# Black Knight hybrids



## beepro (Dec 31, 2012)

Hi, All!


So in this late of a season I manage to find a source of some black hybrid
queens. Not sure what type of hybrids they are I called them the black Knight.
Can anyone tell me what type of hybrid queen it is?



Black Knight hybrids:


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## Tenbears (May 15, 2012)

I have quite a few of those. I have kept them because they are prolific layers. We call them Black Onyx queens, Our strain came about completely accidentally from the hybridization of Italian queens, with local wild drones. Which I believe are the descendants of carnolians I kept here years ago. My original Queen was so prolific that she overcrowded a 8 frame hive in 4 weeks. And they are survivors as well. The seem to be able to handle the mistakes of beginners very well.
All of her offspring have equaled her. She has produced many Black Onyx offspring with the occasional Cordovan color pattern which is a recessive color pattern anyway. 
For my money they are a hybridization of Italian, Carnolian and ?????. But I sure like them! They look just like yours without the blue dot :applause:


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## Arnie (Jan 30, 2014)

I've got one like that.
Picked her up from a local beekeeper who raised her from some survivors he's got. I like her a lot, going to get some daughter queens from her.


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## beepro (Dec 31, 2012)

Are you going to clip her and reduce her laying area to only
3 frames of space? Seems to be a way to keep the queen living longer to
produce more daughter queens for you. No clip she might swarm away.
What do you think?


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## Arnie (Jan 30, 2014)

beepro, I don't know if you're asking me about clipping her, but I doubt that I will.

I only have a few hives so if I raise some queens from her it would be on the level of a dozen or so at a time.
I've seen what you do and it's impressive, especially the queens you raise in canning jars, i just don't have any where near that type of operation. The most hives I have ever had was 25, I'm small time.


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## thomas (Apr 23, 2006)

Where can i get one of these queens and are they gentle to work with.


Thomas


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## beepro (Dec 31, 2012)

Yes, Thomas.
All carnis here are the gentle type bees. Because
the 90% carnis drones are from the bee association stationary
hives just 5 minutes from my bee yard. There is a guy here that belong to the carnis bee association
near by. For me, I only keep the Cordovan/Italians
queens. After four generation of queens, they gradually turn the Cordovan hives into
a 50/50% carnis and Cordovans. This is an interesting experiment that I stumbled on when
I did my little bee experiment this season using the Cordovan (recessive traits) vs. the 90% carnis
drones out there. From the 50% carnis workers in my hives, I can make those
black carnis queens too. As a matter of fact that they are too gentle for my liking. I
like the Cordovan bees better. Both are the gentle types here. I'm starting to incorporate the VSH
traits into my apiary this and the next season. Now it is going to be more fun doing the mite/bee
experiments this coming Spring time.
Oh, those are not the canning jars. They are the little jars that people throw away at work. I just
thought to recycle them so they gave me a bunch everyday. A large igloo has been filled up
with these little jars already. I'm hoping to expand more the coming seasons by perfecting my little
jar cell experiment so that the chance of a virgin surviving will be increased. They cannot fight each others anymore.
Now I can really pick my favorite color queens. Humm, is it the Black Knight carnis or the Cordovan?


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## thomas (Apr 23, 2006)

I have mostly NWC and some black caucasians but are you selling any of those black queens if so how much or anyone that are selling them.


Thomas


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## GaryG74 (Apr 9, 2014)

Nice photos! Those are really nice looking queens!


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## beepro (Dec 31, 2012)

Thomas, I don't sell any queen bees at the moment because my hives
are in their expansion phase right now. Eventually I might have
some for sale if they make those. I still like the Cordovan genetics mated
with the carnis drones out there. I'm in the process to incorporate
some Russian genetics into my apiary using the Italians/Russian queen.
The Russian is also a black type bee. We will see if any worker bees look
like the Russian once they hatched. If you want to know the source of this
black queen then send me a PM. I found the infos on the net.


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## Oldtimer (Jul 4, 2010)

To me the queen in your pic looks like a carniolan. The bees don't though.

Of course I cannot see clearly but a few features why she looks carniolan to me, is she is long but quite slim, and best I can see, has a slight kind of luminescent look in the abdomen, the other black queens, AMM, that I used to know were not as slender, and solid duller black without the luminescent look.

Have attached an old pic of one of my carniolan queens, note the similarities.


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## kramerbryan (Oct 30, 2013)

They do look very similar


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