| The weight of history Much biodiversity in Belgium |
|
|
|
| Sunday, 18 May 2008 | |
 The black bee (Apis mellifera mellifera), indigenous to us, occupies an area of wide distribution. There she met ecological conditions extremely diverse. As a result of natural selection, the black bee has adapted to these ecological conditions varied, hence the emergence of biological diversity (biodiversity) very important. This diversity is the result of a long evolution (about 200000 years). The work done by the irreplaceable nature has produced populations hardy and well adapted to their environment, characteristics useful in beekeeping today, but certainly in the future.The biodiversity of the bee has been preserved until the man began to practice beekeeping, and thus to domesticate the bee. The domestication has remained very brief up to half of the nineteenth century, before the invention of modern beehives. However, the rearing of bees in hives fixed implies still using primitive farming techniques. These techniques automatically lead to some selective pressure on the population of bees, and thus a decrease in biodiversity and the mechanism of genetic erosion is therefore begun and it will increase…! On asphyxiait once colonies to harvest the honey; bells the heaviest that would give a lot of honey and lighter, which lack adequate provisions, would die during the winter were sacrificed. To maintain a constant herd in apiaries, colonies should give many swarms each year. Unconsciously, beekeepers at the time have helped strains with a high rate of spin. This selection continued for centuries and has diminished the genetic variability of the bee helping to stem the decline of less essaimeuses. The "hunting" On the other hand, some behavior today regarded as defects have been fostered by beekeepers for many years. Thus, it accuses the black bee its agitation on the frames. This character has been selected by an ancient technique still in force in southern Belgium to 1940, hunting of bees. The transfer of a bell for the harvest was done by tap: it was to raise bees a full bell, reversed in a vacuum bell placed above the first to pat the regular aid two sticks. At that time, bees very easily nerve leaving their executives have been promoted. This feature is still present in the little black bee selected today.
 The irreparable damage… With hives modern farming technologies appear more sophisticated. Among these techniques, one of them hold our attention because it was the most destructive of all, it is the importation of foreign bees, thus belonging to another race than black bee. The immediate consequence for the emergence of colonies and a cross-miscegenation generalized, cross-breeding colonies in turn with indigenous settlements, and so on. Current Situation In terms of races, the situation in Belgium is very confused. Each student race he wants. It is located in an area where live colonies of foreign breeds and their crosses, beside a large number of local colonies of bees more or less dominated cross very often the genetic type of indigenous black bee. A survey ( "audit of beekeeping") conducted in 1994 (there is unfortunately no more recent data) across the Walloon Region and Brussels gives a picture of the situation regarding races of bees (Fig. below). It notes that the bee is best represented; beekeepers speak of bee raising a bee when they do not master race. It is a black bee more or less cross by region. Under these conditions, the black bee represents the bulk of the gene pool Walloon. The race buck fast is "not black" which today is experiencing the greatest success in 1994, she was raised by nearly a beekeeper in five. The other races have a fairly marginal and localized. audit of races in 1994Représentation (%) breeds of bees in Belgium Since this survey, the landscape has changed significantly beekeeping in Belgium, notably under the leadership of CARI. It is the bee buckfast which has benefited from more developed professional beekeepers Walloon and Brussels because it is a race already selected. At the same time, the association Mellifica saw the day in order to enhance the black bee among beekeepers - they are many - attached to the bee local and regional heritage. For them, it is more important to work in harmony with nature, with a bee in their region, rustic and economical, rather than to produce a little more honey. Garnery, a population geneticist at the CNRS (Gif-sur-Yvette, France) was interested in the people of south-Hainaut. Its results are presented on the map below (but for details, see genetics).
|
| < Prev | Next > |
|---|