Questions

NorthShore · July 25, 2007, 08:43:05 PM

Are there different kinds of honey bees?Which ones would be good for a beginner?Can you attract or catch wild bees,and will they produce the same amount/quality?Sorry for so many question in one post but I'm tired and have to go to bed early.

topbarslo · July 25, 2007, 09:18:55 PM

So far Carniolan bees were very gentle towards me ;)

Main kinds of bees that I see being talked are Italians, Russians, Carniolans and African ....

jl · July 25, 2007, 09:22:08 PM

This is my first year and I got Italians. They've been very gentle, except the night they got knocked over by a bear, but who can blame them.

NorthShore · July 25, 2007, 09:22:31 PM

what is the difference between these types of bees?

Michael Bush · July 25, 2007, 10:34:07 PM

http://www.bushfarms.com/beesraces.htm

Brian D. Bray · July 28, 2007, 12:10:28 AM

Drat MB, I was going to say the spelling was the difference. And where they're originally from of course.

Michael Bush · July 28, 2007, 06:25:33 PM

The spelling looks correct.

Brian D. Bray · July 28, 2007, 11:49:46 PM

MB, you missed the joke, Carnoilans is spelled different than Russian which is spelled different than Italian. So the difference between the different types of bees is the spelling. I hate it when I have to explain a joke.

UtahBees · July 29, 2007, 05:15:56 AM

Haha! I got the joke! Nice one.

Leave it up to MB to have a page about this. MB - your pages are worth A LOT! Thanks for making them available for us beginners.

Have a great week!

bluegrass · July 29, 2007, 10:43:52 AM

Mike
You don't list feral survivor stock as a breed? I wonder if there will ever be and American strain? I don't call mine anything but honey bees because I don't buy into the straight bloodline breeding programs as having enough control.

Michael Bush · July 29, 2007, 11:20:37 AM

>MB, you missed the joke

Sorry. I thought it was the old discussion about "Carniolan" vs "Carnolian". I did miss it.

>You don't list feral survivor stock as a breed?

By definition they would be "mutts". I suppose if they get more homogeneous they could be considered a "race". Right now, here I see black ones surviving as do many others in the North. But I notice other people in other areas sometimes find yellow ones surviving. So which is which?

bluegrass · July 29, 2007, 11:41:27 AM

A few of my hives have black bees as well striped. I think the defined traits is the biggest issue with people excepting that our bees are all one species. I wonder if any biomarkers have been done by anybody yet? My wife (a geneticist) says that with so few strains to begin with and 200 years of mix breeding that it is highly unlikely that geneticly there is any difference in the bees we have here in the States unless more have been brought in within recent history. Unfortunately she works in human genetics and knows nothing about running a biomarker on bugs :?