engleski

Origin of queens as a cause of colony losses

Colony losses in Croatia are significant and ranged from 10 to 30% per apiary. Some beekeepers report losses up to 90%. Through the survey at 1591 apiary attention was given to the reason of loss. By the opinion of the beekeepers, the most common cause of loss was varroa (47%) followed by problems with queens (22%), nosemosis (15%), lack of food (15%) and other reasons (1%). In our research, attention was given to the source of queen and the incidence of loses. Queen breeding in Croatia has tradition and significant part of beekeepers introduces queens from known origin. However, part of beekeepers still relays on natural queen replacement through swarming or supersedure. From the total, colony losses due to queen problem were reported by 36, 38% beekeepers in 2008 and by 27, 49% beekeepers in 2009. The losses are indicated through the year. Losses of colonies are lower at the apiaries with regularly replaced queens.

colony losses; queen origin; queen replacement

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