Does anyone have any NWC and russians cross

[tom]

Hello

  I am getting two NWC Queens that were mated with russians and i was wondering if anyone here has this hybrid and how did they work out. I am adding different blood into my yard so i can have a good strain of gentle bees and hard working bees that can help me with getting several good young queens for next year. I just want to know are they gentle to work and do they swarm alot like the carni's do i have three caucasian hives and now i am going to re-queen two of my other hives with this new stock of bees to see how things will go.

Tom ;)

[NWIN Beekeeper]

I have several NWC hives, some of which are likely to russian mated because the large remainder of hives are russian.

Here is something to consider in the future when purchasing queens.
If you bought russian crosses for mite resistance think about this.
Your drones come from non-fertile eggs (no male contribution).
This means that your drones will be NWC (the species of the queen).
Your hives will be adding NWC drones to the local mating population.

In the future, this increases the likelihood that any reared queens, regardless of race, will likely be NWC mated (not russian).

Mite resistant genetics are retained best in the Russian line of bees.

You would have been better off getting Russian queens mated to NWC drones.
Then your drones would be Russian, and even local feral stocks would benefit from some increased mite resistance.


Previously, I tested a single russian queen.  I was very unimpressed as she seemed to shut down at the slightest hint of the flow slowing. This was my fault in management, as the problem was actually because she was introduced on too few bees. She never had a nurse population great enough to support the brood laid.

This year however, heavy packages have yielded as well as established NWC nucs.
Weaker packages have built to a healthy fall strength.
Queens have all laid throughout the season at an appropriate rate.

My only complaint is buying packages that contained russian queens on italian packaged bees.
It would have been nice to have started the year and brood rearing with a russian population.
This meant that I had to wait 4-6+ weeks until the population turned over to have a true russian hive.

The temperment has been excellent. even at times it shouldn't have been.
They've even made me consider burning a few 'hot' cutouts from the summer.
Swarming hasn't been a big issue, but I attribute that to being a new package and reasonable management.

-Jeff

[CWBees]

I have Russian and Carniolan hives. They can be defensive at times and will swarm but I don't have any Italian hives to compare them with so don't know if there is much difference in those behaviors compared to other bees. Since starting keeping bees again last year I have not treated any hives for mites other thanusing screened bottom boards and the Dowda methid a few times (powdered suger treatment). I have sold a few queens so maybe I can get some feedback on my bees from other beeks.