I don't think there is any question that queen quality should be looked at, and that beekeepers worldwide are having issues with queen quality. To wit:
> The reasons for undertaking this work were based on observations of commercial queen honey bee breeders rearing queen bees using current knowledge and technologies, followed by introduction of those queens into established honey producing hives with subsequent failures of the queens to survive or perform satisfactorily. -- Rhodes, John W. "Quality of commercially reared queen and drone honey bees (Apis mellifera L.) in eastern Australia." (2011).
> Commercialization of queen breeding requires the mass production of large numbers of high quality queens (Büchler et al., 2013). But what does quality stands for? And how is it assessed? In this paper we review the research results from many countries in the field of queen quality control. -- Hatjina, Fani, et al. "A review of methods used in some European countries for assessing the quality of honey bee queens through their physical characters and the performance of their colonies." Journal of Apicultural Research 53.3 (2014)
More recently:
> Queen failure, which can occur due to pathogens, pesticide exposure, inadequate mating, or a combination of factors, has recently been reported as one of the top causes of colony losses in the U.S. Our study provides new information on whether current queen-rearing methods may interfere with the development of the normal gut microbiota in honey bee queens. -- Powell, J. Elijah, et al. "Modulation of the honey bee queen microbiota: Effects of early social contact." PloS one 13.7 (2018)
¶
The issue of queen quality is not new. Rhodes states: "For many years, at least since the 1960's from my own experience, commercial
beekeepers (honey producers) have been dissatisfied with the quality (survival and performance) of queen bees purchased from specialist commercial beekeepers who rear queen bees in large numbers for sale to honey producers to requeen their bee colonies, usually on an annual basis."
Why does this continue to be a problem? I submit two possible explanations: 1) Beekeepers don't see it as a problem, or are focused on other things; 2) Beekeepers view it as a problem about which they can do nothing. As I have said before, the queen production industry is driven by supply and demand. The demand is for large numbers of queen bees early in the season, so that is what the industry produces.
Prior to the 1900s, queen rearing in the USA was centered in the northern states, where honey production was highest. Beekeepers raised their own queens or bought them from breeders in the north, during the summer. A hundred years ago, the production of queens and bees for sale shifted to the south, when southern beekeepers realized they had a market for bees which they could raise months earlier than the northern beekeepers.
There's a saying, if you want to make money in the bee business, sell to beekeepers. Many producers found they could make a more reliable living selling bees rather than trying to produce honey. This is true now more than ever.
PLB
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