Waiting on a friend, so below is a loose translation from the Slovenian original article, as it is annoying to see something that might be useful, and have to guess at what is being said.  Here, the crossbreeds are called  “Chrysanthemums” or "Crested", perhaps because they are brighter yellow than the native Carnis, which are dubbed “Lavender”.  (Otherwise, Solvenian is "close enough" to Polish and Russian.)

No breakthroughs in requeening here, and yes, they are basing all their work strictly on color, so someone needs to deliver the bad news about color alone being a less-than reliable indicator of much of anything important.

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Carrying Out Basic Selection, Cross-Breed [“Chrysanthemum”] Identification and Replacement of Queens

Selecting bee colonies by the color of the worker bees' hindquarters a fundamental selection in beekeeping.  Slovenians should be pleased that we have preserved our bees. But, in addition to new bee diseases and climatic change, the invasion of other bee subspecies and chosen lines poses a threat to the Carniola bee today. The percentage of bees with yellow or orange rings rises as a result. These bees are offspring of our bees and populations from nearby populations. The queen must be replaced if there are more than 2% of bees in a colony with yellow or orange rings on their backs. By taking this action, we can eradicate hybrid bees from the Slovenian population.

We must pay close attention to this feature when inspecting our bees to perform basic selection. When more than 20 bees with yellow or orange rings on the back are seen on one side of a full hive of bees in a single bee colony, the queen must be replaced as soon as possible.

There are two reasons why the [nut] must be replaced. Foreign genes from this family are spread by [thrushes] who mate with young queen, and genes from this family are also spread by queens that will hatch from this queen's eggs.

Image - A three-level bee coloration indicator for the correct basic selection of Carniolan bees
(left to right) Pure Carniola Lavender (b) Crossbreed (c) Yellow (Italian or Buckfast bee)

When the weather is good, the young queen is simultaneously added to the hive in the queen cage and the old queen is removed from the colony with too many crosses.

Put the queen inside the hive so that the bees may access the cage openings where they can interact with the developing queen.  The queen bee is positioned in between the combs containing covered brood, however the bees are prevented from accessing the queen or the fondant plug in the queen cage. We check the bee colony's mood the next day.

The bees are receptive of the new queen if the workers are present in the queen's nest, fanning their wings, and are easy to remove. In this instance, the hive is closed and the queen and fondant plug are made available to the bees.  We wait a day or two before allowing the bees access to the fondant plug and the queen if the bees are still restless and it will be harder to separate them from the queen. In a day or two, the queen can exit the hive when the bees are allowed access to the fondant plug, which they eat.

During the course of a week, we evaluate the reception of queens.
We must be conscious that a hasty search of the colony and the ensuing commotion we create inside the colony may result in the young queen's demise.  We do not look for the queen during the inspection of the acceptance of the queen; instead, we just look for uncovered brood.

The primary objective of using basic selection in beekeeping is to adhere to the Breeding Program's directive that the Carniolan bee be preserved on Republic of Slovenian soil.  The distinction between the Carniola bee and the ["Crested"] bee must be understood by all Slovenian beekeepers.

When identifying crossbreeds for the first time, beekeepers frequently need assistance, which they can get from field consultants in beekeeping or from a nearby beekeeper who has already acquired the necessary knowledge. Our shared objective is to safeguard the indigenous Carniolan bee for future generations.


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Sidebar - 1200 Commercial Queens Will Be Replaced by Beekeepers This Year

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Field beekeeper experts will be able to offer more discussions with beekeepers in the area of fundamental selection in May and June. In fact, field consultants have until the middle of June to report the necessity to replace queens from their areas of operation. If you discover that each bee colony contains hybrids, the field consultant will recommend that you replace the queen, which you will receive at no cost. In order to find out the coloring status of the bees in your area, beekeepers should contact a field consultant (you can find the list in the appendix).

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