Keith said: > There is no need for patented Queens, I said: > Apparently you are alone in your thinking Keith said: False, hopefully others that are now on this list will back up my statement. J.W., M.B. tell everyone about feral honey bees and how much they out perform carefully bred strains. Now would be a good time to give a crash lesson in bee breeding. The best bees ever produced I have seen came from one of two types of breeding programs. For the survivor program the closed population breeding works best in my opinion but only a handful of people around the world are able to to use the program succesfully for too many reasons to post right now. The second is the inbred-hybred breeding system which as Keith pointed out you need to keep buying queens. The closed breeding system can be further divided into two types. The instrumental insemination program which by far has the most control but due to only a small amount of people worldwide which use instrumenatl insemination (II) closed breeding programs using II are fairly rare. The other is the closed breeding system using remote breeding yards (Brother Adam used at first and then used II in later years with the Buckfast bee) but because a drone may mate up to 20 miles from his hive (Dr. Larry Conner 2004) one can see a single drone can cause mixed results. In a breeding program many times II breeder queens pay and not cost. You are buying the genetics! With the Purvis Brothers Apiaries queens Keith is refering to you are getting the final genetics of an eight year closed breeding system using instrumental insemination. I remember a Glenn Apiaires "Marla Spivak hygienic II breeder queen ". The first arrived dead in the cage. A report was filed with the post office an another sent. The second produced over a thousand hygienic daughter queens.Using the thousand figure the cost per daughter was seven and a half cents a daughter queen! Keith said: Maybe I am wrong about you Bob, but it was my understanding that you have patented a stock of bees and stand to benefit monetarily. Dann Purvis applied for the patent to protect his eight years of hard work. I did enter into a written agreement with Dann Purvis and a retired researcher ( wants to remain unnamed on Bee-L) in order to learn the makeup of his patented bee. The information is between the three of us and if I share the information with others I can be sued! Dann and I are sharing genetic material in the way of Russian/Russian queens. Dann and I are close friends. We both used to raise and breed fish. Dann tropical fish and me marine fish. Marine fish biology is my hobby. I said: > Slipping in a varroa tolerant queen is the easiest , cheapest and > fastest solution to a varroa problem. > Keith said: But can unravel quickly if not dealt with properly by breeders, unlike the stability that can be gained by keeping bees on a more natural system. Keith is correct with the inbred/hybred system *but not* the closed breeding system. Sincerely, Bob Harrison Fish enthusiasts scroll down. I have a marine fish tank which has been running over twenty years without a tear down The local marine fish club considers the tank a record for the club. The dolomite for the tank was given to me by a local fish shop as being thrown away as the shop said the pH of a salt water tank could not be maintained with dolomite after five years of use.Goes to show you can not believe everything you read in marine fish books! The tank was inoculated from a handful of wet Florida beach sand brought back by me from a trip to visit my family! :::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::: -- Visit www.honeybeeworld.com/BEE-L for rules, FAQ and other info --- ::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::