"They typically supersede rather than swarm - another good trait; we see many
3 and 4 year old queens that are then superseded without swarming. Mother
and daughter are often seen together".
I see this as wel in our mellifera, I think it might be related to selective pressure of their location, a very windy island. I have 6 pure colonies here on the main land in which we look at things like mite reproduction. Where the carnica colonies make 3-10 queen cells. the mellifera make 10-20.
The multi queen thing I see too. Some time ago I fortified a small colony with bees from another. There was some fighting and the next day I found a dead queen in front of the hive. I was already cursing myself for being sloppy and not using very young bees only but when I opened the colony behavior was normal and I found a laying queen doing here thing. On the island itself I have seen double queens in say 2 out of 25 colonies this year.
Typical for ours is the presence of chalk brood. I really never see that on the main land but it common in island colonies.
I like our mellifera a lot. They have something ant like about them. Small, runny, shiny, blackish color.
Some pics:
http://imkerforum.nordbiene.de/viewtopic.php?f=25&t=978
Lennard
***********************************************
The BEE-L mailing list is powered by L-Soft's renowned
LISTSERV(R) list management software. For more information, go to:
http://www.lsoft.com/LISTSERV-powered.html