As many know, I am an enthusiastic supporter of Carniolans, specifically New
World Carniolans, because that stock was developed and is constantly
maintained and improved by Sue Cobey, now at Ohio State.  Here in upstate
NY, I have used it almost exclusively for over 20 years.  To the extent that
finally, during the past few years, my supercedure and after-swarm queens
are showing a relatively high percentage of 'black', instead of 'yellow',
which indicated crossing with Carniolan drones instead of Italian.

Long background, but the point I want to make is that I believe we queen
buyers have little chance of buying 'pure' Carniolans.

Go to Sue Cobey's web site http://www174.pair.com/birdland/Breeding/, look
at her list of approved breeders and jot down their locations.  Go to
www.mapquest.com and place them on a map.  You will see that almost all are
within a hundred mile or so radius of each other in Northern California.
This is the heart of the world's largest (and, arguably most competent)
community of queen producers.  This area is also the home of a tremendous
population commercial producers of honey.  California leads the US in annual
production of honey, and most of it comes from this area.

Most (but not all) producers of NWC's also produce Italians, and most also
run large numbers of hives for honey and pollination.  Most of the queens
and drones in the area are Italians as these are best suited for the climate
and specifically for almond pollination, the income from which provides a
fair amount of the 'queen producers' annual income!

The forthright producers readily admit their suspicions that few queens sold
as NWC are 100% mated to NWC drones.  The numbers and lack of good isolation
possibilities make that highly unlikely.  Most choose their 'NWC' queens by
reference to color.  The 'black' are NWC, the yellow are Italian, and the
intermediate are 'hybrids'.  As we all know, the genes for color have little
if any linkage to the genes for winter hardiness, temper, hygienic, tracheal
mite resistance, etc.

Some of these NWC queen producers annually purchase NWC breeders from Sue,
and also select from their own stock for queen mothers.  At least one only
uses NWC breeders from Sue as queen producers, and at least one (not in
Calif.) only uses semen purchased from Sue to inseminate his queen mothers.
IMHO, these (and others that follow similar practices) have the 'best
available' NWC queens.  But not even these will come even close to telling
anyone that their NWC queens are 'pure' NWC.

So, don't be afraid of not getting 'pure' NWC's, because you can only get
them via Instrumental Insemination (at $500 each).  What we can get is at
least mildly hybridized, but is damn good stock and for northern climates is
just about unbeatable.  (I have no inside knowledge, but I think it will not
be long until we see VD resistance with NWC, via the SMR traits.)

Lloyd
Lloyd Spear, Owner Ross Rounds, Inc.
Manufacturers of Ross Rounds Comb
Honey Equipment, Sundance Pollen Traps
and Custom Printer of Sundance Labels.

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