on the veterinary approach.

Mike (UK)

4 years non-treatment/no manipulations: 29 out of 33 hives overwintered and building well.


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## WLC (Feb 7, 2010)

If you bought your bees from a longtime TF source like BeeWeaver, you're TF.
There's no reason to treat.


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## mike bispham (May 23, 2009)

WLC said:


> If you bought your bees from a longtime TF source like BeeWeaver, you're TF.
> There's no reason to treat.


You're only t/f under that scenario if you don't treat (or manipulate) them.. Otherwise you'll be losing the ability to keep them without treatments. You're only t/f under that scenario if you don't treat (or manipulate) them... otherwise you'll be losing the ability to keep them without treatments. 'Treatment free' must surely entail a committment to maintaining the ability to remain t/f?

If you're planning to buy in new queens regularly I suppose you can do what you like. 

Mike (UK)


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## bluegrass (Aug 30, 2006)

mike bispham said:


> They survive/thrive because they have what it takes to successfully manage varroa - as well as any other predator/micropredator/pathogen.
> 
> This is for me the very definition of health.


The mites are not as big of a problem as the viruses they carry are. Viruses have a nasty habit of changing once their host develops a resistance to them. So you can have the best bees in the world, but once one of the mite born viruses mutates they will die. This is why the Flu vaccine gets changed every year and is sometimes not effective, because Influenza changes every year and we are not always good a predicting the changes. 



> In my view a creature that has to be helped to be 'healthy' isn't truly healthy at all. (Randy Oliver defines.......


 Randy Oliver doesn't get to make up definitions willy nilly. Domesticated refers to any population that has been selectively bred by humans to accentuate certain traits. That is the official definition and the European Honey bee has met that criterion for 5000 years or so. 



> The only way to keep bees like this without suffering extensive sickness/large losses is by learning from Nature and practicing (unnatural) propagative selection - unless you are lucky enough to have a thriving local resistant feral population.


 see definition of domesticated again. 



> From this perspective, _any act that tends to undermine a bee population's ability to thrive unaided comes under the heading 'treatment'_.
> 
> It is undesirable precisely because it leads toward greater human dependency ('domestication') and away from independent, self sufficient health.
> 
> ...


You have a lot to learn Grasshopper.


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## WLC (Feb 7, 2010)

mike bispham said:


> If you're planning to buy in new queens regularly I suppose you can do what you like. Mike (UK)


That's the idea of relying on a breeder like BeeWeaver. All I have to do is order new queens without having to break a sweat.


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## bluegrass (Aug 30, 2006)

WLC said:


> That's the idea of relying on a breeder like BeeWeaver. All I have to do is order new queens without having to break a sweat.


What if that plan fails? Just because they come out of a "Treatment Free" operation doesn't mean you will have success with them treatment free. 

I don't think treatment free can be bought, I think more of it has to do with beekeeper then it does the bees.


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## WLC (Feb 7, 2010)

Can TF bees be purchased? Meaning that you can buy them and use them in a TF operation?

I think so.

I understand the kind of 'blending' Daniel Weaver is doing by open mating his queen stock.

I also understand what I've seen so far with these bees.

Bluegrass, there's an 'Ah, Hah!' moment in TF beekeeping.

Looking at a video of Tim Ives working his bees gave me the first one. Looking at Dean's video of Dee Lusby's bees was the confirmation.


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## Fusion_power (Jan 14, 2005)

Yes, you can purchase treatment free bees. This does not mean they will be the best bees for your particular climate or circumstances. There is also an argument to make about which set of traits give the best treatment free bees.


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## julysun (Apr 25, 2012)

"proves that this thread is trolling." Sol Parker

Agree.


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## WLC (Feb 7, 2010)

FP: 

I think that the Texas bees solved a high heat problem I had. They're also resistant stock. So, they fit the bill. Throw in good service and 'YEEE HA!'. (I hope that was from Texas).


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## bluegrass (Aug 30, 2006)

WLC said:


> I also understand what I've seen so far with these bees.


What is your experience with them so far?


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## WLC (Feb 7, 2010)

Good build up and productivity. Queen issues (easy to fix, but I had some). Clearly different behaviors than previous domestic stocks I've had.

I'll take a peek tomorrow to see if they fly in 55 degree F temperatures. It's still winter though.


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## JakeDatc (Apr 19, 2010)

WLC said:


> Looking at Dean's video of Dee Lusby's bees was the confirmation.


Had not seen these before so something productive came out of this thread  i didn't know about the cell orientation towards the middle. housel positioning i think he says.


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## Rader Sidetrack (Nov 30, 2011)

Probably 'Housel' positioning.  Those threads often turn out to be quite amusing ....


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## JakeDatc (Apr 19, 2010)

i see that now *HIDE* k:


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## mike bispham (May 23, 2009)

bluegrass said:


> The mites are not as big of a problem as the viruses they carry are. Viruses have a nasty habit of changing once their host develops a resistance to them. So you can have the best bees in the world, but once one of the mite born viruses mutates they will die.


As and where there is no vector, there is no virus problem. To think of bees present difficulties in terms of virusus rather than mites is wildly misplaced.



bluegrass said:


> Randy Oliver doesn't get to make up definitions willy nilly. Domesticated refers to any population that has been selectively bred by humans to accentuate certain traits.


Lets be honest: 'domesticated' is a little vague. And anyone can offer to apply terms, anytime. I think Randy's take offers a very useful perspective. (To characterise it 'willy nilly' is well wide of the mark: Randy is a serious bee person who has clearly given this plenty of thought). And his point - that there are bee stocks and then there are bee stocks, and only some can be kept t/f is spot on. How would you characterise the difference between treatment-dependent and health self-sufficient stocks?)



bluegrass said:


> That is the official definition and the European Honey bee has met that criterion for 5000 years or so.


Not so much. The honeybee has been bred for a long time, sure, but has also remained wild, and the populations have co-existed and interbred all that time. That fact, and the lack of full control over mating that has resulted, has until recently meant the bee has defied 'domestication' in the normal sense. 

That situation has changed to a significant degree with systematic application of the veterinary model to beekeeping, industrial queen raising, and the abandonment of any attempt to breed in innate resistance to the new predator. 

Unlike wild bees these stocks need human help to survive. Randy is right: that has to be viewed as a significant step toward domestication - for those stocks. 

If you want to see his argument its here: http://www.beesource.com/forums/showthread.php?224684-k)-Diseases-amp-pests&p=1068801#post1068801



bluegrass said:


> You have a lot to learn Grasshopper.


Don't we all.

Mike (UK)


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## bluegrass (Aug 30, 2006)

mike bispham said:


> As and where there is no vector, there is no virus problem.


 There will always be a vector, even the "mite resistant" Bees here have mites and mite borne diseases, they just have a manageable amount. My prediction is that at some point the MBVs will mutate so that a smaller viral load can impact a colony, then we have to breed more resistant bees.... and so on and so on. 




> How would you characterise the difference between treatment-dependent and health self-sufficient stocks?


 I spent several years in the Appalachian mountain range capturing ferals and my conclusion became that for many of those bees, their ability to survive is in their isolation. I had many, that as soon as they were put into a managed apiaries, they became over run with mites and died. The key to their survival was that they were existing as isolated populations and just hadn't met varroa yet. Unless you have been to the areas I speak of that is hard to understand..



> Unlike wild bees these stocks need human help to survive. Randy is right: that has to be viewed as a significant step toward domestication - for those stocks.


 I disagree; any experienced TF beekeeper can take a package of bees from a commercial operation and successfully switch them to TF. And any inexperience beekeeper can take a treatment free hive from a successful TF beekeeper and have them die. There are commercial operations here who went from chemical dependent to treatment free without changing out their stock. The way you describe it that would not be possible. They simply weaned their hives off of chemicals over several years and now are treatment free.


Mike (UK)[/QUOTE]


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## mike bispham (May 23, 2009)

bluegrass said:


> There will always be a vector, even the "mite resistant" Bees here have mites and mite borne diseases, they just have a manageable amount.


There hasn't always been; there is now, and that is the problem. But yes, you're right, smaller mite loads are better than overwhelming ones.

At the outset of the varroa outbreak almost all bees lacked any defence, and were quickly overwhelmed by numbers of mites, as well as weakened by viruses, and probably bacterial and fungal infections too. Constant skin punctures tend to have that effect. In many places resistance to both mites and, presumably viruses and fungal infections has come about, due largely to natural selection for the fittest strains, which has raised natural behavioural defences in the wild/feral populations and possibly other kinds of natural defences. 

This process would ordinarily be expected to continue, so that mites pass from a calamity to a nuisnace to, eventually, a mere irritant. The process is however undermined by treatments (both the chemical sort, and the manipulations which some people regard as non-treatments)



bluegrass said:


> My prediction is that at some point the MBVs will mutate so that a smaller viral load can impact a colony, then we have to breed more resistant bees.... and so on and so on.


Yes, that's predictable, its how nature works, and why husbandry must always involve propagation only from the strongest. If it doesn't the predators are winning the perpetual 'arms race'.



bluegrass said:


> I spent several years in the Appalachian mountain range capturing ferals and my conclusion became that for many of those bees, their ability to survive is in their isolation. I had many, that as soon as they were put into a managed apiaries, they became over run with mites and died.


Populations adapt to their circumstances. In the your wild where perhaps most colonies had varroa largely under control, and mites were largely less fecund strains, individuals will thrive. Move them into managed apiaries with raging mite strains and concentrated viral loads, sure, they won't thrive.

However: you can change the environment - the apiary - to a less bee-hostile place. Then your ferals would likely be happy there too.



bluegrass said:


> The key to their survival was that they were existing as isolated populations and just hadn't met varroa yet.


That's one theory. Round here its the other way around. Feral bees interact with apiary bees constantly, and only those with a little distance *and* a good measure of tolerance thrive.



bluegrass said:


> I disagree; any experienced TF beekeeper can take a package of bees from a commercial operation and successfully switch them to TF.


That's quite a claim. How would you go about it?




bluegrass said:


> There are commercial operations here who went from chemical dependent to treatment free without changing out their stock.


Again, how did they go about it?



bluegrass said:


> The way you describe it that would not be possible.


Its my understanding that mite tolerance is supplied by genetics. Period. Bees lacking the genetic basis for mite-defensive behaviours cannot be genetically altered, nor 'taught'. They're duffers.

Of course if you bash them down onto small cell, organise artificial brood breaks, dig out drone larvae, they'll thrive. But I don't call that 'treatment free'. And none of it helps the populations adapt - which is the thing that is needed. So its an unhelpful approach if what you want is a sustainable sort of beekeeping, in which apiary bees don't kill off local feral populations, which in turn strengthen apiary populations. 

That's how things happened most places until varroa arrived, and the great experiment of systematic treatments began. 

Mike (UK)


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## bluegrass (Aug 30, 2006)

mike bispham said:


> That's quite a claim. How would you go about it?


It can be done many ways... I do it by stacking the number in my favor... Hives get split in late summer and a % of them make it through the winter, the next year the process is repeated. 



> Again, how did they go about it?


 http://www.beeweaver.com/welcome

In the USA the common theory is that resistance is in genetics, but then when you look at our genetic pool it is pretty narrow...... All told our entire bee industry is descendant from less then 50 queens... some experts put the number in the 20s.. We do have some influx from Canada and of course AHB in the south, but predominantly pretty narrow. Basically when the mite made it to our shores, before any chemical treatments were approved, all the bees without some level of resistance died off. Everything we have left is capable to at some level to tolerate mites.


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## mike bispham (May 23, 2009)

bluegrass said:


> It can be done many ways... I do it by stacking the number in my favor... Hives get split in late summer and a % of them make it through the winter, the next year the process is repeated.


Well yes, simply constantly splitting, (creating artificial brood breaks) is a well known method - but should it really be described as 'treatment free'? 



bluegrass said:


> http://www.beeweaver.com/welcome


My understanding was that that Beeweaver bred hard, and have thus been able to create truly treatment free bees. That's something very different.



bluegrass said:


> In the USA the common theory is that resistance is in genetics, but then when you look at our genetic pool it is pretty narrow......


Its not just a theory. Resistance - like all other traits and qualities in heritable in all organisms. Bees are no exception. 

Your 'narrow' is a little meaningless in this context. Its lower that Europe, sure, but like everywhere in Europe you had inputs of genetic material from all over for hundreds of years. 



bluegrass said:


> All told our entire bee industry is descendant from less then 50 queens... some experts put the number in the 20s..


Where do those numbers come from???



bluegrass said:


> Basically when the mite made it to our shores, before any chemical treatments were approved, all the bees without some level of resistance died off. Everything we have left is capable to at some level to tolerate mites.


That simply isn't so. For one thing you get millions of queens imported from Australia - which afaik doesn't even have varroa! Further, your industry has been propped up from the first by treatments, and in most cases any nascent rise resistance has been snuffed out by their systematic. 

That isn't to say there's none - but it varies a great deal, and is most obvious in feral populations where natural selection has raised levels, and where deliberate selective propagation has achieved the same thing by artificial means. 

Mike (UK)


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## Rader Sidetrack (Nov 30, 2011)

> Basically when the mite made it to our shores, before any chemical treatments were approved, all the bees without some level of resistance died off. Everything we have left is capable to at some level to tolerate mites.




mike bispham said:


> That simply isn't so. For one thing you get millions of queens imported from Australia - which afaik doesn't even have varroa!


Not True! 

Import of live bees into the USA has been restricted in some form since 1922.

You can read more about that issue here:
http://www.beesource.com/resources/usda/federal-and-state-bee-laws-and-regulations/


Australian queens are not imported into the US except _possibly _for research purposes by legally _authorized _institutions.


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## Michael Bush (Aug 2, 2002)

>Australian queens are not imported into the US except possibly for research purposes by legally authorized institutions. 

Maybe not at present but not very far in the past they were. We were getting bees from New Zealand, Australia and Canada from 2005 to 2009. It was stopped in 2010.

http://www.ars.usda.gov/is/pr/2007/071119.htm
http://www.cbsnews.com/news/australian-bees-invade-united-states/

Foreign queens are also coming into Canada, of course they are careful never to swarm across the border... Canada gets queens from: New Zealand, Australia and Chile 

(Also California and Hawaii. Not sure why California, where there are AHB and not nothern states where there are not...)

http://www.agf.gov.bc.ca/apiculture/factsheets/002_importing.htm


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## honeydrunkapiaries (Oct 16, 2013)

Importation in Canada doesnt make a whole lot of sense. Its the Prairie beekeepers that want "cheap" packages. Australian/NZ bees dont have varroa resistance and they sure as hell dont winter too well. On that note have a fellow beek up here who is pretty sure he got an AHB queen from California, and sent it in for genetic testing which should be back in June/July (sadly they died out during the winter). We can import queens from the states but its a mountain of paperwork that none of the US guys want to wade through (understandably). I dont think opening to packages is the way to go (you can keep your AHB, and SHB). However I will happily trade queens for any of your stocks, specifically if you have TF varroa resistant bees; you can have mine just incase you guys get swamped with another nasty winter!

We have lots of guys up here doing the TF thing, but sadly I just dont think our genetics are there --yet.


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## bluegrass (Aug 30, 2006)

> Your 'narrow' is a little meaningless in this context. Its lower tha Europe, sure, but like everywhere in Europe you had inputs of genetic material from all over for hundreds of years.


 Yes we did, and all that is gone... The nice thing about honey bees is that the drones are genetic copies of the queen, so you can test Mitochondrial DNA and see all genetic lineages. Where as in humans when you test Mitochondrial DNA it is only 50% of the picture; if a drone mates with a queen and their offspring are mitotyped, the drone and the queens lineage will show up... if that lineage no longer exists, it doesn't show up. 

Those numbers come from Mitochondrial DNA studies... I have seen research that has put the number at 27 lineages, there is a more recent one that was recently posted in another thread that showed 30 lineages. 

Queen breeders here select from relatively few queens. Usually they buy one or two "Breeder Queens" and they rear 1000s of queens off of them. A package producer might raise and sell 20 K package queens off of 5-6 queens total. 

Yes we have had some influx; AHB is included in the 30 or so lineages though, Primorski were brought here by the USDA in the late 90s, but were not released to breeders until 2001 and only three lineages at that time were released. (orange, purple and yellow)... so again a limited gene pool. 

Search genetic diversity of honey bees usa and you will find plenty to read... here is one for you: http://comp.uark.edu/~aszalan/magnus_esa_2008.jpg

The US can only get queens from Canada currently, otherwise the border is closed to live bees. With the exception of Ferguson Apiaries I do not believe any Canadian queen breeders are importing here. Australia oroginally got their honey bees from North America, their lines do not offer us any genetic diversity, at least none that would last very long.


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## mike bispham (May 23, 2009)

bluegrass said:


> Yes we did, and all that is gone... The nice thing about honey bees is that the drones are genetic copies of the queen, so you can test Mitochondrial DNA and see all genetic lineages. [...] if a drone mates with a queen and their offspring are mitotyped, the drone and the queens lineage will show up... if that lineage no longer exists, it doesn't show up.
> 
> Those numbers come from Mitochondrial DNA studies... I have seen research that has put the number at 27 lineages, there is a more recent one that was recently posted in another thread that showed 30 lineages.


Interesting, thanks. But this speaks of 'lineages', and says nothing about the genetic variation within lineages. 

In the same way its understood that all humans stem from a single female, way back when. I know, there's been a long time for mutations to occur, and for natural selection to work on developing local adaptations; but the same will have happened - and remain - in the US bee popluation. Not all bees of a particular lineage are identical - far from it. And the diversity has been expressed as locally adapted populations all over the place.

This quote is at line 9 (the abstract) of your document:

"*Finding representatives of all 4 (A. mellifera) lineages, and documenting genetic diversity within all 4 lineages demonstrates that there is a large amount of genetic variation within honey bees in South Central United States. * "

This is, in case anyone could miss it, in direct opposition to the conclusions you draw.



bluegrass said:


> Search genetic diversity of honey bees usa and you will find plenty to read... here is one for you: http://comp.uark.edu/~aszalan/magnus_esa_2008.jpg


Understanding the documents, and their implications, and the important lessons to be drawn, is clearly something else...



bluegrass said:


> Queen breeders here select from relatively few queens. Usually they buy one or two "Breeder Queens" and they rear 1000s of queens off of them. A package producer might raise and sell 20 K package queens off of 5-6 queens total.


I agree, this is a real issue. Its one of the best arguments for local approaches to raising resistance to the outstanding problem - mites - since the present orthodox methods tend to reduce diversity not only through the mechanism you outline, but by undermining pockets of feral bees - which hold not only the precious diversity, but actual functional combinations of it.



bluegrass said:


> The US can only get queens from Canada currently, otherwise the border is closed to live bees.


I did a bit of quick research yesterday and found a federal document that seems to indicate NZ and Aus bees are also permitted. I did check and the effective date is March 10th 2014:

http://www.ecfr.gov/cgi-bin/text-idx?rgn=div5&node=7:5.1.1.1.7#7:5.1.1.1.7.2

Mike (UK)


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## bluegrass (Aug 30, 2006)

They open and close the border so often it is hard to keep up.

If you read the "discussion" section you will see this: 


> Samples were biased towards feral Colonies so their is a greater proportion of a lineages bees then one would find in bees maintained by beekeepers....
> 
> Feral populations of O and M may represent a source of genetic diversity which could be used to increase the genetic diversity of bees maintained by beekeepers.


Mitochondrial Eve has had 200 000 years worth of genetic mutation... US bees have not... And there are more then one "Adam" Not all of us received our Y chromosome from a single male. Remember what I said about drones and 50% of the picture earlier?


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## Tim Ives (May 28, 2013)

snl said:


> I'm guessing to call yourself treatment free, you must have a definition in mind as to what that is. It seems that TF folks cannot among themselves agree what it is. If you sugar dust, are you still TF? If you use FGMO, are you still TF?
> 
> What is treatment free?



Can you put in writing, that you will compensate all financial losses for me to use anything in my hives other than what the bees put there themselves?


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## honeydrunkapiaries (Oct 16, 2013)

There was a research project going on this year in Canada, where in order to find out the genetic diversity of honeybees in Canada we sent in samples from 6-7 of our hives. They have since finished up genome mapping of honeybees in Asia, Middle-East, etc. Results for Canada should be in sometime this summer. You can check their website @ http://zayedlab.apps01.yorku.ca/wordpress/


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## Dominic (Jul 12, 2013)

bluegrass said:


> They open and close the border so often it is hard to keep up.
> 
> If you read the "discussion" section you will see this:
> 
> ...


Are you talking about bees or humans? Bees don't have a Y chromosome, and thus no Y-chromosome Adam. As for humans, by definition, there can only be one. If you can trace back the origins to a few, then you haven't gone far back enough to find their common ancestor. I didn't look it up, maybe they haven't figured out where and when he was yet, and maybe he wasn't even a **** sapiens, but by definition there can only be one.


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## Dominic (Jul 12, 2013)

bluegrass said:


> Yes we did, and all that is gone... The nice thing about honey bees is that the drones are genetic copies of the queen, so you can test Mitochondrial DNA and see all genetic lineages. Where as in humans when you test Mitochondrial DNA it is only 50% of the picture; if a drone mates with a queen and their offspring are mitotyped, the drone and the queens lineage will show up... if that lineage no longer exists, it doesn't show up.
> 
> Those numbers come from Mitochondrial DNA studies... I have seen research that has put the number at 27 lineages, there is a more recent one that was recently posted in another thread that showed 30 lineages.
> 
> ...


Hold on there, 30 mitochondrial lines does not mean that all of our bees come from the same 30 queens! If you want to argue that, you may as well argue that all bees in the world come from the same ancestor queen. This can be said of any species, and is not a measure of genetic diversity! Especially not with species like bees that have haplodiploidy! If you made a sperm bank where you uniformely mixed the semen of all of the drones of the world, and used that in a breeding program, you'd still end up with no more mitochondrial lines than you started with. Even with the WSU is importing races we haven't had in a while, like A.m. caucasica, that still won't add any mitochondrial lines because they are only importing germplasm.


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## mike bispham (May 23, 2009)

bluegrass said:


> If you read the "discussion" section you will see this:
> 
> "Samples were biased towards feral Colonies so their is a greater proportion of a lineages bees then one would find in bees maintained by beekeepers....
> 
> Feral populations of O and M may represent a source of genetic diversity which could be used to increase the genetic diversity of bees maintained by beekeepers."


Its rather depresssing that you haven't acknowledged the gross error in your interpretation of the facts that I pointed out. There is, according to your paper, plenty of genetic diversity in US bees - albeit in the feral rather than the commercial population. These are the bees that you claimed had been killed of by varroa, resulting in a lack of diversity. 

An honest correspondent acknowledges errors, and moves with his fellows toward an understanding of the realities. He doesn't carry on as if nothing happened. Or try to plaster over the cracks with out of context extracts. 

We know commercial bees are a horrible mess, and that is the fault of commercial breeders who raise far too many queens from far too narrow a genetic base, and without any attempt to promote longevity or self sufficiency. We've known that for donkey's years. Its one of the grotty features of modern commercial beekeeping that (used to) drive people toward tf beekeeping - in the hope of finding a sustainable path.

What's interesting is (as this paper reveals yet again) feral bees are very much part of the answer. They're diverse, and locally adapted, and have overcome varroa on their own. They are what apiary bees would have been if beekeepers hadn't forgotten how to do husbandry.

Mike (UK)


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## fieldsofnaturalhoney (Feb 29, 2012)

mike bispham said:


> What's interesting is (as this paper reveals yet again) feral bees are very much part of the answer. They're diverse, and locally adapted, and have overcome varroa on their own. They are what apiary bees would have been if beekeepers hadn't forgotten how to do husbandry.
> Mike (UK)


:thumbsup:


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## bluegrass (Aug 30, 2006)

mike bispham said:


> Its rather depresssing that *you haven't acknowledged the gross error in your interpretation of the facts* that I pointed out. There is, according to your paper, plenty of genetic diversity in US bees - albeit in the feral rather than the commercial population. These are the bees that you claimed had been killed of by varroa, resulting in a lack of diversity.


Excuse me? 

Magnus's Hypothesis was that there was plenty of "Diversity", hence her conclusion that finding 4 Mitochondrial lines and 36 Haplotypes in a sample of 239 hives across 4 states was plenty of diversity... If another researcher had done the same research and came up with the same data, but their Hypothesis was that "genetic diversity was limited" these same numbers would have just as easily proved that point. 

To put this in a better perspective for you: She would have had to sample 59 hives before she even found the second Mitochondrial line. And in that same sample she would have only found 9 haplotypes.

And haplotypes have to be passed in pairs or they are useless. So using her sample as a guide; a breeder would need to be selecting from >60 hives in order to start improving diversity... preferably 60 hives not from their immediate area. If that breeder is not using 60 feral hives their diversity is even worse off... as this study was done on feral derived populations.

My hypothesis stands.


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## mike bispham (May 23, 2009)

bluegrass said:


> Excuse me?
> 
> My hypothesis stands.


... In direct opposition to the statement provided in the abstract of the document you reference.

Mike (UK)


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## iivydriff (Apr 20, 2011)

Most of my bees have came from feral swarms. I have bought some packages and even bought a breeder queen. A high dollar one. And the bees that I raise myself that are not treated with anything are better bees in my area. All the bees Ive ever boughten to try and improve my stock never works out. The mites get them or they cant survive on their own. after getting established. I raised some queens off that breeder queen i had. Ive got one hive left from them that actually survived on its own. And them bees were supposed to be the new hottest thing in Mite control and they very well probably are good in that aspect. But they just required constant feeding when there was a dearth and even through the winter. They built up super fast though. Like i was saying I dont treat with nothing. And ive had some good bees die because they could not handle the mites but hives on either side of them never even be affected by the mites at all. Ive lost 6 or 7 hives during the winter in 4 years Ive got around 25 hives all the time. Hopefully this year going up to 50. Some of my bees are way too hot for most peoples liking and some of them swarm like to swarm alot. Ive got hives that were feral that the mites have not touched and they have not swarmed in 4 years and make a ton of honey. Only drawback on them is they are a little hot. In winter beeks all around me loose a way larger percentage of their bees than i do. Some even treat their bees and still lose more than i do. Last fall I didnt even feed my bees up for the winter, and this winter was bad. Lost a few hives but the ones I lost were smaller hives. I even had a 5 frame nuc make it through this winter. All the bees that I have bought somewhere were not as good as what I can raise myself. And every year my bees are getting better Less likely to swarm and getting more honey and losing less to the mites all the time. I dont even use screened bottom boards. The guys that I know who do use them lose more than twice the hives I do. i think there is something wrong with the queens that are sold commercially. Im not sure what it is, but alot of times they will get superceeded or they are not good layers. Or they will do good for a little while then fizzle out or the mites will get them. if i had to keep a commercial operation running off of Queens like Ive boughten or the guys I know have bought. I would be in trouble I dont see how they can even keep going. I think there is more to getting a really good queen than what modern scientists know. One question i have is this? A queen knows she is laying a drone egg or a worker egg why isnt it possible that in a swarm cell she is actually laying a queen egg? Why cant that be possible. I really dont think emergency queens are as good as swarm queens they are likely to get superceded. Kinda just like the queens you buy wich the queens that come from grafts are basically emergency queens. Now I dont know for sure if this is the way it is. Its just a Theory I have.


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## rhaldridge (Dec 17, 2012)

You may find Jay Smith's book "Better Queens" interesting. He was a queen breeder back in the early to mid 20th century. He has many thoughts about the quality of queens. If he's right, most commercial queens are poorly fed and indifferently mated.


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