12-04-2010, 08:02 AM
Hello!
This forum has been active for almost a year and posts from bee breeders
all over the world make it an interesting and valuable resource.
A few things have changed. General consensus is that VSH can be blended
into any population. Specific VSH traits are layered into an existing
population making the population hardier, yet selecting for VSH is still
difficult.
Tests/assays are available for gross selection in mite tolerance
and hygienic, mite specific behavior, yet many breeders still use
survival as the final selection test with their untreated populations. Thus,
basing a breeding group on stock confirmation or ranking of degrees of VSH
is difficult at this time.
All involved here believe that a robust exchange of breeding stock will enhance
populations expressing VSH and hardiness. Hopefully, we can work together
collectively to facilitate some international germ-plasm exchange as well because
currently, this is not easy and we're busy breeding bees, and do not have
the time to wrangle with import/export regulations and the bureaucracy that implements them.
Welcome everyone, old and new!
If English isn't your native language, use a free web translating program
for now and let me know--I can make this forum available in many languages.
Let's continue to make a difference!
Adam Finkelstein
This forum has been active for almost a year and posts from bee breeders
all over the world make it an interesting and valuable resource.
A few things have changed. General consensus is that VSH can be blended
into any population. Specific VSH traits are layered into an existing
population making the population hardier, yet selecting for VSH is still
difficult.
Tests/assays are available for gross selection in mite tolerance
and hygienic, mite specific behavior, yet many breeders still use
survival as the final selection test with their untreated populations. Thus,
basing a breeding group on stock confirmation or ranking of degrees of VSH
is difficult at this time.
All involved here believe that a robust exchange of breeding stock will enhance
populations expressing VSH and hardiness. Hopefully, we can work together
collectively to facilitate some international germ-plasm exchange as well because
currently, this is not easy and we're busy breeding bees, and do not have
the time to wrangle with import/export regulations and the bureaucracy that implements them.
Welcome everyone, old and new!
If English isn't your native language, use a free web translating program
for now and let me know--I can make this forum available in many languages.
Let's continue to make a difference!
Adam Finkelstein