It's me gammy leg!

[Jon]

I have seen 4 queens with a paralysed back right leg this year, all grafted from the same mother. The one in the video is not laying but others have flown and mated, producing fairly patchy brood which is hardly surprising.

I am speculating that this is a genetic defect caused by a gene from a single one of the drones the mother queen mated with as I have seen 4 queens like this out of about 60.

Could this be possible if the gene does not have a detrimental effect in the drone? Drones being haploid should not be carrying lethal genes.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YxVslbbSjNo

[gavin]

Was that the new camera? Looked like a better quality image.

It certainly suggests that genetics are involved if they are all from the same mother. Presumably your drone colonies were contributing to queens from other mothers too? If that is the case and they didn't show the defect then the mother must be a source of the gammy leg gene too.

That spoils your 1 in 15 single-drone hypothesis but it could still be a genetic trait.

Queen mother carries a recessive gene for the trait - Aa (and doesn't show anything) (gene a for arthritic of course)

*two* out of 15 drones are a

Daughter queens come in the aa form in half of two fifteenths ie 1 in 15.

Alternatively, something about the daughters of these queens caused the mating colony to knee-cap the poor virgin. Dodgy territory here referring to knee-capping in an Irish bee.

Its fun to speculate.

[Jon]

This is the queen I swapped one of mine for last summer. It is a Galtee daughter and mated with presumably mainly galtee drones at the other apiary. That is Mervyn's hand you can see in the video and he said he had never seen this in any of his own queens. 4 queens all with a gammy right back leg. It must be an inheritable genetic trait. I am just curious re. how it has come about.

[gavin]

Now that you have saturated Belfast with your preferred queens, you could always experiment! Do you have eggs from one of those arthritic queens?

If it is a single dominant gene (A causing the gammy leg) then the gammy legged queen will probably be Aa. Assuming her daughters mate with normal drones, 50% of the queens raised by that queen will have a gammy leg (unless they are unfit prior to mating in which case the frequency could be lower).

If it is a single recessive gene (a causing the gammy leg) then the gammy legged queen will be aa. Her daughters will show the trait again anytime one mates with a drone carrying a, which is probably at a low frequency and will change from mating site to mating site (try some at your dad's apiary and see if the trait disappears).

Then you can write a wee paper on it!

Do folk in the Galtee group see this trait sometimes?

[Jon]

Do folk in the Galtee group see this trait sometimes?

I asked Mervyn the same question but he had never heard any mention of it.
The queen was open mated at his apiary so assuming it is a genetic problem it is not necessarily related to galtee bees.
I sent him the video link which featured his own fair hand so he can forward that to interested parties.

probably at a low frequency and will change from mating site to mating site

4 queens is probably a frequency of about 5% judging by the number of queens I have seen this year although if the defect impairs flying or mating it could also account for a few disappearing queens. The other 3 mated and started laying.

[Adam]

I'm pleased you lashed out on a new camera Jon.

Is there anywhere - an idiots guide to genes and crosses etc available? I see words like alleles and homozygous and such like but know little about it all.