Will be interseting to see this. From a practical take on the commercial side i think this product is an item looking to solve a problem that doesnt exist. Though thorough selction of breeder queens that are 95% hygeinic or more the prevelance pf AFB, EFB, and chalkbrood is defacto zero. Just a small effort on the genetics front eliminates the need for the vaccine. Absolutely does.
Hi Bob, I'm so glad that this showed up in my feed. Dr. Delaplane was my first and most significant source of information on keeping honey bees when I got started. I have the DVD titled - A year in the life of an apiary. It has no date of publication on it, sometime in the '90s. It was the best out there at the time for backyard beekeeping. I'm grateful for Dr. Delaplane and all the information he's shared. I'm so glad you interviewed him. :)
@@bobbinnie9872 Hi Bob, you never know! I found it on the BetterBee site at $45.00 with a book. So, apparently, it's increased in value already. Thank you for the response!
If you ask me, these types of videos might be your natural evolution of your channel presentation. Just look at your comment interaction, quite impressive Mr. Rock Star
Probably the best information I have obtained so far on genetic variation that nature has been able to accomplish even without human intervention. Thank you both for bringing up this topic, I am surprised that nature can allow a queen bee to mate with 60 or 70 drones, being only limited by the queen's storage capacity. All this can only result in ever evolving genetic combinations to make the super hybrids if that's a true word, bringing together a mix of different traits and combinations in the same hive. Truly amazing, thank you.
Loved this! So very interesting and explanatory. Keith Delaplane is a great speaker and has a wealth of information. Thank you for doing this video Bob.
WoW, what an awesome video Bob!! I've watched many of your videos. I am just a sideliner. But, no matter how much I've learned from your videos, there is so much more to learn. Now you bring something completely new to the table..... Polyandry amazing!
Thank you for producing the video, Bob. We have some of our bees in one of Brother Adams old fields, where he took queens for isolated mating, and each Queen from other beekeepers had to arrive in mating nucs with glass sides, so he could see that no other drones were being introduced to the area, or to mate with his own queens. I've been aware of diversity being a good thing, but this has now changed our own plans for this year's mating and drone production. Lots to pick out from this video, and more to delve into now, regarding Brother Adams reasoning. Thanks again,
I really enjoyed this. Informative and thought provoking. Unfortunately most beekeepers never see, read or hear about research of any kind. Thanks Bob for getting this out there.
A couple questions from a novice keeper. 1. Is there a way to force extra drone production from a colony? 2. Can you explain what a "Drone Congregation Area" is?
Easy way to explain may be drones and queen bees meet at a mating club, the drones die after mating, they meet somewhere higher than at ground level, the drones get attracted to the queen bees pheromones, and queen bee gets fertilized by multiple drones. Hope the above helps answer your question.
Hi Bob! I met you shortly at Hive life. Your knowledge sharing has made me such a better bee keeper. I built a hot room in my garage because I had 80 gallons of honey in my living room and one bucket was blowing up lol. You made it so clear to me how to harvest nectar faster and produce higher quality honey. Thankyou for sharing your tricks and trades
Hey Bob, did Keith use a centrifuge to mix the 30/60 sets of drone semen or just allow it to mix in the capillary tube? Very interesting conversation and great video. I greatly appreciate the time you take to produce these videos. Thank you.
Hi David. I don't know the answer to that question. Search "Keith Delaplane" and his contact info is easy to find. He's a nice guy and would probably answer you.
Thanks so much for doing these videos. So much to glean from the researchers who are doing work on the cutting edge of these topics. Never an end to what we have yet to learn.
As always thanks for the great information. It's pretty interesting, especially in respect to drone mating numbers and coinciding with varoa resistance! Thanks Bob
Hi Bob When Keith talked about brood mixing, would that be done after 9 am when the field bees have left the colony? Seams like a very interesting and simple experiment. As long as there wasn't a dearth and robbing wasn't a problem would you just put them straight in or Spritz everyone down with sugar water?
Personally I would just put them in, bees and all, unless there was an uproar in the yard like robbing. If it was a lot of bees I might splash a little syrup on the top bars. And yes, it would work better if the field force was gone.
What a great discussion and food for thought for those fixed on a certain way to breed a "better" bee! In a previous life I spent decades breeding marine worms and we saw similar things!
I am curious how brood mixing may have negative effects and if the trade offs are worth doing it. Should we mix bees and brood? Mixing bees could create temporary disruption of caste workflow... nurses, foragers, etc. Perhaps it's easier to shake the bees and simply mix as many frames of capped brood as possible. As usual, two really smart guys talking together leads to a lot of questions 🤣 Maybe call the new queen line "Poly Queens"
Brilliant video Bob, Keith is excellent and I find the whole topic fascinating. We had him on one of our zoom meetings during Covid and was it was great.
Great video Bob! It really gets the old rusty gears in my mind turning. This subject is so much deeper than most average beekeepers will ever think about but so interesting and plays a role in how successful or just how good that beekeepers stock (bees) will be. It was good to see and talk to you at HL.
I’m speechless this is exactly what I’ve been doing in my operation, minus AI I have invested in queens of many kinds mixed into my yards something has always told me this was important in the evaluation of our bees and will be the key that unlocks the mite resistance door . I’ve found in doing this I have healthier yards and hives . I knew there was something to this !
An important video Bob. I really like it when you connect science/biology/chemistry in your videos. Your knowledge is huge!! Thank you....Been a beekeeper for over 30 years and always have been focusing on strong hives and diversity. The Holy Grail ??does it exist?? That is also my concern with mite resistent bees. So it si not my focus.
THIS! Great contribution to understanding the very big puzzle that is the nature. And that we must use the methods of nature itself. Interesting to increase diversity by mixing brood frames, expect that to be an established method.
Great video Bob and certainly very informative!!! I talked with Dr. Deleplane about this very topic at last year's GBA spring conference.....very interesting stuff!
One of the best videos to date. Keith is a wealth of information! Thanks for sharing Bob. Haven't seen an email from you yet regarding the old pics. If I don't hear from you, I will call the store on my next day off.
04:35 The debate that popped into my mind was Genesis 11:1 "Now the whole world had one language and a common speech." God interrupted our super organism. 25:16 too much of a good thing, old but replayed out story Proverbs 25:16 "If you find honey, eat just enough- too much of it, and you will vomit." 40:27 It's easy, mix it up when breeding Honey Bees for same results
Certainly fascinating subject matter. I would have liked to hear a little more elaboration about the science behind “the majority of our evidence is that the sperm mixes”. How specifically does that ‘mixing’ happen? Are the sperm cells proposed to be individually altered genetically at some point within the queen’s spermatheca?
Bob and Keith , Thank you! Bob, Questions: 1. What real evidence do you have that there was inbreeding ? Can you provide an example of how you were able to determine that there was inbreeding? 2. If the 6:100 ratio is not enough for ideal mating , what ratio would you recommend?
No scientific proof actually, just casual observation. I had several yards that were isolated from other apiaries and where I continually split and re-queened from within those yards, always letting them raise their own queens. I did this for experiments that I won't get into here. In every case the general temperament of those yards got worse and worse over time ( seven years) which led me to believe that inbreeding was causing it. Again, no scientific proof.
This is such an intriguing concept, Bob. Thank you for sharing this conversation with us. This information will help us in our queen rearing this coming season. I've shared this with our local association to help others benefit.
Instead of trying to propogate a desirable trait through queen selection it sounds like I should be cherishing the drone layers (instead of shaking them out) for their contribution to neighborhood dca's! Also, it appears that exchanging frames of brood when equalizing colonies in the spring pays unexpected dividends in genetic diversity within colonies in addition to the boost it provides to colony population. Fabulous material Bob and Keith! Thanks so much!
Another thought I had was related to the importance of needing more drones for mating. Could the reduction in queen longevity be traced back to the popularity of plastic worker sized foundation? Should we be encouraging beekeepers to be including one or two foundationless frames in each colony? I use foundationless, and I see 20 to 30% drone comb on most frames. I also do not see any drone comb on the bottoms of frames like I see in most videos.
My understanding is that colonies in the wild build the majority of their drone comb on the periphery of the nest. I'm sure managed colonies are being forced to alter their natural inclinations.
Concerning the number of drones in the drone containment area, is the practice of using the green frame to purposely collect drones and their mites on a frame to then destroy, reducing the number of drones in the containment area, or reducing the number of drones with mites in the containment area?
Some beekeepers do use drone frames for simply freezing and killing mites as a part of an IPM (integrated pest management) program. I use them to insure ample drone production for mating purposes and to help keep my brood comb primarily worker comb. If you don't give the bees a place to rear drones they can often put patches of drone cell anywhere in your primary worker comb.
WOW! Very interesting. I think I will try mixing up my brood frames some this year. I had the thought when Keith was talking about the various mites in China and the VD mite and how various kinds of bees have various kinds of mites...could the mites actually be part of some important aspect of the bees overall survival. I know that mites are a big problem to beekeepers, but perhaps there is more going on in the cosmos than the goals and objectives of beekeepers? Kind of like with humans, the idea of nemesis flowing from hubris and resulting in a form of humbling that may be more in the service of life than excessive pride is.
Wow...consider my mind officially blown! Bob this is a great video and I think it's your best most interesting one yet. Can't wait for part 2. You know it just goes to show you that nature always has it right. Don't get me wrong I'm all for science but I love it when it comes full circle right back to nature. Very interesting...good stuff!
Great video! However, varroa resistance and VSH in particular is not a recessive trait, it is an additive trait. With this fact most of the talk in this video about varroa resistance is not valid.
Good stuff. What I heard is that the best way to spread beneficial traits is to increase drone production off of those prized queens more so than grafting with them. I am wondering if anyone is taking queens with undesirable characteristics and insiminating them with multiple drones with desirable characteristics.
This is fantastic stuff from a beekeeping and philosophical point of view. Are we actually primarily super organisms who rely on each other for food, clothing and shelter?
Interesting back door support for the benefits of polyandry. Wondering if such cross-fostering of brood might have a benefit for say an apiary undergoing an epizootic or even perhaps commercial Beekeepers bringing their colonies to almonds where we know there will be significant pathogen exchange. 🤔😮
It could also foster significant pathogen exchange by mixing. I do still think it'd be better overall, even if you spread more pathogens. It could equalize the load and ability to withstand it.
Hey Bob, thank you for this awesome/important talk about drone importance. I found that the size of cell, and also if you isolate a new mated queen 2-3day before you let her lay, her laying eggs can be bigger and bee can become smaller or bigger because of cell size. Also work on queen rearing. This is epigenetic? Expression of genes ?
I've learned two new words today, one of them being epigenetic. (I had to look it up) You're absolutely correct about cell size effecting bee size. That's why we find smaller bees in very old comb. I'm not an expert on this subject but I think your idea about that being epigenetic is a real possibility. Thanks for the comment.
