Rather than figure out exactly how the bees develop resistance -- which Cobey says would be too lengthy a task -- she and the other researchers are simply selecting and breeding the bees that seem to prosper the most overall despite the presence of the mites and other environmental conditions. As a result, the Ohio State bees are hearty in general.
“Our strategy seems to be working, judging from this past spring,” said Cobey. “We had a cold wet spring, and many bees died in the general population, but our population did tremendously well.”
Cobey called for beekeepers and their suppliers to put more effort into maintaining breeding stock, like the farm industry does. She said that suppliers of queens and drones don’t control breeding enough to assure the quality of their bees.
“You can ask for the pedigrees of chickens, pigs, or cows before you buy them, but you can’t ask for a bee pedigree,” said Cobey.
But beekeepers can’t easily control who their bees mate with. Queen bees mate with up to 20 different drones in a season. They mate in mid-flight, sometimes with drones from neighboring hives.
“Artificial insemination is the best way to guarantee the quality
of the bees,” said Cobey, “but it’s a fairly technical laboratory
procedure, which industry has been slow to adopt.”
As a result, most beekeepers just let their bees mate freely, and any
beneficial genetic traits that their bees initially possess become lost
in succeeding generations.
Cobey wants to organize queen producers on a national level to promote
bee breeding. She offers a summer class in bee breeding to encourage beekeepers
to establish their own breeding programs. Cobey warned that bee breeding
requires patience and a long term co
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Contact: Susan Cobey
Cobey.1@osu.edu
(614) 292-7928
Ohio State University
20-Jan-1998