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<blockquote data-quote="Alastair" data-source="post: 12935" data-attributes="member: 13"><p>Read the article and pretty much agree with the whole thing.</p><p></p><p>What has saved bees, is that unlike other domestic animals such as dogs whose breeding at least in pedigree lines is tightly controlled and has resulted in many dogs having deformities and costing the owner heaps of vet bills, for the most part bees open mate and humans cannot interfere as much, which has kept our bees resilient.</p><p></p><p>If you watch a wildlife film about the African savannah one thing that stands out is all the animals are superbly fit. If you look at a herd of zebra or wildebeest they are beautiful looking healthy animals. Because anything not fit is picked off by predators. With bees, it is possible to pick the best queen or two and breed hundreds of queens from it, the idea being to improve our bees. But the excellent condition of the herd animals in Africa is not achieved by breeding from just one or two of the best. It is achieved by the constant removal of the worst, and the majority get to breed, maintaining genetic diversity. In this, I agree with the article, he is breeding from most of the hives, except for the worst which he requeens.</p><p></p><p>As to swarming, something to think about is that bees have been reproducing by swarming for thousands of years and swarming was the only way they reproduced. However a balance was achieved because a strain that almost never swarmed would have been outbred by others, but a strain that overswarmed would have sent out lots of little swarms unlikely to survive, plus deplete the parent colony. So a balance has been reached where hives send out a primary swarm which is a big strong swarm with excellent chances of survival provided they find a suitable nesting site, and then maybe some afterswarms with virgins if the parent hive still has good numbers.</p><p>But humans can interfere with this, because we catch swarms even weak ones, house them, and care for them. Meaning that a greater number of swarms survive, and therefore lines that swarm more will gradually become more numerous.</p><p></p><p>When I was in the South Island, many hives never even tried to swarm, and any that did were marked to ensure they were never used as a breeder. But here in Auckland, every healthy hive will try to swarm, so there is little way to identify low swarming strains. I think this problem has got worse since the introduction of carniolan genetics.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Alastair, post: 12935, member: 13"] Read the article and pretty much agree with the whole thing. What has saved bees, is that unlike other domestic animals such as dogs whose breeding at least in pedigree lines is tightly controlled and has resulted in many dogs having deformities and costing the owner heaps of vet bills, for the most part bees open mate and humans cannot interfere as much, which has kept our bees resilient. If you watch a wildlife film about the African savannah one thing that stands out is all the animals are superbly fit. If you look at a herd of zebra or wildebeest they are beautiful looking healthy animals. Because anything not fit is picked off by predators. With bees, it is possible to pick the best queen or two and breed hundreds of queens from it, the idea being to improve our bees. But the excellent condition of the herd animals in Africa is not achieved by breeding from just one or two of the best. It is achieved by the constant removal of the worst, and the majority get to breed, maintaining genetic diversity. In this, I agree with the article, he is breeding from most of the hives, except for the worst which he requeens. As to swarming, something to think about is that bees have been reproducing by swarming for thousands of years and swarming was the only way they reproduced. However a balance was achieved because a strain that almost never swarmed would have been outbred by others, but a strain that overswarmed would have sent out lots of little swarms unlikely to survive, plus deplete the parent colony. So a balance has been reached where hives send out a primary swarm which is a big strong swarm with excellent chances of survival provided they find a suitable nesting site, and then maybe some afterswarms with virgins if the parent hive still has good numbers. But humans can interfere with this, because we catch swarms even weak ones, house them, and care for them. Meaning that a greater number of swarms survive, and therefore lines that swarm more will gradually become more numerous. When I was in the South Island, many hives never even tried to swarm, and any that did were marked to ensure they were never used as a breeder. But here in Auckland, every healthy hive will try to swarm, so there is little way to identify low swarming strains. I think this problem has got worse since the introduction of carniolan genetics. [/QUOTE]
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