Peter Edwards writes: "I have seen it claimed that virtually all the stock 
in the US has been bred from fewer than 800 queens,..."

From Purvis Bro's web site: "The Goldline bee represents one of the largest 
if not the largest and therefore most diverse line of bees available 
anywhere.  We collected initial breeders from any and all credible sources 
to include feral, New World Carnolian, Russian, purebred Italians (via 
Australia), Carnolian, Caucasion, German Black and many other private and 
commercial sources.  The bottom line is we gathered any bee that had 
potential and included it in our gene pool."

Peter, although this does not necessarily contradict the point you were 
making, it does seem to indicate that a lot of diversity could be 
incorporated into 800 queens or maybe even less.  Presumably a breeding 
program of any kind would have a certain goal; most likely to produce a few 
good queens.  But starting from a broad field and narrowing it down to just 
a select few, the question becomes how much in the way of diversity is 
completely lost?  How may genes drop out of the pool?

Steve Noble

 

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