No bee population can remain static and the same as the originals, they are all constantly evolving. My thoughts on a good "native" queen is that she has captured a snapshot in time of the local gene pool in the multitude of drones she has mated with.Originally Posted by drumgerry
mbc
I would guess that if we swapped queens they would likely do well in either location as I am guessing that our bees cope with wet windy and cool conditions better than some others.
I'd imagine the original sub-population that evolved here to cope with cold, snowy winters and drier than the west summers (because of the Cairngorms which catch most of the rain you know!) are long gone unfortunately. And no local source of good AMM breeding stock especially given the current fetish for Buckfasts about 20 miles north of me.
Interestingly John Durkacz recently sent me a poster advertising a bee farmer who operated about 5 miles from my house during the 30s and 40s. I just wonder what bees he had and whether they might have been "originals".
Gavin made a very pertinent observation earlier ( as did Bridget some days ago); some breeds of bees may well be able to withstand cold temperatures and poor foraging conditions but will succumb to dampness. The Carniolian was introduced to Ireland on a number of occasions but displayed an extraordinary propensity to contract nosema - something that did not happen in it's native land. I often thought that the damp climate was the reason or at least a contributary factor, it is possible that other bee breeds would be similarly effected.
DB
We had a guy up north imported Slovenian carnica queens for a while but they did not seem to do well.
He put an ad in one of the bee magazines - Irish Carnica for Easy handling! was the strapline. Obviously the Magazine existed in a limbo where the trade descriptions act does not apply.
Other than AMM and assorted mongrels the only other stuff anyone keeps here is Buckfast.
Buckfast bees seem to be going through a phase of popularity at this time. More to do with fastbucks than anything else, I suspect. They'll not be popular for long once they start crossing with local drones. We have had the odd colony turn up here from time to time - the originals were normally quite docile but the offspring were the most agressive bees I have encountered, pinging off the veil in an attempt to get to ones eyes and then stinging everything that moved within a 200 yds. radius or so from the hive.
It was an amazing achievement by Brother Adam to have created and stabilised a new breed of bee
Even in a population of chickens to create a new breed is monumental achievement.
The thing both these have in common is that the breeding program moves in a forward direction by selecting from the new genetic mixtures
mbc I think is right you can't reasonably expect to breed backwards to the original UK black bee any more than we can recreate a Neanderthal from the genes which are present in all of us.
But why is it breeding backwards DR? There are AMM populations all over the place. Maybe not the AMM populations that were originally there but AMM nevertheless - and I don't think for one minute they are all based on imports from France or the like. I really don't subscribe to Bro Adam's view that Acarine killed all the AMMs off.
DR
I agree that the concept of backbreeding is a fallacy and I also agree that the chance of finding 'pure' AMM like something which may have existed on these islands 500 years ago is slight due to introgression of genetic material from waves of imports in the last 150 years.
But anyhow, there has always been overlap between the ranges of the different bee subspecies in Europe so the idea of having some interbreeding where the ranges overlap is not unusual.
The way to go if you are interested in AMM/native bees is to start with the best/purest stock possible and just keep breeding to improve it based on normal selection criteria such as gentleness and hardiness.
Obviously you need to control matings the best you can which is why it is good to get a group of like minded people working together in the same area.
If you start with something which has a minimal percentage of AMM genetics you have not got a mission of creating AMM by backbreeding.
You might get a lookalike after a while but whether this will breed true is anyone's guess.
This also applies to wings which is the big risk of you select breeders fundamentally on wing venation. Bad idea.
I think the term 'Buckfast' is used more loosely now than in Bro Adam's day.
Well if by breeding backwards DR you mean trying to recreate some halcyon version of Britain's bees I'd be tempted to put a less negative slant on it. I'd say that instead probably the best bee for our dodgy summers is one based on AMM and that it's not an unreasonable proposition to therefore breed for it (with no rose tinted spectacles on) in the best way we can in our various localities. For some of us (such as yourself) in the heart of commercial beekeeper land that might be an almost impossible task but for others such as myself where beekeepers are spread far and wide it's a less onerous task if approached in the right way.
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