>
> > I'm also seeing late drone rearing in some of my colonies that I've
> suspected might be preparations for suicide swarms.
There would be very little evolutionary pressure for bees to produce
suicide swarms. Thus, I suggest that perhaps we be overlooking something
to call them such.
It may be more accurate to call them "usurpation swarms"--in which the old
queen and a group of workers usurps an established colony already prepared
for winter. This would be highly adaptive genetically, and is a trait
exhibited by ancestral Apis mellifera, as well as documented by Dr Wyatt
Mangum, and observed by me and others in non-Africanized bees. it would
also explain the spike in swarming long documented in September.
--
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