# General beekeeping > Native honeybees >  Is there a native honey bee

## Greengage

Post moved from the 'Restocking Options' thread. Gavin.

I see the native bee topic has come up again is there any such thing as a native bee there is Apis millifera millifera but here in Ireland there is some research ongoing into native bees and so far there is no proof there is anything native or indiginious about them.
While there are some beekeepers making a living out of bee keeping every one else that I know of are selling honey on the black market if that is the correct term, so while you have on person paying tax eg PRSI vat etc the small producer gets cash all the way. While honey itself is exempt from tax the extra income you recieve is not.I have being at discussions where people talked about compensation from the goverment for loss of bees or compensation from farmers for putting bees on their crops but they the beekeepers even refuse to register their bees, Over here we even have to register chickens if you keep them. After all bees are Livestock. Alclosier I now know of 3 beekeepers under 30  :Wink:

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## Jon

> [COLOR=#800080] and so far there is no proof there is anything native or indiginious about them.


According to who?

The DNA work currently being undertaken at LIT has shown that dozens of samples collected around Ireland are pure or almost pure Amm based on the microsatellite markers looked at and the 'M' lineage mitochondrial DNA.

Quoting from Jack Hassett the guy who is doing the research:



> Throughout the course of this project to date, approximately 275 hives from 26 bee breeders from across the country have be sampled. From these hives, approximately 180 microsatellite and 80 mitochondrial sequences have been generated and all are either completely analysed or else in the advanced stages of analysis.





> From the completely analysed samples, all samples were determined to be greater than 95% pure Apis mellifera mellifera via microsatellite analysis.


More background info on native bees at:
http://nihbs.org/

This paper from 2005 also looks at European Amm populations including the Irish one
Varying degrees of Apis mellifera ligustica introgression in protected populations of the black honeybee, 
Apis mellifera mellifera, in northwest Europe

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## The Drone Ranger

prakel posted an interesting link showing a mechanism whereby the bees choosing the larva to raise queens from meant certain "Royal" lineages are favoured 
So there's a possible mechanism for 50% of the genetics going forward in open mating in hybrised areas
Can't apply that to grafted larva though there you would still need a closed population 
If its right and I understood it

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## Greengage

I was also at that Talk by Jack hassett and Dr Jane McCormack, I also remember the slide with a family tree of Apis millifera and the piece about the markers, There is still no confirmation of an indiginious Native Honey bee she said things were looking good. There are lots of different bees around if and when they do confirm there is such a thing how to protect it when queens are out mateing, _"Non-native subspecies of honeybees have been introduced and propagated, so that native black honeybee (Apis mellifera mellifera) populations lost their identity by gene-flow or went extinct. "_ I think it would be great if a population existed and could be preserved but you would have to be sceptical. As a matter of intrest I have dark coloured Honey bees and have asked Jack to test them as I recieved them from a breeder who told me they were native?? they are dark in colour in an urban area with lots of mongrols. Did I not read somewhere that the germans tried to replace Apis milifera millifera with Apis carnica.  http://www.ibrabee.org.uk/component/...apis-mellifera. I will have to check my notes from the talk.

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## Jon

I am not quoting from the presentations at the AGM.
Grace McCormack's work is at Galway, NUIG, not LIT and involves a different project to do with varroa tolerance. Her PhD student is Keith Browne.
I have regular correspondence with Jack about the progress of his work.
The native bee of Ireland is Apis mellifera mellifera. That is not in dispute by anyone.
Amm had a historic range from the west of Europe through to the Urals but the distribution has become fragmented now.
Any bee subspecies whether Amm, Carnica or Ligustica carries a wide range of genetic variation within its population.
The issue is whether the population has become seriously hybridised with other subspecies or Buckfast and it appears that it has not been, based on the initial work carried out.
Amm Queens have been swapped all around the British Isles by Bibba members for decades. Historically some Amm was brought into the British Isles from France and Holland. That will have left a genetic trace I imagine but does it matter? Not to me.
I would not expect Scottish Amm to be hugely different from Irish Amm but I dare say there a a few markers which would show a difference. This is of no practical significance though as the main issue would be hybridisation with different subspecies as opposed to some crossing between ecotypes of the same subspecies.

The Germans have tried to replace their native Amm population with Carnica over a number of decades. I think this started in the 1930s.
According to Robin Moritz the German 'Carnica' population still contains some Amm genetics

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## prakel

> *There is still no confirmation of an indiginious Native Honey bee* she said things were looking good. 
> 
> _"Non-native subspecies of honeybees have been introduced and propagated, so that native black honeybee (Apis mellifera mellifera) populations lost their identity by gene-flow or went extinct. "_


What's this thread about exactly?

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## Greengage

> What's this thread about exactly?


I posted a comment about native bees on the restocking of Scotland honey bees, I queried if there was such a thing as a native honey bee, I never said anywhere Is there such a thing as a native Irish honey bee, the topic  title was added by Gavin I think, Jon is more of an expert on Native Irish Honey bees than me. I am just not convinced, I cannot look at my dark coloured bees and say they are  indigenous to Ireland, My problem is that I cannot look at the Bee in question and say yes that is an indigenous native Irish honey bee (Apis millifera millifera,) If bee keepers have to use DNA markers to identify bees it is way out of my league. I got interested in this through monitoring Bumble bees and Hover flies. If you take Bombus lucorum workers they are said to be a complex species  B. lucorum, B. cryptarum and B. magnus. These three species cannot be reliably distinguished from each other. Therefore they are recorded as B lucorum agg.
Iam a member of NIHBS, I have attended a number of their courses and conferences and think they do great work and I look forward to the results of the study by Jack.

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## Jon

Thing is GG, the stuff about Amm 'dying out' was propagated by Brother Adam as it paved the way for his his solution - the Buckfast bee, which has been a popular choice commercially all over the world.
Sure, DNA work is out of the budget of most beekeepers but this project at LIT has let a lot of the main Amm breeders in Ireland submit samples for testing free of charge.
Aoife and Micheál Mac Giolla Coda sent in dozens of samples for testing.
This is really useful as it means that any stock showing significant hybridisation can be discounted as a breeder stock.
Some of the samples taken were split and one half was sent to a DNA lab in Switzerland for testing so that results can be compared to give a certain amount of validation to the methodology at LIT.
I think I am the only beekeeper who sent in samples from NI. The rest of the samples are from all over RoI.

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## gavin

Sorry Greengage.  I did add the title, having decided to shift the post from the Restocking Options thread.  I've just modified the title to make it broader, which I think reflects the content of your post.

My take on this is that no strain is going to be completely pure but there are plenty around in Ireland and some in Scotland that are close to it. 

German carnica has some Amm in it.  NZ carnica has the cytoplasm of the Italians it was crossed into (as imported sperm) and has other ligustica genes in the already impure carnica that came from Germany.  

Some 'Amm' in Ireland or Scotland will be, to some extent, derived from hybrids with the other types of bee around ... and if the hybrids crossed back to Amm they will be quite close to Amm but will still carry some DNA from other types.

I'm just accepting that the Amm some of us keep in Scotland is close to the original but can never be completely pure now.  The Colonsay stock was isolated before the recent burst of importing and mixing up the genepool but these stocks would also have been exposed to imports too.

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## gavin

Just to add to Jon's comments on Brother Adam, we see today the huge exaggeration made about bee losses by some beekeepers and the media - CCD for example, and 'the bees are dying' in just about every newspaper in recent years.  It is what people do, talk up the crises.  Did Brother Adam make extensive sorties around Scotland and Ireland with an open mind, looking to see if all the bees had died?  No, he will have been listening to Chinese whispers in a time when it wasn't possible to quiz people on the internet to see if it was really true.

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## Jon

At least Brother Adam did not claim that Amm was wiped out by Bayer's neonics or Monsanto's Roundup as multiple spammy posts re bee 'decline' tend to suggest on Facebook.

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## Greengage

> Sorry Greengage.  I did add the title, having decided to shift the post from the Restocking Options thread.  I've just modified the title to make it broader, which I think reflects the content of your post.
> 
> My take on this is that no strain is going to be completely pure but there are plenty around in Ireland and some in Scotland that are close to it. 
> 
> German carnica has some Amm in it.  NZ carnica has the cytoplasm of the Italians it was crossed into (as imported sperm) and has other ligustica genes in the already impure carnica that came from Germany.  
> 
> Some 'Amm' in Ireland or Scotland will be, to some extent, derived from hybrids with the other types of bee around ... and if the hybrids crossed back to Amm they will be quite close to Amm but will still carry some DNA from other types.
> 
> I'm just accepting that the Amm some of us keep in Scotland is close to the original but can never be completely pure now.  The Colonsay stock was isolated before the recent burst of importing and mixing up the genepool but these stocks would also have been exposed to imports too.


I think you have said it better than I was trying to explain, I hope you were not being mischievous trying to get me in trouble  :Embarrassment: . RE Jon and the samples sent to Switzerland I heard they were not falling over themselves with the report they sent back, One line short reports. I listen to a lot of talk about the project and people have different opinions some excited about it and others not so enthusiastic, as for me I wish it well.

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## Jon

That was the original report GG but the issue got sorted later on.

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## gavin

> I think you have said it better than I was trying to explain, I hope you were not being mischievous trying to get me in trouble .


Not at all  :Smile: .  I feared that the thread was going to go quite far off topic and I came up with a title for a new thread with too little thought, far too early in the morning.

These issues of purity and identity aren't easy.  Matters of judgement.  In nature, populations do exchange genes from time to time anyway.  They retain their identity either through strong selection pushing things back to where they were before, or they just get diluted out into the bigger picture.  Amm (Irish or Scottish) with a bit of a contribution from elsewhere via man's actions is probably just a broader beast than what it would be naturally.  

G

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## Greengage

As Bill O’Herlihy the famous sports commentator always said at the end of his programmes "We'll leave it there so"

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## The Drone Ranger

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Breeding-Bet.../dp/1904623182
cheap copy of the definitive guide to AMM
Some undeniable facts in there  (for example -- there was an Ice Age) 
It seems I bought one in 2011 I wish I hadn't left it out in the rain
got a couple of Brother Adams as well  :Smile:

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## Greengage

Great book can you buy it by the page or on HP, Is there a PDF version available, I also take it your not a fan of AMM.  :Confused:

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## Mellifera Crofter

> ...I wish I hadn't left it out in the rain ...


I have one!  You should soon see a third buying option for £998.
Kitta

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## The Drone Ranger

> I have one!  You should soon see a third buying option for £998.
> Kitta


Do you think its money laundering or something ?


GG
I used to hear Breeding Better Bees cited on a daily basis
reading it I didn't find their arguments and conclusions compelling 
Getting some things right for the wrong reasons is usually just called guessing

Did you ever see the Morcambe and Wise sketch where Andre' Previn tells Eric hes playing all the wrong notes
Eric says "I'm playing all the right notes", "just not necessarily in the right order"

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## SDM

> he will have been listening to Chinese whispers in a time when it wasn't possible to quiz people on the internet to see if it was really true.



God I hope that last bit was ironic.

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## The Drone Ranger

See there is a native honey bee 
get your wallets out we need to save them

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## Greengage

Ah yes the Bare footed natural beekeeper never expected to see him on here, I send a few bob.  :Roll Eyes (Sarcastic):   tks.

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## Jon

Phil is late to the party but I guess it's better late than never!

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## fatshark

This vid was used on a crowdfunder

The_British_Black_Bee_Project__an_Environment_in_Totnes__Devon__United_Kingdom_on_Crowdfunder.png

(or not) project last Spring ...

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## gavin

Phil C visited Lochaber on 16th May for a natural beekeepers meeting and had a chance for a chat with our Kate too.  Hear the voice of our very own Posh Bird (!) here:

http://tinyurl.com/zmk3ctr

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## The Drone Ranger

Nice to see  Paynes polystyrene hives have made the environmentally approved list
Wonder why they are not in the compost hive?

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## prakel

> Phil C visited Lochaber on 16th May for a natural beekeepers meeting and had a chance for a chat with our Kate too.  Hear the voice of our very own Posh Bird (!) here:


Fair play, he does a good podcast. Building quite a nice library over there. As for Kate, I've said it before, it's nice to hear a beekeeper with a clear voice, one that doesn't whisper and mutter.

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## The Drone Ranger

> Fair play, he does a good podcast. Building quite a nice library over there. As for Kate, I've said it before, it's nice to hear a beekeeper with a clear voice, one that doesn't whisper and mutter.


Yes 
here's another very clear speaker 
Not sure his assistant falls into the same category though

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## Poly Hive

Not being funny but... this is from Wikipedia. 

Due to health problems he was sent by his devoutly Catholic mother at age 11 from Germany to Buckfast Abbey, where he joined the order (becoming Brother Adam) and in 1915 started his beekeeping activity. Two years before, a parasite, Acarapis woodi that originated on the Isle of Wight had started to extend over the country, devastating all the native bees, and in 1916 it reached the abbey, killing 30 of the 46 bee colonies. Only the Apis mellifera carnica and Apis mellifera ligustica colonies survived.[citation needed]

He travelled to Turkey to find substitutes for the native bees. In 1917 he created the first Buckfast strain, a very productive bee resistant to the parasite. On 1 September 1919 Adam was put in charge of the abbey's apiary, after the retirement of Brother Columban. In 1925 and after some studies on the disposition of the beehives he installed his famous breeding station in Dartmoor, an isolated model to obtain selected crossings, which still works today. From 1950 and for more than a decade Adam continued his gradual improvement of the Buckfast bee by analysing and crossing bees from places all over Europe, the Near East and North Africa.[citation needed]

So aged 13 he goes to Turkey to start the Buckfast... umm I find that very hard to believe. 

I do wonder if he had worked with AMM where we might be now.

You note the woodi in the name. He was a retired East India Company man and gave Craibstone £6000 to fund the search into the problem. Alaistair Lilburn from Aboyne had met him in person and said he was a very keen beeman. 

So some anecdotal info which really should be preserved. 

PH

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## prakel

> So aged 13 he goes to Turkey to start the Buckfast... umm I find that very hard to believe.


Sometimes we simply have to accept that some of the people adding entries to Wikipedia appear to have very poor research skills coupled with limited ability to present their findings in a coherent manner. But in this specific case it's simply a combination of incomplete content which has been badly written with the farcical timeline being all over the place..

For real beekeeping nonsense; read the R.O.B Manley entry.*



* I see that that entry has been cleaned up to the point where it's not quite so bad as it was....

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## prakel

This would appear to be a more worthwhile biography if you're interested in Brother Adam:

https://www.google.co.uk/url?sa=t&rc...49093890,d.bGs

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## prakel

Having just glanced at some of the early posts in this thread the following came to mind (it may be of historic interest to some):




> The British Black 
> 
> This is a black bee with faint bands of white hair on the abdominal segments. It is a moot point whether this bee should be written of in the past or present tense. If this bee has been allowed to die out, it is a matter that reflects no credit to British Apiculture. Prior to the advent of the I.OW. disease, it had been condemned for being insufficiently prolific and for it's rather excitable behaviour when under manipulation. While, it is granted, the fecundity of this race was below that of other races, it by no means follows that that was a disqualification. From whom came the condemnation on account of it's want of prolificness? Not from the average bee-keeper, who was quite content with the bee in that respect. The climate of Britain is not such as to demand a very prolific bee; what is necessary being a bee that builds up early in the season; and this trait we had in the old British Black.
> 
> If intsead of importing bees of almost every race under the sun, we had endeavoured to improve the native bee, it is probable that we should never have had the sad and expensive eperience of the I.O.W. dusease. The British Black had characteristics that were eminently suitable to the changeable climate of our country. It never bred out of season, and was very conservative in the use of it's stores, always looking forward to the bad seasons which are far more frequent than good ones. That it had it's faults is admitted. But so had other domestic stock, whose faults in the hands of capable British stock-breeders were eliminated: their good points developed and their economic value much increased. The same results could have been achieved in the case of the native bee. It was hardy; wintered well; did not swarm excessively; withstood dampness and various epidemics; was docile when pure; industrious and strong on the wing, and it's sections were unsurpassable.
> 
> When the disease known as I.O.W. vistited this country, the bees in this country were found to be very susceptible, and the British Black was condemned as being more susceptible to that disease than any other race.
> 
> The fact, however, that fresh importations of bees fell victims almost immediately to that disease, should make us pause in the condemnation of the native. That there should have been a greater number of British Black stocks affected is only to be expected, since stocks of that race were in a great majority. But apart from these considerations, it is to be regretted that after the abatement of that scourge no definite action ws taken to discover whether any pure British Blacks were still in existence: for had there been any, their existence would have been conclusive evidence of the possession of both a robust constitution and a high degree of immunity. Such a bee would have been invaluable and worthy of retention.
> ...

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## Poly Hive

Indeed and if that effort had been made by selective breeding then the whole picture would now be very different. But... it was not. The burning question is where do we go from here and how?

PH

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## Calluna4u

> Indeed and if that effort had been made by selective breeding then the whole picture would now be very different. But... it was not. The burning question is where do we go from here and how?
> 
> PH


Now there is a thorny question for you. Very much depends on the agenda of the person you are asking. Wide spectrum of desires out there, and going with one ideal means everyone else's gets to some extent compromised.

So the burning question Pete, is 'what is the question?'

I know Gavin tried to tease out the questions and the answers in his Scottish govt survey and report, but while there were some patterns emerged on what people wanted, it was still a very mixed picture.

What was clear was that there was a general acceptance that their stock could do with a BIT of improving, but the overall picture was not the complete disaster that many seem to think. It was a relatively sensible overall impression.

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## Poly Hive

Well for what it is worth here is my take.

I have had what was as far as could be tested for at the time, 1990's circa, Amm. Now some were pretty good and some were pretty bad. However by selection for calmness and supercedure I got to the point where some 60% supercedewd on the heather and some 40% needed swarm treatments. I had reasonable takes with at times some 3 tons from a season and near always two from some 60 stocks. so roughly 75 lbs or so. However they were not so great at wintering and losses could be quite high. 

Whilst down south I had the pleasure of the Alpine Carniolians which were very quiet, wintered well and were reasonably productive in my area which did not have heather. I cannot cite numbers for them as I ran for comb honey but can say one colony on a lime flow did 230 lbs. They wintered well and I pretty much gave up on using a smoker even on the third generation. The problem though was they were determined swarmers but once this was over come they were frankly a delight to work with. 

I think they are good on heather as the big boys who depend on it have pretty much changed over to this bee. 

So indeed what is the question? Which way do we go and how?

PH

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## Adam

Tonight at 7 pm Countryfile has, apparently, a piece on AMM and the first ever nature reserve for them.

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## steve

Thanks for that info, Adam.

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## Mellifera Crofter

This is what they say on the website:




> Ellie is on the Rame Peninsula - Cornwall's 'forgotten corner' - and visits Mount Edgcumbe, where the UK's first ever native dark honeybee reserve has just opened.


So, is Scotland no longer part of the UK?!

Kitta

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## Black Comb

Those workers did not look like blacks.

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## steve

You have to remember how these colonies are built up. Hybrid nucs created to take AMM queens? The colony they inspected was little more than a nucleus itself, I have a colony of AMM with possibly more bees and they were made up at the end of July. I admit, it was unfortunate that they kept cutting to that same entrance shot and the clearly banded bees.

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## Adam

Jo Widdecombe responded to the BBKA forum and said that the bees shown were not blacks.... 

_"The Countryfile report was a bit misleading. The footage with the close-up of bees interspersed throughout the reports on black bees were not my bees. To me they looked more like a Buckfast cross.

Cornish native bees do not have any ginger stripes. Some colonies could be seen in some of the footage but unfortunately no close-ups. So if anyone thinks the bees shown close up weren't native, they were correct, and it is not me being ignorant of what a native bee is"._

BIBBA have a black bee reserve in Essex too - it was shown on our local news a couple of weeks ago with three colonies put there recently.

As far as the question "is Scotland no longer a part of the UK".... Well for now it is, lets hope it stays so (as long as you behave yourselves!  :Smile:  However I am sure that many Americans and other will think that Scotland is a small island off the N of England  - say Shetland or something!

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## Adam

Jo Widdecombe has responded to the Countryfile report on the BIBBA website here: https://bibba.com/countryfile/

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## prakel

> BIBBA have a black bee reserve in Essex too - it was shown on our local news a couple of weeks ago with three colonies put there recently.


Aren't 'reserves' meant to have some kind of protection such as that afforded to Colonsay? Anything less, where bees are concerned is an apiary or, perhaps, a collection of apiaries.

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## Greengage

I read Jo Widdecombes reply aren't you better off without any publicity than something misleading. Bit of a Donald moment there.

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## greengumbo

> As far as the question "is Scotland no longer a part of the UK".... Well for now it is, lets hope it stays so (as long as you behave yourselves!  However I am sure that many Americans and other will think that Scotland is a small island off the N of England  - say Shetland or something!


Americans ? I think most of the UK media / press / MPs for North East Somerset think that ! 

I had a very nice response from the producer after I mentioned Andrews reserve to them. He was very apologetic and said it was just an oversight which is understandable.

It was a great wee piece other than the close ups but surely most beekeepers must be understanding of that or recognise the way these pieces are put together ?

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## Greengage

[QUOTE= most beekeepers must be understanding[/QUOTE] OK I edited your piece to make the quote suit.  :Confused:  you would want to be following the beekeepers over here in Ireland at the moment. its becoming expensive looks like either NIHBS or FIBKA will loose my membership.

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## Jon

NIHBS is a lot cheaper than FIBKA!

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## busybeephilip

> expensive looks like either NIHBS or FIBKA will loose my membership.


I suppose it depends what you are after eg insurance.  If you are a farmer your farming insurance might cover beekeeping activities, alternatively join a club in the north and you are able to avail of UBKA insurance.  As for reading materials, try Am.B.J. , probably a bit more expensive but you get a really good read with original up to date material or UK mainland journals eg Scottish etc journals

FIBKA , in my opinion wont increase their price, or else they will loose so many members that it will die a death esp when there are so many other subscriber options available with similar benefits,

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## Greengage

In reply two the last to posts the fee will be increased by €18 I am told. As for FIBKA and NIHBS I have attended more NIHBS workshops than FIBKA ones and because NIHBS it is a smaller group more people know each other and it seems like a friendly bunch of people interested in talking about bees rather than politics. Unfortunately NIHBS do not provide insurance but even if they did I still don't know what I am entitled to from it people say it covers you for this and that but until there is an actual court case and lawyers fight it out nobody knows what it covers. I never had to access it but I cannot even access an extractor from my local association as that is not covered by insurance. So what do I get as an associated member, 12 editions of An Beachaire, A conference in gormanstown for one week which I pay for to attend, Examinations,  and this famous insurance.
What do I get from NIHBS 4 editions of the Four seasons, 1day long conference  which I pay to attend, Invites to numerous apiaries, workshops on Queen rearing, Workshops on pest and disease control, membership of bee improvement group, Regular study group run by NIHBS members for FIBKA exams. Lots of chat and banter about bees and access to numerous people who will answer my questions no matter how controversial  or silly that are. Interesting times ahead.

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## Greengage

http://www.irishtimes.com/news/envir...-all-1.3243037
Native honey bee confirmed.
Now there is an opportunity to have Ireland declared import free, This window will not remain open for ever.
We are an Island behind an Island on the edge of a continent. We need someone who has a scientific background to talk to the decision makers they must have good charisma and  political skills to negotiate with the powers that be. Somehow I don't think we have that person on the island although some do great work. We are governed on the island by two different jurisdictions so that will be two governments that need to be convinced don't think that will succeed but it is as it is. Being members of the EU there will be the issue of free movements of goods to negotiate. Good  news for people who keep Amm. I snse more trouble ahead amongst beekeepers for those who import bees  and Buckfast groups. Anyway I think its good news well to the researcher and my bees who contributed came back as 98% pure with a bit of Italian in there. Don't know how they will fare when they are out mating next year. Unless we could flood the area with Drones. But not everyone agrees. Interesting times.

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## Thymallus

Its an interesting conundrum. In Denmark the island of Læsø is an Amm reserve. But it wasn't without it's teething problems as some beekeepers on the island wanted Italian bees and resisted being legally restricted to one type. IIRC the Amm lobby initially won but a change in government meant the Italians could be imported...they were...and then another change and now AMM's only...with a smattering of Italian.
With II any strain of bee can be propagated indefinitely and several unique strains can be kept in the same apiary. Many bee research stations do this. So no problem retaining any unique populations. Sperm can be stored and T-REX resurrected as required.

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