Photo credit: http://summary
newspaper.com
While processing honey bee samples for Varroa mites at the Bee Research Lab, I came across a sample with a large amount of white eyed as well as red eyed drones. After literally thousands of samples, I have never come across white eyed drones much less red eyed. This sample contained four white, seven red and five black eyed drones. They are easy to spot as they pop right out amongst the common black eyed bees. It was truly amazing!
This encounter reminded me of Jennie Stitzinger’s previous post on white eyed drones. The white eyed characteristic stems from a recessive trait and is an indication of blindness. Whereas, the drones with red eyes slowly convert to black as they age and this does not seem to alter the drone’s vision.
I am not sure about the probability of seeing a hive with this amount of variation in eye color, but I do know it is not too common. I tried to locate information on this probability and was unsuccessful. From what I was able to find, these variations due occur due to the dominant and recessive genes in queens the drones that she mates with. Since the drone has a single set of chromosomes being produced from an unfertilized egg, any recessive gene will be expressed in this drone. Since the queen and the workers have two chromosomes, dominant genes will be expressed in both. Glenn apiaries has a good explanation for these variations and others (http://www.glenn-apiaries.com/oddball.html). All that aside, I haven’t seen it in any other samples…it seems to me to be as uncommon as a four leaf clover, maybe that is where this hive was foraging…
Photo credit: Heather Eversole; Red, Black and White eyed drones
Photo credit: Karen Rennich; White and Red eyed drones
