That squares with my own observations as I see yellow worker offspring in the F1 from my black queens yet the drones they produce are always black. If black were dominant, you should always have black workers in the F1 assuming the queens you start with are pure.Originally Posted by gavin
Gavin
is that one queen producing both yellow and black drones I've never noticed that I will be paying closer attention in future
Jon that is something I have never noticed either I will look more carefully
Last edited by The Drone Ranger; 26-07-2011 at 11:34 PM.
Roger Patterson has a slide he shows from a colony which produces 50/50 yellow or black drones.
Yes Jon, in your case:
yy queen (black) x Y drone gives Yy (yellow) worker offspring but y (black) drone offspring.
A daughter queen (Yy) could do the thing DL mentioned, give 50:50 yellow and black drone offspring
Gavin
Is it really that simple? I never see a coloured drone in my own colonies and yet I have queens which vary from jet black to almost all yellow (abdomens). I caught a yellow swarm last week and yesterday found a yellow drone and yellow virgin in it so it seems someone around here is keeping quiet about his yellow bees. I thought everyone had signed up to our local bee policy so it was a bit of a disappointment to me.
Rosie
No, far from it. That was the very simplified version. The long version made my head hurt!
There are lots of modifying genes that affect the shade, and there are genes that give colour in drones but not females and t'other way. A gene from African stock gives dark drones despite the yellow workers. I wonder if Buckfast do that as they have some African parentage. But there is a big effect gene that does the above.
The Buckfast drones I remembers (from an abberation a couple of years ago!) were very gingery.
I'm afraid that there are probably always a few beekeepers dotted about that do their own thing and never make themselves known.
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