Tropical north Queensland’s wet weather would in most cases flip bees to mush, nonetheless one colony of hardy staff is being bred to create it thru the wet season unscathed.
Key aspects:
- Honey producers Doug and Janine Cannon are hoping to breed stronger and extra resilient bees
- The focus is on guaranteeing bees are well-adapted to the build they dwell
- They breed queen bees that are then in a web site to mate with wild bees in the gap
Breeding bees that can stand the test of time has been the passionate decade-long project of one north Queensland couple, who are now definite to breed bees that can thrive in a wet ambiance.
After discovering success in breeding bees that adapted well to the coastal climate of Mackay, Doug and Janine Cannon wished to gaze if they’re going to lift what they had realized and switch the tips into a extra delicate aim — the tropical rainforests of Eungella.
The honey producers said, when it came to their bees, the volume of honey they bought came 2d to making definite the bees were well-adapted to the build they lived.
“We’re making an strive to entire a resilient bee that goes to continue to exist us and we don’t would like to wrap them up in cotton wool and tend to them your entire time,” Mr Cannon said.
The Cannon family is now branching out into recent areas the build they’ll utilise their unfamiliar formulation to beekeeping.
Ongoing push to adapt bees to recent environments
It has been an extended and provocative fling to safe their honey commercial to the build it’s miles as of late.
“We chanced on that by wanting for queens from locations fancy Brisbane or down south, while they produced masses of honey, they were relatively light, especially for our stipulations,” Mr Cannon said.
They recently web site up a recent web site in the tropical rainforest terrain of Eungella, an hour’s drive west of Mackay.
It’s renowned for its heavy rainfall and vastly cooler climate.
It has been a test of endurance for the couple, and it took a beefy 12 months earlier than the bees were producing honey that might per chance per chance be bought.
“Or no longer it’s been reasonably of a route of to safe these bees localised and adapted to their ambiance,” Mr Cannon said.
“We hold misplaced a couple of along the style because we’ve got bought relatively an even ambiance up here with hundreds rain.
‘Wherever we dwell, bees can continue to exist’
The Cannons hold always had an awfully easy formulation to bee breeding — breeding queen bees that are then in a web site to mate with bees in the local ambiance.
“The bush wild bees will breed naturally with our virgin queens,” Mr Cannon said.
Fresh colonies are then established by doing a ‘split’, which entails taking part of a colony from one hive and organising them in a recent hive.
“So that they’re going to lift their very include queen and then that virgin queen will wait with spherical 12 wild drones or those we’ve got bought here, and that genuinely will keep on with it the genetics for the subsequent generation,” Mr Cannon said.
The technique of getting a colony that raises its include queen is is named a “saunter away split”.
“[Back in Mackay] we chanced on those that we raised the build we did a saunter away split, those bees would change into stronger and stronger, 9 times out of 10 for us,” Mr Cannon said.
“So we’re adopting that idea again, up at Eungella here.
“We genuine thought that wherever we dwell, bees can continue to exist, and they’re going to tranquil continue to exist.”