Distributing Apis mellifera mellifera

Ideally all beekeepers would raise their own queens from local stock, gradually improving them.

However, there are many beekeepers who live in areas with a high density of imports where it is impossible for them to get their queens mated with local drones.  These beekeepers currently have the option of buying in queens form the national suppliers, most of which are imports of non-native strains, or british bred queens from imported breeder queens.

This proposed project would look at whether it is feasible to persuade UK queen rearers to produce native (Amm) or near native queens for sale.

It would require:

• Identification of potential queen rearers
• The provision of breeder queens for both queens and drones
• A financial guarantee to the queen rearers that they would be able to sell these queens