Uncertainty in the mating strategy of honeybees causes bias and unreliability in the estimates of genetic parameters

Table 1 Simulation and estimation scenarios

Simulation scenarios			Estimation scenarios
Set	Mating strategy		Sire modeling
Set	Controlled mating of BQs	Open mating of DPQs	Controlled mating of BQs	Open mating of DPQs
I	SS	Homogeneous open mating drone population	C_SS_P	O_PS_P
			C_dummySS_P/DPQdam
			C_dummySS_P/Q
			C_PS_P
	PS		C_SS_P	O_PS_P
			C_dummySS_P/DPQdam
			C_dummySS_P/Q
			C_PS_P
II	SS	Heterogeneous open mating drone population	C_SS_P	O_NoPheno
				O_TwoPS_P
				O_FixedGroup
				O_RandGroup

Controlled mating strategy in the simulation: SS (single sire) and PS (pseudo-sire) mating
Sire pedigree modeling for controlled mating: C_SS_P, C_dummySS_P/DPQdam, C_dummySS_P/Q, C_PS_P: in the pedigree, controlled mated queens are assigned, respectively, single sires, dummy single sires per dam of DPQ(s), dummy single sires per mated queen, pseudo-sires
Sire modeling for open mating: O_NoPheno: open-mated DPQs’ colony phenotypes were excluded from the genetic analysis; O_PS_P, O_TwoPS_P: in the pedigree, open-mated DPQs are assigned, respectively, a single open-mating pseudo-sire, or one for each open-mating drone subpopulation (initial BQs and each half of the DPQ); O_FixedGroup or O_RandGroup: the effect of the drone subpopulation mating DPQs was accounted for by adding a fixed or a random non-genetic effect in the statistical model describing the phenotypes

ISSN: 1297-9686