David Eyre wrote:
> .......................................Given enough repeats, ie.
> daughters replacing mothers via 'walk away' splits or emergency
> raising over a period of generations the quality falls apart. We kept
> results and notes over a 7 year period. After 3 generations it was
> possible to note the difference. Aggression, poor wax making, lack of
> forage ability, poor winterability all round lack of vigour.
>         After 5 generations we had to destroy one hive as being impossible
> to work because of it's aggression. From these results we determined,
> aggression is not a gene characteristic.

Given that what David reports is true and accurately observed by him,
what
is the explanation?
The fundamental biological equation states:--
Phenotype = Genotype + Environment
That is observed characteristics are a result of the genetic "blue
print" in
the genes plus the external conditions from conception (and maybe before
ie. the parents state of health)to death. Clearly the early stages of
life
have a greater weight in this equality than the later stages of life.

So why, if this is what David is actually saying, should an emergency
queen and
a grafted queen produced from eggs from the same mother be different ie.
regressive/non-regressive (using the term as defined by David)?? One
must assume
that David (as he has several times recommended) removes capped queen
cells on
day 3 or 4 to ensure that the emergency queens are NOT produced from
"mature"
larvae (incidentally I hate the term grub). Input please!

As to agression not being genetic I must admit to being puzzled by this.
Most references
state quite categorically that agression IS genetic and related to
racial purity.
Brown bee - italian bee crosses were called vicious by Ruttner for
example. BIBBA
is working towards "better bees", ie. non-regressive in Davids
terminology, by trying
to breed pure A.m.m (a form of positive regression). Comments?

Cheers Tony

--
Anthony N Morgan,
Førsteammanuensis
Institutt for Elektroteknikk
Høgskolen i Sør-Trøndelag
N-7004 Trondheim, Norway
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Tlf. 73 55 96 04
Fax. 73 55 95 81