True breed

[Mitch]

I have read some post on this subject befor but.i got 5 packages this year Russian queens.$ of the 5 are very dark balck if you will.Now the new bees are just emerging only one of the 5 is making black worker bees.Now it is true i do not know how the queens were mated.My question is if a queen is open mated am i corect in thinking the offspring from the queen will not be the breed of the queen or atleat not a true breed.That said then why worrie so much about what breed of queen you get.I would think all the Russian queens should make black bees IE Russians.

[Joel]

Queens mate with several drones if they are open mated and the queen actually stores the sperm from each doaner and dispenses it, if you will, each time she lays and egg (except of course drones which are unfertilized). Therefore you can have a queen laying a variety of color variations. You should also check to see if your any of your queens have been superceded or possibly you don't have Russian queens at all.

[Mitch]

Thanks Joel
I am sure that there has been no supercedure.Im just trying to understand what i am getting from the worker bees.4 of the 5 queens are black like carnis.So if made a split from one of my Russian queened hives and had them make there own queen.I would get a half russian asumeing it is a true russian queen and half what ever she mated with.So you will not get russian worker bees unless the breader used AI with all pure bread stock.Or the queen happend to open mate with a Russain drone.