Bee Breeders Working Hard To Bring Improved & Gentle Hygienic Bees To Market - AFP

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Cobey initially developed the New World Carnolians stock, a dark race of honey bees, in the early 1980s by back-crossing stocks collected from throughout the United States to create a more pure strain. "Over time, it has proven very productive, winter hardy, well-tempered and more resistant to pests and disease," she said. "For many years I have wanted to work with pure Carnica. Now I can." The scientists imported semen from Germany in 2006 and again this year, increasing the purity. Cobey said genetic diversity, the raw tools for selection, is critical "in maintaining colony fitness and resisting pests and diseases."

The honey bee (Apis mellifera), initially brought from Europe to America in 1622 and to California in 1853, is declining in population. Mussen and Cobey attribute the decline to multiple factors: diseases, pesticides, parasites, malnutrition, stress, climate change, and colony collapse disorder, in which bees mysteriously abandon their hives.

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The German Carnica Association, a national program, traces its pedigrees back to the 1950s, Cobey said. More recently the program began taking selected stock to isolated islands and exposing them, without treatment, to varroa mites. The stronger bees, the ones showing more resistance, are crossed and propagated to enhance this trait.

"Both stocks, the New World Carniolan and the German Carnica, are selected for hygienic behavior," Cobey said. Hygienic behavior is the ability to recognize and remove diseased and varroa mite-infested brood from the hive, she explained. The bees also exhibit good grooming behavior; they remove the parasitic mites from themselves and their nestmates. Initial test results show this trait is enhanced by crossing the two lines.

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http://www.terradaily.com/reports/Building_A_Better_Bee_999.html

perhaps hybridized bunch--very aggressive and intolerant of movement and noise at over 100 ft from the hive. I had to get rid of them.

Initially, these new traits in the Carnolian/Carnica strain sound positive, but I would want first-hand contact with the bees to test their aggressiveness. North American Bees need a little love, but will the Carnolian/Carnica strain be resistant to our pesticides?

NoFederales