Which strain (breed, race) of bees should a beekeeper buy, particularly a first-year beekeeper?

Italian, Carniolan, Caucasian, Russian, Buckfast, Saskatraz – many beekeepers enjoy experimenting with different strains. However, most every bee supplier claims their strain(s) is (are) docile, unlikely to swarm, mite resistant and high honey producers. That can’t always be true. So, who can a new beekeeper trust?

The good news is: succeeding with bees is over 90 % colony management following basic guidelines and procedures. For beginners, until you develop the necessary skills to keep your bees healthy and overwinter them, what type of bees you have is of little importance. Warning: this is experienced beekeeper observation but not a scientifically provable fact.

The bad news is: If you are looking for a pure strain of bees, most beekeepers aren’t selling those. Honest beekeepers admit that their bees are mutts if the queen was open mated, which is the truth unless the queen was artificially inseminated or mated  in special isolated circumstances.

Many bee suppliers don’t know what genetics their bees have because they don’t even understand how queens and drones mate. Unless a queen was artificially inseminated or mated in isolation circumstances, we don’t know what drones (approximately 10 to 20) she mated with up in the sky. So, at best only half the genes she passes on to her offspring are of the strain the seller said.