TW>From: Trevor Weatherhead <[log in to unmask]>
  >Date:         Sun, 10 Aug 1997 07:49:14 -0400
  >Subject:      Re: Egyptian bees
 
TW>I was interested to note Andy's comments about Egyptian bees.  I am not sure
  >of his context but I do recall reading an article where bees in the USA had
  >some DNA work carried out on them and were shown to be Egyptian in origin.
 
Hello Trevor from Australia where the clocks run backwards or is it the
flush toilets?<G>
 
Yes, so called "feral" hive in California, and in Arizona are said to
have Egyptian blood lines. Could be honeybee swarms that survive in
"rock" cave hives somehow brings out the Egyptian in them. Last I heard
the wild hives in California were doing well, but not so for the ones in
Arizona.
 
TW>Apparently in the American Bee Journal and Gleanings in Bee Culture in the
  >1890's and early 1900's there is mention made of developing a yellow Italian
  >by crossing the ligurian bees with Cyprian bees, Egyptian, and Holyland bees
 
TW>In the 1890's, here in Australia they were importing Punic bees from the USA
  >and breeding this in Australia.  Apparently the Punic bees originated
  >from the area around Algeria and Tunisia in north Africa.
 
TW>There was an American, Mr. Frank Benton who had established an apiary in
  >Cyprus and was exporting Cyprian bees to the USA and Australia.
 
Yes, Benton who also invented the queen cage I think, did set up
breeding stations maybe to find new stock that could survive EFB that
some said destroying 100% of the US bee population. He also set up test
yards in California with all these imported queen bees. He had
government support. It is interesting, one, nothing is written that
indicates they were destroyed at the end of the tests, or queens and
drones were discouraged from nature flights, at least I don't remember a
point being made of it. Other then that the bees that turned out to be
the hardest to handle were the Cyprian Bees, but none were as bad as
selected (for bad temper) USA stock of the time. More interesting is the
African bees were reported also as bad and discarded as breeders but the
Cyprian bees were not discarded by the bee breeders of the day, maybe
because they were very beautiful, some say. We had Cyprian breeders in
California into the 1940's and I saw a glass hive of them as a child I
will never forget at our state fair with all the other bees then reared
in California to compare with and for sure the Cyprian bees were indeed
a beautiful bee to behold.
 
I guess in those days DNA did not count and imported bee breeder stock
was picked by color, light or dark, and then tested for other traits.
All of the so called different races of honeybees came in light or dark,
and the bees we today think of being dark like the Caucasian or
Carnolian also could be selected so they were as yellow as the Italian.
 
TW>So I suppose it will not be surprising when some DNA work is done to find th
  >the USA and Australia have a background of many of these races.
 
  >Our Italian today is far removed from those ligurians that were
  >originally imported from Italy.  In a newspaper article in Australia
  >in 1887 it says "Even in Italy the
  >purity of the Ligurian strain cannot be universally guaranteed for beekeeper
  >there are now constantly experimenting with the crosses of Cyprian, Syrian,
  >Carniolan etc.  It is not unlikely, therefore, that Kangaroo Island will in
  >time become the depot from which all the world's beekeepers obtain their pur
  >Italian strain."  Kangaroo Island is an island off South Australia which is
  >sanctuary for the ligurian bee.
 
That sounds like a commercial I have heard before from within the
Northern California Beebreeders but makes little difference here in
the US as long as the federal government is controlling who gets what the
average beekeepers will end up paying more for less bee it new stock or
new chemicals. Bee breeding is itself is a personal thing, and many
say they are the best, or isolated from others but few come up to the
standards of the Banta's, Reives, or the Koehnen's who have set
standards yet to be met by any government or most bee breeders DNA
tests or not.
 
IMHO, Andy-
 
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