| Buckfast Bee | |
|---|---|
| A Buckfast honey bee hive. | |
| Scientific classification | |
| Kingdom: | Animalia |
| Phylum: | Arthropoda |
| Class: | Insecta |
| Order: | Hymenoptera |
| Family: | Apidae |
| Genus: | Apis |
| Species: | A. mellifera - hybrid |
The Buckfast bee is a honey bee a cross of many species of bees into a stable race developed by "Brother Adam", (born Karl Kehrle on 3 August 1898 in Germany), who was in charge of beekeeping at Buckfast Abbey, where the bees are still bred today.
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In the early 20th century bee populations were being decimated by Isle of Wight disease. This condition, later called "acarine" disease, after the acarine parasitic mite that invaded the bees' tracheal tubes and shortened their lives, was killing off thousands of colonies in the British Isles in the early part of the 20th century.[1]
In 1916, Brother Adam discovered a feral colony which was a hybrid between A.m. ligurica (North Italian) and A.m. mellifera (English). Brother Adam collected the bees and from this began to develop what would come to be known as the Buckfast bee.
The Buckfast contains heritage from mainly A.m. ligurica (North Italian), A.m. mellifera (English), A.m. mellifera (French), A.m. anatolica (Turkish) and A.m. cecropia (Greek). The Buckfast bee of today also contains heritage from two African rare and docile African stocks A.m. sahariensis and the A.m. monticola, but not the "Africanized" A.m. Scutellata."[2]
Brother Adam moved the bees he discovered to the isolated valley of Dartmoor which became a mating station for selective breeding. With no other bees within range, Brother Adam could maintain their genetic integrity and develop desirable traits.
Brother Adam investigated various honey bee races and made many long journeys in Europe, Africa and Middle-East searching for pure races and interesting local stocks. The book In Search of the Best Strains of Bee tells about his travels in search of genetic building blocks. Brother Adam imported more bees to cross with his developing Buckfast bee.
Every new bee strain or bee race was first crossed with the existing Buckfast Bee. In most cases, the new desired qualities were passed on to the new generation and the new combination was then made stable with further breeding work. Every crossing with a new race took about 10 years before the desired genes were fixed in the strain. Over seventy years, Brother Adam managed to develop a vigorous, healthy, and fecund honey bee which he christened the Buckfast bee.
The Buckfast bee is popular among beekeepers and is available from bee breeders in Germany, Ireland, the United Kingdom, France, and more. Most of the Buckfast bee's qualities are very favorable. They are extremely gentle and highly productive. Brother Adam, in his book, Beekeeping at Buckfast Abbey writes that in 1920 they obtained "an average of no less than 192 lbs surplus per colony and individual yields exceeding 3 cwt [approx. 336 lbs]."[3] In the 1986 BBC-affiliated documentary, The Monk and the Honey Bee, more than 400 pounds of honey are reported to have been produced by a single Buckfast colony. According to Brother Adam, "The average annual honey yield over the last thirty years has been 30 kg (66 lb.) per colony. Thus we have a favourable balance compared with the average production in America or in Europe. "[4][5]
The qualities and characteristics desired in Brother Adam's breeding can be divided into three groups; Primary, Subsidiary, and 3rd, those that have bearing on management.
Primary qualities are those qualities essential for any maximum honey production.
There is a difference from the native U.K. version of the Buckfast bee and the American version of the Buckfast bee (available through R. Weaver Apiaries). Due to import regulations, Buckfast bees have never been imported to the United States. Instead, frozen Buckfast drone sperm has been mailed from Buckfast Abbey to its dealer in Texas. The American Buckfast is reported to be more aggressive than the U.K. Buckfast, possibly due to the fact that it had to be based on a non-Buckfast queen in the United States because no queen could be imported. Canadian Buckfast bees are bred far enough north that there is no chance of having been cross-bred with Africanized breeds (A.m. Scutellata) of the southern regions of North America, a possible major contributing factor to the common aggressiveness exhibited by second generation Buckfasts from the southern United States.
Whilst the above explanation may be true for some strains it is however well known in UK beekeeping circles that visitors to Buckfast have been known to fly home bearing pieces of comb containing freshly laid eggs wrapped in damp cloth which remain viable over 24-48 hrs. Hence it is almost certain that pure Buckfast queens HAVE been raised in the US and then either open mated to produce hybrids or artificially inseminated with Buckfast Drone sperm.
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