Hello Keith & All,

>Wouldn't it be interesting to find out more of this bees origin?

The next time I speak with Tom Rinderer or a Russian cooperator I will see
what I can find out Keith. Charlie Harper (of our list) and I talk by phone
every once in awhile and it has been awhile. Might give Charlie a call and
see what he can share. Charlie is a "hunt & peck" typist and to quote
Charlie when we first met:

"I would rather talk on the phone than try to do long emails"

I would rather talk on the phone with complicated subjects but have had
three different hour long calls today which gets old but still I am
flattered beekeepers want to call me and talk beekeeping. They seem to know
when I am not busy which works out for me.

> The correct name for the Primorsky bee is A.m. macedonica.

Do we have discovery? or is this a good guess?

Ruttner classified the Primorsky area bee as A.m.macedonica in 1988. Tom
Rinderer sent Ruttner samples of the queens he was importing and Ruttner
verified macedonica. The Primorsky bee is made up of races not seen in the
U.S. EXCEPT for a *very small* percent of Italian & carniolan in *some*
samples.

I believe that the feisty nature of the Primorsky Russian/Russian comes from
the high percent of Cyprian in the bee. Although the Cyprian bee was never
(to my knowledge other than perhaps a bee lab for research) imported into
the U.S. at one time we had a USDA beekeeping ace named E. L. Sechrist which
had years of experience with the cyprian in other countries.His writings of
the
fifties sound like writings about  "scuts".

I can give some direct quotes if the list desires?

>If this is the case this bee should be considered for incorporating into
breeding programs to improve the Primorsky bee for commercial use while
maintaining varroa tolerance.

Several of us have been doing exactly that. Charlie Harper and the bee lab
are doing selections also.

>A shame as it is by far the best bee I have so far used for my location and
it takes to small cells well.

in my opinion the pure Russian/Russian is a tough bee to fit into a
commercial operation although Tubbs , Manley and Charlie are doing so and
report success!

I will continue to work with the Russian II breeder queens and experiment
but will not be adding Russian bees to my production line as I have been for
the last four years.

> the one I liked was Russian/Carniolan and subsequently the off spring of
my strongest survivors of this cross.

 I liked the above cross but the cross was NWC. I liked the Russian/Purvis
brothers gold line better but have only one season on those and I have had
three years with the Russian/NWC cross.

Bob

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