Could someone give a discription of the Buckfast bee, I know that they were from brother Adam, but what makes them special?
Printable View
Could someone give a discription of the Buckfast bee, I know that they were from brother Adam, but what makes them special?
one of the best answers to a question I have seen on beesource!Quote:
Originally Posted by TheBuzz
Originally, what made them special was their resistance to Acarapis woodii...the tracheal mite. This mite just about wiped the native Amm bees from the British Isles, and Bro Adam, through selection, developed the Buckfast bee to fight Acarine disease. Worked well here too, when the tracheal mite hit North America.Quote:
Originally Posted by sfisher
Thanks Michael Palmer
Buckfasts do not really exist any more. There are breeders of buckfast stock, but they are no longer licensed as buckfast bees. They were more of a hybrid than anything else.
I have a few of their stock (first year hives), and notice they will be out of the hives sooner (and more of them) in my zone on cold days than others, part of their trait. Somewhat more suspicious of movement around/in the hive, but man these ladies stored a lot of honey.
Buckfast are special because Karl brought back queens with the best traits from several continents. Bee importation in the US has been virtually illegal since 1922. Sure there was fozen germ pasm, but that is only half the gene set.
Buckfast are currently licensed and maintained by Gemeinschaft der Europäischen Buckfastimker. They are available through Ferguson in Canada, Miksa in Florida and Weaver's popsickle prodigy of 20 + years ago.
When I had a lot of R Weaver Buckfast colonies years ago, I could tell them apart by merely taking the covers off....especially the F1 queens. Didn't have to look at the hive number or my records. Out they'd come, onto my socks and up my pants. Marla agreed with me once when I called them ankle biters. The surely were.Quote:
Originally Posted by fieldsofnaturalhoney
My wintering nucs were made up with queens from Bill Ferguson in Ontario. I have also noticed that they seem to be more active at lower temperatures than my other bees.Quote:
Originally Posted by fieldsofnaturalhoney
Adam
Thanks everyone, cool link Buzz.
I have three hives of Italians that have gone through supercedure. They are in West Texas, and all three of these hives are now ankle biters. They even crawl on the ground. At least two experienced beekeepers have told me those characteristics are common with AHB. Maybe so, as I am only 200 miles north of Mexico.Quote:
Originally Posted by Michael Palmer
No way! Weaver raises queens in the only county that does not have AHB in Texas. He may be surrounded by AHB, but they don't cross the county line, Right?
The BeeWeaver YouTube videos they talk about that and their Italian hybrids have a little of all four types, according to the genotype study they did on their bees. I cannot remember if it is in part 1 or 2, below is the link for part 1.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eQhwc3Rt-g0&feature=plcp