Hi Bob & Bill
> I believe that Chris Slade, Dave Cushman and others on their side of the
> pond are trying to return to the pure black bee(AMM)
I would couch it in different terms, it is not that I am trying to
return to AMM, but that I am trying to return to a stable state and AMM
gives me the best chance of doing that.
The natural range of AMM includes Great Britain and Ireland (and a large
part of Europe) therefore it has evolved to suit the habitats that are
within that geographic range, the habitats are wide ranging in terms of
weather, flora and fauna.
From this we can deduce that the AMM bee is at least adaptable enough
to cope with all the varying conditions, but that does not mean that you
can take a colony of AMM bees from Salzburg and plonk it in Dublin and
expect it to perform the same.
I use AMM bees because they are the choice made by nature, over
millennia, for the region where I live, it is hard work to go against
the grain.
Bill says...
> We are really talking apples and oranges because honeybees are not
> native to the US so there really is not settled bee for any region.
While we can't say there is a bee that is natural to the US, the size of
the place and variance in habitats is not much different to the ranges
inhabited by AMM in Europe, so the possibility should be there to
establish a US bee population. I would have thought that AMM was a very
good candidate for this purpose as it is very adaptable.
However US beekeepers have progressively eliminated what AMM stock that
was imported to US many years ago...
http://www.dave-cushman.net/bee/us_uk_dna.html
I think the reasons were twofold, first when Italian genes are
introduced into AMM populations, the normal docile behaviour
deteriorates and the bees become aggressive, even nasty.
The other reason is that Italian bees were chosen on the false premise
that 'more bees make more honey' and Italian bees are noted for their
inappropriate over production of brood.
More bees make more honey is only true if comparing colonies of similar
type, so if you were comparing Italian colonies, in general the ones
with more bees would gather a bigger surplus.
Providing you are comparing AMM to AMM the saying also holds true, but
you can't compare AMM to Ligustica and say it because it is the total
number of bee foraging journeys that gather the crop, the length of bee
working hours and industry while working come into play so the
comparison is bunk.
Bob Harrison on this list has criticised AMM as 'welfare bees' because
the colonies he kept did no good, I would ask what was the AMM
contaminated with and what selection strategies were used in the
development of the strain that he was complaining about.
I think those that decided Italian bees were best for US made a wrong
choice, the natural range of Ligustica is rather small and not very
variable in conditions. I also think the idea that bigger colonies are
better influenced the decision
Another point is that US beeks seem to count their yield by the hive, I
think a fairer measure of yield is to count the honey weight per brood
box employed and the amount of beekeeper labour input.
I know in my own system three hives each with a single brood box of AMM
will outperform any bee I have ever seen that needs three brood chambers
for a nest and it takes no more beekeeper work to run three single box
hives compared to a single hive with three deeps. In those years when a
single box hive produces six or 8 supers of honey, does a triple deep
colony produce 18 to 24 supers ?
Bob Darrell mentions...
> able to use morphology.
I have clipped this from my website, there is often confusion in the use
of and meaning of the two words.
"Morphometry Called Morphology in some parts of the world
However, morphometry is the precise study of anatomical characters by
measurement and morphology is merely the study of form and structure.
Morphometry takes Morphology a stage further and applies physical
measurements and numbers to the features noted by morphology.
Bob also says...
> but the term is not well known by beekeepers that I know here.
I would not suggest it is top of the agenda for many UK beeks either,
but we have an organisation in UK... BIBBA that has been promoting local
breeding of bees for over forty years and that includes demonstrating to
beekeepers and provision of workshop training sessions in all aspects of
raising queens and selecting them fro improvement, so morphometry is
better known in UK, but not by as many beekeepers as I would like to see
take interest.
We have Our National Honey Show in UK this week...
http://www.honeyshow.co.uk/
Apart from the competitive showing of honey there will be a stream of
erudite lectures and there is a trade hall as well, of the small number
of stands (27), one will be put on by BIBBA and another put on on behalf
of the Bee Instrumental Insemination Group, which reminds me I need to
print up leaflets ready for the fray, I doubt if any US beekeepers will
be visiting, but anyone that will be there is welcome to have a chat
with me on the BIIG stand and whoever is manning the BIBBA stand would
also be pleased to chat.
Regards & Best 73s, Dave Cushman, G8MZY
http://website.lineone.net/~dave.cushman or http://www.dave-cushman.net
Short FallBack M/c, Build 6.02/3.1 (stable)
******************************************************
* Full guidelines for BEE-L posting are at: *
* http://www.honeybeeworld.com/bee-l/guidelines.htm *
******************************************************
|
