Subject: Re: African honey bees:How far North?

From: [email-masked]
Date: 27 Apr 94 17:51:05 GMT

While we are on this subject:  It has been said that the African bee
is not becoming gentler by crossing with gentler strains, as was originally
hoped would happen as they came northward.

My question:  Is there any evidence that crossing HAS occured?  It may be
that the african queens select african drones and thay do not randomly mate.
I am sure someone has looked into this more deeply.  It should be easy
to demonstrate using DNA samples.

Maybe they are randomly mating but Nature selects for aggressive behaivior,
keeping at least the aggressive genes at high frequency. 

Any thoughts?
Allen

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From: [email-masked] (Paul C. Cheng)
Date: 27 Apr 1994 22:22:00 GMT

>keeping at least the aggressive genes at high frequency. 

There have been DNA analyses done previously.  If memory serves, Glenn Hall
(and others) did a restriction fragment length polymorphism (RFLP) analysis 
on inheritance of mitochondrial DNA.  It was found that queens found in 
swarms had mitochondrial genomes of mostly African descent.  RFLP analysis 
of genomic DNA also implies a predominantly African make-up.  However, RFLP 
gives only correlative evidence which should not be used as the gold standard 
for discriminating between mellifera races.  In conclusion, even though
crossing has occurred, the spread of African bees does not appear to be 
greatly affected by mating with feral European colonies or European colonies 
in apiaries, hence less "dilution" of the aggressive behavior. There are many 
hypotheses as to why this is the case, including high African drone 
populations, absconding rate, etc.  Even if the dilution hypothesis were 
correct, California would still be in trouble.  Eric Mussen noted last year 
that the feral European colonies have all but died off due to Varroa, so 
there won't be much diluting going on.

Rob Page's lab at Davis does DNA stuff.  Mike Crosland, who used to be
in Page Lab, is now in Australia, I believe. They might be good people to 
ask for more detailed info.

Regards,
Paul
-- 
Paul C. Cheng ([email-masked])
Northwestern University Medical School, MSTP-1
Ward Bldg. Box 213
Chicago, IL 60611

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From: [email-masked] (Aaron Morris)
Date: Thu, 28 Apr 94 16:44:55 EDT

In article <[email-masked]>
[email-masked] () writes:
 
>
>                            ...It has been said that the African bee
 
There was a speaker at the Southern Adirondack Beekeepers Assoc who
had been to a Central American Country (Costa Rica?) to work with
AHB to see what's in store for the States when AHBs arrive.  The
locals have found a number of things about the AHB to support the
statement that AHBs are NOT becoming gentler as they breed with feral
bees.  The hypothesis for this is the AHB's aggression (not aggression
as in nasty bees, rather aggression as in highly motivated).  It was
stated that the AHB is highly motivated to do those things that bees do,
such as collect nectar and pollen, clean hives, and procreate.  The
AHB workers are highly motivated in foraging behavior, out competing
their European cousins in the quest for limited floral resources.  And
when it comes to mating with virgin queens, the AHB drones are more
motivated (hornier?) than their Eurpoean cousins and are therefore
more likely to pass on AHB genes, whether the queen is European or
African.  Therefore, in the constant struggle for the survival of
the fittest, the AHB is more aggressive (read motivated) in the
struggle, and hence the local strains are becoming more aggressive
as the AHB genes are more successfully passed on.
 
Sad to say that I did not take good notes at this meeting and
cannot say who the speaker was, although I have no reason to doubt
his credentials.  Unfortunately, given that I can't identify the
source, what I have written above about natural selection must be
classified as hearsay.  Any experts able to back this up?

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From: [email-masked] (David MacFawn - Sun NC Development Center)
Date: 27 Apr 1994 19:23:49 GMT

It's my understanding that african drones fly eariler and later than the 
European drones which results in the area becoming africanized.

In article [email-masked], [email-masked] () writes:
While we are on this subject:  It has been said that the African bee
is not becoming gentler by crossing with gentler strains, as was originally
hoped would happen as they came northward.

Any thoughts?
Allen

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From: [email-masked] (Doug Hood)
Date: 2 May 1994 14:11:53 GMT

>there won't be much diluting going on.

Which leads to the inevitable question: How will the Africanized hives 
fare against Varroa? 

doug