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Informed Discussion of Beekeeping Issues and Bee Biology <[log in to unmask]>
Date:
Fri, 21 Jun 2002 09:39:39 +0200
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Dear All

Allen Dick asked:
>
> > US commercial bees would most certainly not be able to handle
> > capensis, and it would be likely to cause great devastation if
> > released.
>
> Can you speculate over what period of time that would ocur, and how
> the beginning of such problems might manifest themselves and be
> recognised? Would they be immediate and obvious, or slow, subtle, and
> hard to recognise?
>

My responses here are largely speculative; the bottom line is that we
really do not understand our Capensis Problem well enough.

My first comment is one that I made in my initial post; namely, is our
Capensis Problem the same in all respects except scale as the
previous capensis incidents? Or, in the current situation, do we have
something "special"? A "more virulent" super-capensis. Maybe it is
better at invasions, or take-overs, or has more pheromone, or
whatever. Alternatively, maybe there is nothing "special" about the
culprits of the current Capensis Problem, in which case all capensis
would cause similar problems.

From the USA point of view, the attitude should be the same in either
event. In the first instance - keep out all capensis in case you get the
"bad" one. In the second instance - keep out all capensis because they
are all bad ones.

Then, to answer your question, what would happen if "bad" capensis
got into the USA commercial stock? I guess pretty much what occurred
in South Africa. Within 12-18 months, beekeepers would report odd
things in their colonies. On inspection, you will find large numbers of
queenless colonies, often with lots of spotty WORKER brood. Will look
like the brood of a very poor queen. There will be a lot of disturbance
and fighting in these colonies, but almost no defensiveness. The bees
causing the problems would generally be very black (almost uniformly),
very shiny, very flighty and with extended abdomens. These laying
worker colonies may persist for many months, but will eventually
dwindle to nothing.

Signs are often quite subtle and ambiguous, especially in the
beginning. Parts can be interpreted as failing queens; or bad foulbrood
infections; or robbing; or mild pesticide poisoning.

And the bad news is that if it is in one colony in an apiary, then it is in
all colonies in that apiary (but at different stages of infection). And if it is
in one apiary of a commercial beekeeper, then it tends to be in all
(because of they way bees are moved). And if it is one region, then it
tends to be in all (because of migration). From what I know about USA
commercial beekeeping (migrations & package bees), if it got started, it
would spread like wildfire. Better not to get it started.

regards

Mike Allsopp

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