> Pete,
> When you quote someone the implication is you believe what they said unless you refute what they said.  For example today you once more quoted someone saying we have a small number of queen producers and thus must be suffering from inbreeding suppression in our queens.  I do not know if you really believe this, but you have made this quote several times now and never once hinted you did not believe it was true,  I suspect you think it is true.  

No, the purpose of quoting the piece was to show that queen quality is considered the primary problem by a large number of beekeepers. The authors speculate that it could be the result of loss of diversity or disease. In fact, I don’t believe that diversity is the problem and have said so. The question of disease is the central point here, if the queen breeding industry is contaminated by disease, that could account for the high rate of supersedure. 

> You also quoted another source that made some very limited measurements that showed sperm viability was 50 to 70% in one small area in Texas over two years and not during the main breeding season.  What does this really mean?  Probably absolutely nothing.

I think fifty percent viability could be an issue, especially if the sperm continued to die after being stored. If the viability declined at a regular rate it could become inviable before the year is out. The fact that the drones were sampled outside the main season is a sticking point the authors raise themselves, but this is the second time this week I have seen data suggesting later season queen rearing can generate poor quality queens. It used to be queen breeders stopped selling queens after the spring rush, now some sell them all summer long.

> You have quoted people and made supporting statements recently on how commercial queen producers operate.  I know for a fact that many commercial queen producers do not operate the way your quoted authorities or you say they operate.  For example simply picking color and nothing else has to be a joke.  Perhaps there is a queen producer out there that operates that way?  

I stated plainly that I worked in the Northern California queen industry and saw this with my own eyes. Several breeders worked collectively and all practiced the same sort of “selection process” as their product was Golden Italians. They shipped tens of thousands of packages and probably 100,000 queens annually. There was a variety of practices I saw that I personally thought compromised the system, including poorly raised cells, inadequate culling of cells, selling queens that had only laid a few eggs, etc.

> You quoted sources that showed a tiny part of a great many queens DNA including Italian queens came originally from Carniolans.  While this is true it is also 100% meaningless and you made zero effort to point out why it is 100% meaningless.

I don’t think it’s meaningless, any more than it’s meaningless that most of the fish sold in fancy NYC restaurants is not the species that it’s sold as. It doesn’t matter to me personally, but it isn’t meaningless. When people are describing the qualities of “Carniolan,” “Italian,” or “Buckfast” bees it seems that those terms should actually mean something. Other than black, gold or stripey. Personally, I think that trying to line breed bees is deleterious but the fact is that most commercial bees are outcrossed, like it or not, so inbreeding would not be a problem. They are like a milkshake made with Neapolitan ice cream. 

> I guess I am very confused as to what you are trying to accomplish on Bee-L.  I have no idea what your message is.  I would suggest more original thought and less quoting would make you more useful, but that is simply my perspective.

I have stated clearly that my goal is to stimulate conversation. I think it’s a valid question whether queens sold for $40 are any better than queens plucked out of random swarms, and whether they are anything remotely like what the breeders claim they are. I think it’s a serious question whether the queen and package bee industry is a vector for disease. Even if it isn’t, it seems plain that it could serve as a rapid conduit for new diseases. 

I certainly think that the issue of sperm viability needs to be looked at. It could account for the phenomenon of early queen supersedure. In other words, the queens could be fine but the sperm is not. In any case, queen loss in midwinter accounts for a very high percentage of colonies that fail during winter.

It is a fact that queen rearing practices are pretty much the same as they were 100 years ago. As Dr. Oldroyd points out, the profit margin is too small to make radical changes in the method of mass producing queens. Coupled with the low expectations of beekeepers, there is little incentive to develop new and better methods. We have often observed that a well bred, tested queen would cost so much that few people would buy them. I didn’t buy any bees this year, and the colonies seem to be doing fine. I have decide to stick with the Charlie Mraz method and let them raise their own queens.

Believe it or not, I have given this stuff a lot of thought. And finally, when I submit a piece of research, it is because it raises significant points, but I don’t agree with everything an author says no matter who they are. In these case, valid concerns were raised which seemed to prompt serious questions which to date remain unanswered. The pieces were new and not everyone has access to new research, especially stuff that's paywalled.

Peter Borst
Ithaca, NY  USA
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