The Complete Idiot's Guide to Beekeeping

Kerstin Ebbersen Video
Kerstin reminds us of what we all know…that no matter where our queens come from, there is an unbroken lineage going back millions of years from queen mother to queen mother.  There is no way to maintain genetic diversity if we rear (and introduce) thousands of queens from one mother, especially if they are not open mated.  A queen can “father” many brood via it’s drones, but only mother a small number of queens at a time.  This is protection against inbreeding as it allows successful genes to spread widely, but not too densely, as in open mating the queen will mate with up to 30 or more drones among whom there is bound to be a diversity of genes.