wild honeybees? feral?

[celerytree]

Our house has had honeybees living in the roof since World War2, probably longer. They come and go from the same place under the slates, and about once a year they swarm. We ring up our local beekeeper who collects the swarm and maybe gives us a jar of honey, (I'm not a greedy woman but . . is this just a tad mean?) He says they are good useful bees and may even be resistant to verroa trouble. They are still about this year, but seem to be fewer in the garden. Instead there are a great many bumblebees of various sizes and patterns.

Can anyone tell me, are our bees truly "wild" or just feral? I could post a photograph of one if anyone would like to see. We are very fond of them and I'd like to plant with the bees in mind.

[john mclean]

Hello Celerytree

Or should I call you by your first name?
Interesting questions
Considering your Local Beekeeper is Actually doing you a service and not the other way round,as is in written litruture stateing to regards said service of removeing any unwanted or equally dangerous swarms of wild honeybees/managed honeybees from ones land or premises.
Also is a recognised benefit to have such beekeepers who give of there own time /expense and equipment to carry out such jobs. For Free.

Considering the potential risk that may be involved to either the beekeeper or the risk of bringing bad tempered bees/diseased bees to there own bees.

As for the odd jar of honey Yes it is entirely up to the beekeepers discretion to offer you any Honey, considering the past 2 seasons have not been the best for crop returns , this year there is an increase in the income of nectar and many beekeepers will have some,but then the bees will they still have enougfh left?

Nutrition is an essential part of resisting wild Honeybee Colonies and is still being researched but not by enough to bring also the other mechanisims at work upto date.

So are your bees wilds or feral?

There both, all bees are wild its just we manage some in boxes and care for them and the ferals are the ones takeing care of themselves without any help from Humans.

So for proof of resistance?

You need to evaluate the bees in particular.

I would hope maybe Gavin could help by adding any answers to any future questions?


Thanks

John..
Ps I'd be delighted to see your photos:)

[whiskywill]

John, are you the mean beekeeper?:D

[Chris]

Some claim that truly wild bees don't really exist in the UK. Instead, they say that swarms from beekeepers hives simply re-colonize old bee nests - the scent of an old bee nest will attract a swarm. These swarms might survive a year or two before dying out, and then another swarm moves in.

On the other hand, there are lots who say they know of wild colonies or abandoned colonies that have lived without the help of a beekeeper for years. They seem to be able to survive despite infestation of the varroa mite.

I collected a swarm a few weeks back which had issued from a wild colony in a chimney of a house. The bees came riddled with varroa. However, you have to say the bees were doing okay else they probably would not have produced a swarm in the first place.

Perhaps you could write some kind of clause into your deeds which says that successive owners should not get the pest control people in!?

[celerytree]

Thank you John and Chris for your replies.

I asked the beekeeper who has been taking our swarms for some years now (my in-laws never bothered and bees used to die all over the house) He said they are the "original" black bee, smaller than some but "a good bee" I'll go away and look up the black bee's posh Latin name.

My husband's grandmother had to have some roof repairs during WW2 and saw the workmen carrying a heavy load out of the house in a tarpaulin. She said it took two men to carry it. They said it was honey. Of course she was excited, Honey! in rationing? Oh they assured her, it is useless, it's all black; and away it went. Ive often wondered if there wasnt a core of usable honey in the middle.
Now you will all know I am the meanest cynic!

They seem to have left enough honey for the poor bees anyway as they continue and can be seen summer and winter coming and going so I didnt think it was new swarms re-colonizing - but you experts would know.

We arent planning to sell just yet, - but I'll tell the son and daughter in law to protect the bees when their turn comes.

[gavin]

Hi CeleryTree

I would imagine that your WWII workmen knew exactly what they were doing and had a market for all the honey already lined up. Honey in comb is well protected and can last years.

On meanness in your beekeeper, it wouldn't surprise me if the beekeeper put more money into looking after the swarm than he got out of it. All that woodware, wax foundation, and feed to see them through the winter needs bought, and several of our recent summers have yielded little honey harvest.

You'll appreciate having the bees around though? You sound like a kindly soul, one who appreciates having something special living with you.

Back to your question of being wild or feral. Who knows - it is hard to define. Feral implies an escape from domestication rather than originally wild, and it is quite possible that your bees are a bit of both.

I wouldn't mind hearing privately more about these bees (click on my user name and you can send a private message). I've agreed, with John's help, to make a presentation at a conference this September on native bees that seem to survive Varroa. I'm keen to take samples of as many such colonies as possible (there are quite a few known across Scotland), and it may be best not to describe exact locations in public as you may have half the forum turning up at your doorstep.

best wishes

Gavin

[Adam]

On meanness in your beekeeper, it wouldn't surprise me if the beekeeper put more money into looking after the swarm than he got out of it. All that woodware, wax foundation, and feed to see them through the winter needs bought, and several of our recent summers have yielded little honey harvest.

We accept small donations (well large accepted but always small!) for our time and effort to collect swarms, we don't offer up a gift in return. I think you are doing pretty well if that's the case.

Adam

[Steve Rose]

Celerytree,

These bees could be special and need to be studied and saved. The species will be apis mellifera. Apis mellifera come in various races or subspecies and if your bees are genuine natives they will be apis mellifera mellifera. Please contact Gavin as he suggested and hopefully he, in turn, will contact your beekeeper so that samples can be collected from a swarm and sent to BIBBA for analysis. If they look promising their DNA will be tested to see just how pure they are. If they prove to be genuine native bees and capable of surviving without a beekeeper's help then they should be bred from in order to help repopulate the area with hardy native bees and even eventually supply others (like me for instance!) with valuable queens.

By the way, usually beekeepers charge for collecting a swarm so I think your beekeeper is being generous.

All the best

Steve

[aardvark]

This colony has swarmed Sixtyfive times since WW II, losing half it`s genes every time.

Even if it was Varroa resistant ten years ago, it won`t be now.

[Steve Rose]

Hello Aardvark

Lets hope Gavin can test your first point but I would be surprised if it's true. Pure natives keep popping up and there must be some mechanism that is preserving the genes - probably something like cold weather mating.

The second point might take years to establish but if we don't take the trouble look for varroa tolerant we will never find them.

Steve

[gavin]

Hi Steve and Ardvaark and CeleryTree

What a strange bunch of names folk around here have! Especially that name Steve ... anyway ...

Taking a wild guess as to CeleryTree's identity (and I'll never reveal the true identity of a woman seeking to remain discrete on a forum like this!) I wonder if the bees in her home are not currently as dark as they once were? If they are the bees and her house is the house I think they are, then we can already assume that they are not pure native stock. There are reasonably native stocks in the vicinity (including apparently wild ones), but not this colony (actually a set of colonies).

Were the bees Varroa resistant 10 years ago? Perhaps fortuitously. Varroa hasn't been in that area much more than 10 years, but these bees might have been facing other pests which permitted and encouraged the selection of bees with some resistance to Varroa before Varroa was on the scene.

It is quite possible that some level of resistance existed in these bees, and that their feral/wild lifestyle also somehow added to the effect. Perhaps a long drop below the comb from whence mites would not return, that kind of thing. If other feral colonies and even apiary colonies around also had some resistance then maybe outbreeding was not a problem. The gene variants that confer resistance could increase in number, not decline.

best wishes

Gavin

[Ruary]

I collected a swarm a few weeks back which had issued from a wild colony in a chimney of a house. The bees came riddled with varroa. However, you have to say the bees were doing okay else they probably would not have produced a swarm in the first place.

I am afraid that this conclusion is not necessarily so.

It has been documented that colonies of bees will abscond the hive when they are heavily infested with varroa. Perhaps this is what was happening and not a swarm as such.
Ruary

[Chris]

Point taken Ruary, but it was a small cast with a virgin. Or at least I think so. The chap who lives in the house said: 'The swarm a week ago was a whopper'.

I stuck 'em in a box and checked for eggs a couple of weeks later, but the queen was laying 100% drone eggs. Couldn't work that out.

[m100]

It has been documented that colonies of bees will abscond the hive when they are heavily infested with varroa.

Late last summer I heard about at least one really strong hived colony that, from the documented mite drop, had a projected mite count of 20000+ (yes that's twenty thousand) The bees were apparently getting along fine, no deformed wings or other problems.

I think from what was said at the time that CSL are aware of these bees, which are in the UK, alongside other hived bees and not in an isolated location.

[celerytree]

Hello Steve and others

I would love to supply you and others like you, as you suggest, with "valuable queens" if such they are of course. Alas I cannot afford to do so as you all expect payment for collecting them.
Secondly of course they arent my bees. I think they are wild.

Hope I havent stirred up a hornets' nest but I think I will buzz off now. Thank you for most interesting info.

[gavin]

Hi CeleryTree

Nice to see you posting again. It was good hearing from you and I hope that you'll drop by from time to time.

I think that you are on safe ground calling them 'my bees' when they are living in your property, whether that is a bee hive or a building with spaces in the walls or roof. Once bees set off in a swarm if you follow them you can continue to claim ownership but once they are out of your sight then that right is lost and anyone can claim them.

Although payment for collecting swarms was mentioned, this is usually when a beekeeper is called out to travel some distance to rid a householder of a problem they have. If your beekeeper is near to you he may be glad to do this for free, and indeed as we Scots are usually so generous we rarely charge and I have never done so! I would if I was helping someone by coming to take them away, unless of course they looked as if the charge would be difficult for them to meet.

When Steve mentioned 'valuable queens' he was talking about queens that have been generated by someone deliberately raising queens from a selected stock. To get to this point it is a lot of work. First of all you need to select many colonies with the traits that interest you (in Steve's case, he would be interested in native Apis mellifera mellifera stock which is gentle to handle, productive and resistant to Varroa). Getting to this point would normally mean keeping many colonies from a variety of local sources and selecting the best from them for breeding. If, for example, anyone was using your bees for breeding they might be mixing these bees with bees from perhaps half a dozen to ten other sources of bee stocks, and selecting the best from them after letting them mix a little over a few seasons.

The next step in the process would be to arrange places to keep the best stocks separated from the others, then tackling the complex and risky process of raising queens from the best stocks and getting them mated. All of this is time consuming and requires a lot of investment in hives, fencing for apiaries, mating boxes, and the fiddly bits to help with the raising of queens from the selected stocks.

Why not ask your local beekeeper for more details of all of this the next time you call on him? Most beekeepers would be happy to spend time explaining this to you.

best wishes

Gavin

[whiskywill]

you all expect payment for collecting them.


Not all of us. Like you, who lives on the right side of Hadrian's wall, I live on the right side of Offa's Dyke. We are different.

[Jon]

I live on the right side of Offa's Dyke.

Well then, I live on the right side of the Irish sea.

[gavin]

I can't imagine that anyone would want to do this for free ... and no, they weren't his own bees. He thinks that they came from a wild colony in a tree.

These very fine photos were taken by John's friend who - I hope - will be along later to tell us all about it.

Rope engineering (it's flipping high up there!):

http://i601.photobucket.com/albums/tt92/Gavin_R/Head%20for%20heights/P7010003.jpg

A wee puff first .....

http://i601.photobucket.com/albums/tt92/Gavin_R/Head%20for%20heights/P7010006.jpg

I can't look and I wasn't even there!

http://i601.photobucket.com/albums/tt92/Gavin_R/Head%20for%20heights/P7010009.jpg

Got 'em.

http://i601.photobucket.com/albums/tt92/Gavin_R/Head%20for%20heights/P7010010.jpg

(to be continued - can only post 4 at a time)

[gavin]

In the bag:

http://i601.photobucket.com/albums/tt92/Gavin_R/Head%20for%20heights/P7010014.jpg

Safely home:

http://i601.photobucket.com/albums/tt92/Gavin_R/Head%20for%20heights/P7010016.jpg

[VEG]

Well done too high up for me.

[john mclean]

Hi Veg.

Thanks.Yes it was a bit too high up but hopefully it will be worth the data recovered along with maybe (good) bees!

John..:)