Effect of mating nucs spacing and subspecies of honey bee (Apis mellifera) on the drifting of queens returning from mating flights

Effect of mating nucs spacing and subspecies of honey bee (Apis mellifera) on the drifting of queens returning from mating flights. The loss of honeybee queens during mating flights increases the cost of their production. The aim of the study was to examine if the spacing of nucs influences the drifting of queen honey bees, which return from mating flights. The study also compared the drifting of Carniolan (A. m. carnica) and Italian (A. m. ligustica) queens. We examined the total of 89 queens which were placed in mating nucs together with about 1,000 workers. Some of the mating nucs were arranged in rows spaced 30 cm apart, without any landmarks, and other nucs were spaced a few meters apart, next to trees or bushes. Each group of nucs included Carniolan and Italian queens. The results show that significantly more queens failed to return from mating flights to nucs placed in rows without any landmarks (51%) than from those placed next to trees or bushes (7%). The study also showed that there is no significant differences between level of drifting of Carniolan