> I see no evidence at all that our domestic stocks of honey bees suffer a bit from inbreeding suppression.

I think this idea has been pretty well dismissed (Harpur, Zayed). However, it is probably due to the mating system of bees which does everything possible to avoid inbreeding, as well as the mixing of the various sub-species. On the other hand, Dorothea Brückner states:

> The workers of inbred queens show deficiencies in many different aspects of their lives when compared to non-inbred workers. The disadvantages of inbred workers are very serious and severely affect the honeybee colonies.   -- Brückner, Dorothea. "Why are there inbreeding effects in haplo-diploid systems?." Evolution 32.2 (1978): 456-458.	

As Randy reported about the Gotland bees (which are undoubtedly highly inbred) --

> it was not a "desirable" stock as far as beekeeping, and in the later years of the study, was not propagating itself sufficiently.

They had developed a useful trait: survival despite varrroa, but they lost most other traits requisite for beekeeping and finally for propagation. 

Obviously, inbreeding is not the bugaboo that everyone thinks it is, lab animals are inbred for 100s of generations. However, people have culled out the deleterious alleles. The purpose for this is to be able to propagate inbred stock without having a lot of the serious problems normally associated with inbreeding. However, lab animals wouldn't last long outside of the lab.

PLB

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