# Honey Bee Identification



## ohbeehave (Oct 3, 2013)

Can you identify this honey bee? Buckfast? Italian?









Thanks!


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## Chemguy (Nov 26, 2012)

I can't identify it, but it looks like the bees in a feral swarm I caught this summer.


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## Honey Hive Farms (Nov 1, 2012)

Honey Hive Farms,

Hard to tell by the picture, Italian is our guess.
As long as they are strong and doing what God intended, that is a good start.

Tim Moore


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## burns375 (Jul 15, 2013)

Very difficult to find thorough-bred bees. Most honey bees are mutts. A little or this and that.


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## Tenbears (May 15, 2012)

Although this bee has Italian characteristics, It is imposable to determine breeding on a visual basis. Unless a queen is artificially inseminated. It is a guess as to the true lineage of any bee in the United States. The wild bee gene pool within this country has become so diversified the bees from the same hive, same queen can have characteristics of many different genetics. Although there are definitely problems with bee mortality both in wild and domestic populations. There is no doubt that there still exists many feral colonies. I spend a great deal of time on vast tracts of public land with no private land within 6 of 7 miles or more. everywhere I go I still see honey bees. This in and of itself tells me there is breading population of honey bees most everywhere. 
Thus any queen that is bred under natural circumstances can carry the genes from a widely diverse genetic sampling, and may express traits from any number of types.

I Not care for the term MUTT as it has come to denote poor quality. There are some mighty fine bees that can be very gentle in nature, produce good volumes of surplus honey, be disease resistant, while carrying widely diversified genetics. I do not call them Mutts, but rather genetically engineered through natural selection.


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## Tony P (Mar 17, 2014)

Very interesting indeed due to lack of control of crossbreeding due to swarming I would think.


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## snl (Nov 20, 2009)

burns375 said:


> Very difficult to find thorough-bred bees.


Are there any?


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