Tom Barrett asks:
>Is it known how the queen stores the sperm from different drones?.
 
I came across a report of a talk to the Cambridgeshire BKA (U.K.) given by a
Prof. Beaumont, entitled "DNA Fingerprinting of Bees".
quote:-
In a mated queen's mature colony:
1. The workers, on average, came from 10 different drones.
2. There were roughly equal numbers of workers produced from the 10 drones,
so the queen stores the sperm but uses it equally, but randomly.
3. Since each worker will have obtained a random half of the queens
chromosomes, all of those which came from any one of the ten drones will be
threequarters related to each other (all chromosomes from one drone are the
same) and have threequarters of their characteristics alike. On average,
they will only be one quarter related to 90% of all other workers in the
same colony, which came from a different drone parent. So the workers have
an enormous amount of variation in their characteristics.
4. When a swarm occurs, the workers did not divide randomly: they divided
very much according to their drone parents, the swarm consisting very
largely of workers from only 3 or 4 of the drones. End quote
 
I find point 4 very intriguing.
 
I will try to find out more about Prof. Beaumont's work, with references in
line with Aaron's request to base  discussion on verifiable facts.
 
John Burgess, Editor of Gwenynwyr Cymru, The Welsh Beekeeper.