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Informed Discussion of Beekeeping Issues and Bee Biology

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From:
Peter Loring Borst <[log in to unmask]>
Reply To:
Informed Discussion of Beekeeping Issues and Bee Biology <[log in to unmask]>
Date:
Sun, 22 Mar 2015 10:33:30 -0400
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> I have never had much faith in the idea of geographical natural selection over any short period of time but I do suspect that culling can remove not adaptive individuals quite quickly as can some folks individual management styles.

Same here. The main differences we note in bee types are characteristics that developed over tens of thousands of years, partially due to geographic isolation, natural selection and genetic drift. These things don't come about during short periods of time (decades). Here Rinderer points out that in 300 years European bees never adapted to Brazil, whereas in 30 years, African bees populated all of the Americas. 

> [The] dramatic multiplication and spread of African genes is explained only by the assumption that their selective advantage was so overwhelming that they did not give the European genes the least chance. The Africanized bees proceeded 300 km and more per year, showing that they were adapted to the tropical environment of America as well as to that of Africa. For the Iberian bees, the 300 years after their importation was too short to develop efficient adaptations.  (Rinderer, 1986)

PLB

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