> > If honeybee eggs are homozygous at the sex allele, the bee is male and > the workers eat it. "Interestingly, the cannibalising of diploid drone offspring by workers seems to be dependent upon season and colony size. At the end of the season diploid drones were reared up to the adult stage in the tested nuclei. This is different to normal sized colonies, where diploid drones are never reared until hatching. Since diploid drones were not reared in the small mating nuclei in summer, we argue that the combination of colony size and season is highly important for our findings." Polaczec (2000) A new, simple method for rearing diploid drones in the honeybee (Apis mellifera L.) . > >On the other hand, colonies benefit from heterozygosity, > I asked a technician who has worked extensively with single-drone inseminated colonies about this. He said that some inbred colonies perform beautifully, some don't. That said, it certainly appears wise to maintain at least enough diversity to minimize loss of sex alleles, and to allow for a breeding population to adapt to environmental changes. -- Randy Oliver Grass Valley, CA www.ScientificBeekeeping.com *********************************************** The BEE-L mailing list is powered by L-Soft's renowned LISTSERV(R) list management software. For more information, go to: http://www.lsoft.com/LISTSERV-powered.html