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Thread: Bees with resistance to varroa mites

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    Senior Member Jon's Avatar
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    Default Bees with resistance to varroa mites

    Some of us in the Native bee group have been discussing possible longer term projects. One of the ideas on the table is to try and identify colonies which deal with mites better than others - and selectively breed from these.
    Marla Spivak reckons that favourable genes helping to deal with mites are to be found within the population of any race of bee.
    The two most obvious beneficial traits are grooming off and biting mites as well as uncapping the cells with a mite infested pupa. The latter behaviour is known as Varroa sensitive hygiene. (VSH)

    I see some the main issues as:

    -deciding what to record and how to record it
    -involving as many beekeepers as possible
    -keeping it simple

    Anyone got any experience in this area or any bright ideas for what is likely to work or fail?

    The cold turkey approach advocated by many of the 'natural' beekeepers is not an option as no-one is going to sign up to a project where the most likely outcome is the loss of most of your bees. (see Ingemar Fries 'Bond' experiment)

    The non treatment option was once described by Dan Basterfield as akin to dropping babies off a bridge with regard to selection technique.
    Ideally we would be looking for something where progress could be made in incremental steps.
    Queens could be grafted and propagated from any promising stock.

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    Default Bees with resistance to varroa mites

    The work being done by Ron Hoskins (Swindon bee) might be a place to start as he's pretty adamant that "anyone" can copy his technique. I'm sure I've got some info from him somewhere which I can dig out if you like.

    LASI is also doing work around hygienic or VSH behaviour in native AMM type bees and perhaps some of their techniques could be modified or adopted into a more amateur (in the best meaning of the word) programme.

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    Senior Member Jon's Avatar
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    They have done a bit of work in the Galtee group counting mites on trays and counting the percentage of mites with missing legs which have been groomed off. The mites are examined under a microscope. This might be similar to Ron Hoskins work as I know he got a grant to buy a load of microscopes.
    Any info you have will be gratefully received.

    The VSH stuff might be more difficult to measure as the standard technique involves killing a circle of brood with liquid nitrogen and counting the percentage of cells cleared in 24 hours.

    We need to look at something which the rank and file can get involved with.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Neils View Post
    The work being done by Ron Hoskins (Swindon bee) might be a place to start as he's pretty adamant that "anyone" can copy his technique. I'm sure I've got some info from him somewhere which I can dig out if you like.

    LASI is also doing work around hygienic or VSH behaviour in native AMM type bees and perhaps some of their techniques could be modified or adopted into a more amateur (in the best meaning of the word) programme.
    BBC springwatch http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p00hhdrw

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    Default Bees with resistance to varroa mites

    Quote Originally Posted by Jon View Post
    They have done a bit of work in the Galtee group counting mites on trays and counting the percentage of mites with missing legs which have been groomed off. The mites are examined under a microscope. This might be similar to Ron Hoskins work as I know he got a grant to buy a load of microscopes.
    Any info you have will be gratefully received.

    The VSH stuff might be more difficult to measure as the standard technique involves killing a circle of brood with liquid nitrogen and counting the percentage of cells cleared in 24 hours.

    We need to look at something which the rank and file can get involved with.
    There is an alternative to liquid nitrogen but I'd agree that it's far more intensive and perhaps not as suitable for an amateur group to persue. I'll see what I've got floating around from Ron, but it sounds like you're already doing the basics of what he suggests.

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    Senior Member Jon's Avatar
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    DR's clip above shows that antennae on the bottom board is an indicator of VSH.
    That would be an easy indicator to count.

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    Hi Jon
    About the middle of this article is a pin prick test
    Doesn't destroy many larva
    http://www.glenn-apiaries.com/breeding.html

    This page suggests two genes involved in hygenic behaviour are recessive
    http://www.glenn-apiaries.com/geneti...l#anchor177465
    Last edited by The Drone Ranger; 14-05-2013 at 05:42 PM.

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    Senior Member prakel's Avatar
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    A nice iwf video 'Selection of Honeybees for Vitality'.


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    Senior Member prakel's Avatar
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    I posted this one previously on another thread but it's well worth another look.


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    IIRC the liquid nitrogen or pinprick tests are to determine hygienic bees rather than for specific varroa sensitive hygiene.
    I think the easiest and most sound criteria for breeding bees is to select those with a very clean brood nest - solid brood pattern. This indicates a high degree of resistance to all sorts of maladies that may affect bees and can be measured at a glance.

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