# The Pros and Cons of the AHB (Africanized Honey Bee)



## Riverderwent (May 23, 2013)

Where do you get your stingless gloves?


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## McBain (Aug 23, 2016)

Riverderwent said:


> Where do you get your stingless gloves?


I have Mann Lake goatskin stingless gloves. I've never been stung on the hands while wearing them. Here is a link: http://www.mannlakeltd.com/beekeeping-supplies/category/gear-gloves-goatskin.html


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## Fusion_power (Jan 14, 2005)

Now that was a truly hilarious moment. I read that entire wall of text and then David asks where to get stingless gloves.

I've worked with africanized bees. 

They are excellent foragers.

They form a thick shell around the brood nest which makes manipulation of frames a bit difficult, but basically excludes hive beetles from the brood area.

They swarm early and often. IMO, this is the one reason I don't want pure africanized bees. I did not like all the 1 pound usurpation swarms.

They don't winter worth a flip. With climate change, this may not matter as much, they will spread over much more of the U.S.

They are not adapted to a region with a strong spring flow, total summer dearth, then a fall flow, followed by winter.

With that said, I think the breeding possibilities are excellent. That winter brooding trait could make them a pollinators dream for early spring crops such as almonds. Just tone down the defensiveness a bit!


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## J.Lee (Jan 19, 2014)

Always wear a hat under your hood and boots that your suit can strap down onto.
Amen to the hat under the hood. I always duct taped my bee suit to my boots as well. Very intense bees that are not for the faint of heart. When you compare these bees with European bees though you have to remember there are the back in the day European bees, you know the ones you and Grandpappy keep back in the fiftys with all the propolis, defensiveness, swarm attitude and survivability breed out of them. When you compare them with smart bees (VSH like Dr. Harbo, V.P. Queens, Olympic Wilderness, and that just names a few) you know the ones that had propolis, defensiveness, swarm attitude and survivability breed back in just to get in touch with that VSH behavior (just my humble opinion) its very different. I never requeen any of my hives and they do just fine requeening themselves. If you would like a good queen supplier I can point you in the right direction. I will be starting my 6th year totally treatment free in 2017 Lord willing and will be raising alot of my own queens. Well they will be their queens, not mine, but you know what I mean. I understand your frustration with the back in the day bees that need chemicals to survive and AHB can be a breath of fresh air,all be it a dangerous one under the wrong conditions. AHB is going to go as far north as she can and short of napalming himself out of existence man will not stop her. When the line is finally drawn where she swarms, afterswarms, afterswarms, afterswarms and afterswarms herself out of existence due to Old Man Winter those below that line will have to adapt like beekeepers in South America already have and work with her or get out. Those north of that line will have to still work with the European bees ability to survive winters. If I lived where you lived I would look into AHB but here in North Carolina I will stick to Europeans and smart ones at that. Hope this helps (or at least was the response you were looking for) I'm so sure more opinions will follow.


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## McBain (Aug 23, 2016)

SnickeringBear said:


> Now that was a truly hilarious moment. I read that entire wall of text and then David asks where to get stingless gloves.
> 
> I've worked with africanized bees.
> 
> ...


Right, I don't think they overwinter very well at all, as they have been a southern variety for the past 59 years. 

Swarming is a problem I didn't mention. As long as you keep track of your hives, you can normally just catch it and make a split.


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## McBain (Aug 23, 2016)

J.Lee said:


> Always wear a hat under your hood and boots that your suit can strap down onto.
> Amen to the hat under the hood. I always duct taped my bee suit to my boots as well. Very intense bees that are not for the faint of heart. When you compare these bees with European bees though you have to remember there are the back in the day European bees, you know the ones you and Grandpappy keep back in the fiftys with all the propolis, defensiveness, swarm attitude and survivability breed out of them. When you compare them with smart bees (VSH like Dr. Harbo, V.P. Queens, Olympic Wilderness, and that just names a few) you know the ones that had propolis, defensiveness, swarm attitude and survivability breed back in just to get in touch with that VSH behavior (just my humble opinion) its very different. I never requeen any of my hives and they do just fine requeening themselves. If you would like a good queen supplier I can point you in the right direction. I will be starting my 6th year totally treatment free in 2017 Lord willing and will be raising alot of my own queens. Well they will be their queens, not mine, but you know what I mean. I understand your frustration with the back in the day bees that need chemicals to survive and AHB can be a breath of fresh air,all be it a dangerous one under the wrong conditions. AHB is going to go as far north as she can and short of napalming himself out of existence man will not stop her. When the line is finally drawn where she swarms, afterswarms, afterswarms, afterswarms and afterswarms herself out of existence due to Old Man Winter those below that line will have to adapt like beekeepers in South America already have and work with her or get out. Those north of that line will have to still work with the European bees ability to survive winters. If I lived where you lived I would look into AHB but here in North Carolina I will stick to Europeans and smart ones at that. Hope this helps (or at least was the response you were looking for) I'm so sure more opinions will follow.


Very true! Sounds like you are running an awesome operation. You're the type of keeper who I would confidently purchase queens from.

I believe in working with local stock. My local stock is the AHB, your local stock is feral European. Local stock is the best suited bee for your individual problems, climate and flowers.


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## Tenbears (May 15, 2012)

SnickeringBear said:


> Now that was a truly hilarious moment. I read that entire wall of text and then David asks where to get stingless gloves.
> 
> I've worked with africanized bees.
> 
> ...


 They thought the exact same thing in Brazil in 1957! Look where that got them.


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## AHudd (Mar 5, 2015)

McBain said:


> Right, I don't think they overwinter very well at all, as they have been a southern variety for the past 59 years.
> 
> Swarming is a problem I didn't mention. As long as you keep track of your hives, you can normally just catch it and make a split.


You must have a lot more steely nerves than I do. I can't imagine having to go through even a half dozen AHB colonies to split them or to check for Queen cells to manage swarming. How often would one have to go through each colony and for how many months each year? 

Alex


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## Pondulinus (Jun 24, 2015)

Great posts


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## Riverderwent (May 23, 2013)

Pondulinus said:


> Great posts


Thank you.


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## AndrewF (Oct 30, 2016)

Hello, new beekeeper here and found the thread interesting as I've kept European bees while in VA. Once I moved to OH, my first hive was from a swarm captured at my cousin's house. Set the colony up and they thrived over the summer. During the first routine check, I've never experienced aggressive behavior as I did that day. After walking about 200 yds away and having about 20 stingers in my arm (through 3 layers!), I figured they were probably AHB, but unsure. 

Is behavior the only way to tell if they're AHB?

I'm encouraged to see the benefits of AHB as my old club in VA always stated that any AHB colony should be destroyed to keep the genetics from other apiaries. I'm pretty rural and don't have that problem, but was glad to see that wasn't the only option. Curious to see how they'll overwinter... Great thread. Thanks.


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## razoo (Jul 7, 2015)

AndrewF said:


> Hello, new beekeeper here and found the thread interesting as I've kept European bees while in VA. Once I moved to OH, my first hive was from a swarm captured at my cousin's house. Set the colony up and they thrived over the summer. During the first routine check, I've never experienced aggressive behavior as I did that day. After walking about 200 yds away and having about 20 stingers in my arm (through 3 layers!), I figured they were probably AHB, but unsure.
> 
> Is behavior the only way to tell if they're AHB?
> 
> I'm encouraged to see the benefits of AHB as my old club in VA always stated that any AHB colony should be destroyed to keep the genetics from other apiaries. I'm pretty rural and don't have that problem, but was glad to see that wasn't the only option. Curious to see how they'll overwinter... Great thread. Thanks.


Bees can be defensive for reasons other than AHB.


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## McBain (Aug 23, 2016)

AHudd said:


> You must have a lot more steely nerves than I do. I can't imagine having to go through even a half dozen AHB colonies to split them or to check for Queen cells to manage swarming. How often would one have to go through each colony and for how many months each year?
> 
> Alex


It is a little intimidating but once you trust your equipment it's the same as opening up any hive. = )



AndrewF said:


> Hello, new beekeeper here and found the thread interesting as I've kept European bees while in VA. Once I moved to OH, my first hive was from a swarm captured at my cousin's house. Set the colony up and they thrived over the summer. During the first routine check, I've never experienced aggressive behavior as I did that day. After walking about 200 yds away and having about 20 stingers in my arm (through 3 layers!), I figured they were probably AHB, but unsure.
> 
> Is behavior the only way to tell if they're AHB?
> 
> I'm encouraged to see the benefits of AHB as my old club in VA always stated that any AHB colony should be destroyed to keep the genetics from other apiaries. I'm pretty rural and don't have that problem, but was glad to see that wasn't the only option. Curious to see how they'll overwinter... Great thread. Thanks.


*This is a good question: *Because you are in Ohio, I am going to take a guess and say they are not AHB. 

I believe beekeepers should strive to use local feral stock if at all possible. In such stock, you should see defensive behavior, as the hive needs to defeat predators without the aid of a beekeeper. 

It will be very interesting to see how this hive winters in comparison to other hives kept by other beekeepers in your area. 

Great question and welcome to the community!


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## razoo (Jul 7, 2015)

I have to say, I am not impressed by your cavalier attitude. 
If this would only affect your hives it wouldn't matter, but I find it quite disconcerting that you are releasing AHB drones into the surrounding area without a care for other beekeepers in your area who most likely don't want your AHB infected stock.


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## McBain (Aug 23, 2016)

razoo said:


> I have to say, I am not impressed by your cavalier attitude.
> If this would only affect your hives it wouldn't matter, but I find it quite disconcerting that you are releasing AHB drones into the surrounding area without a care for other beekeepers in your area who most likely don't want your AHB infected stock.


I'm sorry if I have come across harshly, that has not been my intention. 

Any beekeeper in Arizona knows that if your bees naturally requeen, they will end up becoming Africanized because, as I said, 97 - 100% of feral colonies (which are everywhere down here) are AHB. 

Your European colonies located in Maryland, do not have that same difficulty, they can requeen on their own and, most likely, bread with other beekeepers stock or feral stock.

So, if you are asserting that I am contaminating local stock by keeping AHB's, don't worry. Survival of the Fittest has already weeded out the less dominant European style colonies and the only thing that is left here are the AHB's. If you want a European colony here in Arizona, you must import a queen from another state.


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## razoo (Jul 7, 2015)

I can see that must be a significant problem, as, yes, in MD we are able to let our bees requeen as needed without any thought or concern for AHB. 

I doubt the novice beek from Ohio has AHB, but I felt you were encouraging fellow beeks to consider AHB as they, in your opinion, have their merits. (Personally I was not convinced by your list of pros and cons. )

For the sake of all beekeepers I hope that it was not your intention to encourage beeks to keep AHB. I suspect that beekeepers across the US do not want AHB in their area. Already one novice beekeeper has read your post, and despite his old VA bee club's warnings, seems encouraged that AHB is a viable option. The last thing we want is novice beekeepers encouraging AHB in Ohio or Virginia and spreading those traits further afield.


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## BeeSkipper (Mar 22, 2015)

So I'm on my 3rd year and I was told that my feral colony is HOT and has AHB tendencies ....as they might have a strain or two mixed within the genes.

There a lot more experts on here...and I am far from one....but I ignore my hive a lot ....and it keeps on ticking ....I am not kidding, this bee keeping is pretty easy....and I chalk it up to a feral hive, that is native, and bread for this area.....and oh by the way, I'm in Houston, TX....not on the border, but close enough to say we have strains of AHB....and when I have made my hive mad they light me up - they are no where as nice to my buddy's who have them petting bees from Europe.

I post this to say- consider a strong wild hive if your having trouble keeping bees....nature has been surviving for a long time....I am merely trying to saddle it, and give me a ride ...not change it from a horse to a cow


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## Kimble (Jun 27, 2014)

McBain
At what size do your hives become nasty. Hear of one beek who keep lots of hives restricted to 1 deep and one super. Then exact small amounts more often? Your opinion. Maybe management style needs to evolve.
Maybe keep brood to one medium. Would a medium be viable over time


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## McBain (Aug 23, 2016)

razoo said:


> I can see that must be a significant problem, as, yes, in MD we are able to let our bees requeen as needed without any thought or concern for AHB.
> 
> I doubt the novice beek from Ohio has AHB, but I felt you were encouraging fellow beeks to consider AHB as they, in your opinion, have their merits. (Personally I was not convinced by your list of pros and cons. )
> 
> For the sake of all beekeepers I hope that it was not your intention to encourage beeks to keep AHB. I suspect that beekeepers across the US do not want AHB in their area. Already one novice beekeeper has read your post, and despite his old VA bee club's warnings, seems encouraged that AHB is a viable option. The last thing we want is novice beekeepers encouraging AHB in Ohio or Virginia and spreading those traits further afield.


It seems you have missed my point entirely. I wrote a post sometime last month called 'The Big Question of Modern Beekeeping' in which I made a case that beekeepers should use *local* stock. Local stock is what I believe keepers should be using, not the 'one size fits all' standard European bee. 

Definition of *local stock*: Feral bees which have adapted to your region, climate and pests.

My local stock, as I previously said, is the AHB. I recommend using AHB in a safe location (which does not include your backyard) where they natively occur. You will not find the AHB in Maryland because that is *not* your local stock. Your local stock is feral European, which I would recommend you use. You should not use AHB's because they have not adapted to your pests and will not perform well in your conditions. *In addition, they do not natively occur in your region so why would you import it in?* In the same way, why do keepers here in Arizona import in standard European stock when the thriving feral colonies do just fine?

I hope that clears up my viewpoint for you on using feral bees that have adapted to your region and climate.



Kimble said:


> McBain
> At what size do your hives become nasty. Hear of one beek who keep lots of hives restricted to 1 deep and one super. Then exact small amounts more often? Your opinion. Maybe management style needs to evolve.
> Maybe keep brood to one medium. Would a medium be viable over time


I have really found it just depends on the colony. Another thing I've learned is that the definition of 'the hive is overly aggressive' depends on the beekeeper. = ) In my opinion, if you go to open an AHB hive that has 6 - 8 frames of capped brood, the hive will be classified as nasty (in most cases). I've done some hives and cutouts that are much, much larger and you can barely see anything but bees on your mask. 

A lot of it depends on how many flowers are out. If the bees are working, the bee are happy and a lot easier to work with. 

I like the idea you mentioned a lot! The only problem I can see that one may encounter while testing it is increased swarming. If the AHB queen is space restricted, she will try to swarm. Even sometimes when there is plenty of space, they will be wanting to swarm. 

The one key thing I learned about AHB swarms is when you see the hive separated in the box, take half of them away, move them across the yard and put it into another box. That will trick them into thinking they did swarm and both hives (your new split and the original hive) will get right back to work.


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## AHudd (Mar 5, 2015)

AHudd said:


> How often would one have to go through each colony and for how many months each year?
> 
> Alex


Also, as you stated, "I've done some hives and cutouts that are much, much larger and you can barely see anything but bees on your mask". How long does it take the bees to go back to their hive before you can move on to the next hive or even get into your truck to leave? I ask this because as I go from hive to hive (BeeWeaver bees) the guard bees from the hive I inspected don't go home just because I put the lid on their hive. They follow me to the next hive and the bees there are instantly more alert because of the buzzing of the followers. I can only imagine what that would be like with AHB.
,


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## clyderoad (Jun 10, 2012)

Are you not familiar with a Arizona beekeeper by the name of Dee Lusby? 
Your Pros and Cons have been discussed by many in relation to her bees and methods.
Start by searching here on BeeSource.


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## Fusion_power (Jan 14, 2005)

> At what size do your hives become nasty. Hear of one beek who keep lots of hives restricted to 1 deep and one super. Then exact small amounts more often? Your opinion. Maybe management style needs to evolve. Maybe keep brood to one medium. Would a medium be viable over time


 Horizontal hives were developed specifically so that fewer interventions in the brood nest are required as compared to Langstroths. If you want to read more about this, look up the Jackson Horizontal Hive which is a frame based hive about 32 inches long and roughly 18 inches wide by 12 inches deep. The frames are fully closed at the top which means removing honey can be done by pulling out only the honey frames leaving brood frames along. It has a small opening with a cover at the rear so smoke can be introduced to the honey area prior to opening the hive. Crispin Jackson has a website: http://www.rupertshoney.com/


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## Michael Bush (Aug 2, 2002)

>They are not adapted to a region with a strong spring flow, total summer dearth, then a fall flow, followed by winter.

Having seen what people tell me are AHB in AZ, NM and the Virgin Islands, I'd have to say they vary a lot. The ones I've seen in AZ do not behave the same as the ones in VI. The VI bees will swarm in a drought, abscond at the drop of a hat, and seldom develop into large colonies. The ones in AZ sit tight in a drought and build up to very large colonies. Like all bees they become locally adapted over time.


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## shinbone (Jul 5, 2011)

McBain said:


> I was recently reading a post titled 'Africanized traits purposely imported into traditional lines ?'. After pondering the discussion, it got me really thinking about the pros and cons of keeping AHB's.
> 
> *Please read this entire post before responding:*
> 
> ...




This much verbiage required to explains the pro's of keeping AHB, plus a list of cautions at the end, shows there are no pro's to keeping AHB.

JMHO


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## McBain (Aug 23, 2016)

AHudd said:


> Also, as you stated, "I've done some hives and cutouts that are much, much larger and you can barely see anything but bees on your mask". How long does it take the bees to go back to their hive before you can move on to the next hive or even get into your truck to leave? I ask this because as I go from hive to hive (BeeWeaver bees) the guard bees from the hive I inspected don't go home just because I put the lid on their hive. They follow me to the next hive and the bees there are instantly more alert because of the buzzing of the followers. I can only imagine what that would be like with AHB.
> ,


The defending guards generally do not return to their hives while I do my inspections. The secret to getting rid of the attacking bees was something I learned from a commercial friend of mine. When you finish your inspections, get into your vehicle and turn on the air conditioning full blast. The bees will almost instantly leave you along and fly to the windows to escape. 

Another thing I try and do is open the weaker hives first to minimize that initial group of guard bees, then open the stronger hives later.



clyderoad said:


> Are you not familiar with a Arizona beekeeper by the name of Dee Lusby?
> Your Pros and Cons have been discussed by many in relation to her bees and methods.
> Start by searching here on BeeSource.


This is the first time I've heard of her, but I just searched and found her website. Thanks for the info!



Michael Bush said:


> >They are not adapted to a region with a strong spring flow, total summer dearth, then a fall flow, followed by winter.
> 
> Having seen what people tell me are AHB in AZ, NM and the Virgin Islands, I'd have to say they vary a lot. The ones I've seen in AZ do not behave the same as the ones in VI. The VI bees will swarm in a drought, abscond at the drop of a hat, and seldom develop into large colonies. The ones in AZ sit tight in a drought and build up to very large colonies. Like all bees they become locally adapted over time.


Thank you for your time Michael. Your website is full of so much wisdom that has helped guided me on my journey through beekeeping. 

I've read your website pretty extensively and know you recommend determining weather or not feral stock is worth while before committing to it. As you said though, if a hive is healthy enough to send out a swarm, it's most likely good stock and healthy enough to keep. What are your thoughts on keeping AHB's?


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## McBain (Aug 23, 2016)

shinbone said:


> This much verbiage required to explains the pro's of keeping AHB, plus a list of cautions at the end, shows there are no pro's to keeping AHB.
> 
> JMHO


I'm a strong believer in local stock. 

The AHB variety is the local stock here in Phoenix and throughout the southern states. It is the strongest bee for my region and should be kept where it has been designed to live. If you wouldn't find a feral European colony here, why would I import one? If they don't exist 'naively', why do you think they will superficially exist with your aid? I have extreme heat here in the desert, the European bee thrives in places that recieve seasonal snow.

If you wouldn't find a feral AHB colony in your location, why would you import one? If they don't exist 'naively', why do you think they will superficially exist perfectly with your aid? Do you agree or disagree?

As for cautions, I included them in the original post:


McBain said:


> *If you read this post and are now interested in keeping AHB: *
> 
> You need a good bee suit or you will end up like David, getting tons of stings. Always wear a hat under your hood and boots that your suit can strap down onto.
> 
> ...


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## bucksbees (May 19, 2015)

McBain said:


> The AHB variety is the local stock here in Phoenix and throughout the southern states. It is the strongest bee for my region and should be kept where it has been designed to live. If you wouldn't find a feral European colony here, why would I import one?


Seeing how the AHB was imported in the first place, your logic does not make sense. Also before the spread of AHB, there was feral European colonies through all of Arizona. Once again your logic does not make sense.

If you want to keep AHB, great go for it.

In my experience, and not directed at you in any way, I find long winded people attempting to either sell me something I don't need or convince themselves about something.

However if you want to keep AHB, great go for it.


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## clyderoad (Jun 10, 2012)

McBain said:


> I'm a strong believer in local stock.
> 
> The AHB variety is the local stock here in Phoenix and throughout the southern states. It is the strongest bee for my region and should be kept where it has been designed to live. If you wouldn't find a feral European colony here, why would I import one? If they don't exist 'naively', why do you think they will superficially exist with your aid? I have extreme heat here in the desert, the European bee thrives in places that recieve seasonal snow.
> 
> ...


You must have just come to this feverish belief in local stock as it was only a couple of months ago you were* trying* to requeen with BeeWeaver and pure VSH queens.
These manifesto posts/threads of yours read like nothing more than a whole lot of hot air from a neophyte beekeeper.
And I would like nothing more than for you to prove me wrong by putting your beliefs into action.


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## mike17l (Jun 22, 2012)

I grew up in Hidalgo County, TX, the first county AHB were discovered in the US. I now live about 100 miles north of there, in an area that has been saturated with AHB since the early 90s. The feral bees in this area are extremely variable. I do cutouts and keep many of those bees. They are very prone to swarm or abscond. Some do not produce as much wax or honey. They can be as pissy as all get out or as nice as a puppy. They can do great with mites, or disappear (die or abscond) at the hint of mites. They are not quality bees. Mean stuff at the house is requeened without question. Bees that are not mean are evaluated and kept if they are on the good end of the spectrum and requeened if on the other end. 

AHB was not here in 1989, European bees were, EHB was the feral bee stock. AHB is invasive to the EHB and the qualities that allow them to be as such, make them poor bees to keep. They abscond, they usurp, they swarm, they are aggressive. Not a wise decision to keep them with out question.


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## razoo (Jul 7, 2015)

mike17l said:


> I grew up in Hidalgo County, TX, the first county AHB were discovered in the US. I now live about 100 miles north of there, in an area that has been saturated with AHB since the early 90s. The feral bees in this area are extremely variable. I do cutouts and keep many of those bees. They are very prone to swarm or abscond. Some do not produce as much wax or honey. They can be as pissy as all get out or as nice as a puppy. They can do great with mites, or disappear (die or abscond) at the hint of mites. They are not quality bees. Mean stuff at the house is requeened without question. Bees that are not mean are evaluated and kept if they are on the good end of the spectrum and requeened if on the other end.
> 
> AHB was not here in 1989, European bees were, EHB was the feral bee stock. AHB is invasive to the EHB and the qualities that allow them to be as such, make them poor bees to keep. They abscond, they usurp, they swarm, they are aggressive. Not a wise decision to keep them with out question.


Seems like the OP still has a few lessons to learn.


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## jwcarlson (Feb 14, 2014)

clyderoad said:


> You must have just come to this feverish belief in local stock as it was only a couple of months ago you were* trying* to requeen with BeeWeaver and pure VSH queens.


Well in the OPs defense, the BeeWeaver and pure VSH queens were local to somewhere.


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## McBain (Aug 23, 2016)

bucksbees said:


> Seeing how the AHB was imported in the first place, your logic does not make sense. Also before the spread of AHB, there was feral European colonies through all of Arizona. Once again your logic does not make sense.
> 
> If you want to keep AHB, great go for it.
> 
> ...


I could see how one could easily think that, however, all honey bees have been imported into this continent. 

There were feral European colonies, however, they have all disappeared from the wild because a bee more fit to survive in this region has arrived. 

I really don't enjoy the prospect of taking bees out of their 'prime' habitat and shipping them a couple thousand miles, then companing about how poorly they are doing. I agree with you, good point. = )




clyderoad said:


> You must have just come to this feverish belief in local stock as it was only a couple of months ago you were* trying* to requeen with BeeWeaver and pure VSH queens.
> These manifesto posts/threads of yours read like nothing more than a whole lot of hot air from a neophyte beekeeper.
> And I would like nothing more than for you to prove me wrong by putting your beliefs into action.


*It's a little bit hard for me to take you seriously cyderoad, because a lot of what you do on this form is criticize anyone you disagree with.* Just one quick example is the way you argued with tech.35058 because he did not agree with you: Honey or Syrup? This leades me to the conclusing you are just here to get people fired up and you are not very interested in the issues being presented. You probably didn't read this entire post, because you didn't bring up a thing I said in the OP. 

For the fairness of everyone else, you do bring up some good points. I do have BeeWeaver queens as well as VHS queens. Just so you know, I historically have a 33% success ratio using VHS queens (67% of my VHS colonies die for various reasons). I just got BeeWeaver queens not too long ago but so far all is well. Using AHB cutouts and swarm captures, I have a 66% capture ratio (meaning the swarm actually stayed or the cutout survived) and close to 100% survival ratio after that.

One thing I have observed about you and your posts clyderoad, you rarely touch the real issues of the posts that I, or other beekeepers you disagree with, write. You mainly stick to belittling our ideas and saying stuff like


clyderoad said:


> nothing more than a whole lot of hot air from a neophyte beekeeper.


 You cannot argue with the truth of anything I say, the only thing you can do is criticize my opinion and criticize my operations, that you don't understand the full spectrum of anyway. You have probably never even seen an AHB, coming from NY and all. 

For those reasons, I have a really hard time taking you seriously, but thanks for the post because you always make me think. = )



mike17l said:


> I grew up in Hidalgo County, TX, the first county AHB were discovered in the US. I now live about 100 miles north of there, in an area that has been saturated with AHB since the early 90s. The feral bees in this area are extremely variable. I do cutouts and keep many of those bees. They are very prone to swarm or abscond. Some do not produce as much wax or honey. They can be as pissy as all get out or as nice as a puppy. They can do great with mites, or disappear (die or abscond) at the hint of mites. They are not quality bees. Mean stuff at the house is requeened without question. Bees that are not mean are evaluated and kept if they are on the good end of the spectrum and requeened if on the other end.
> 
> AHB was not here in 1989, European bees were, EHB was the feral bee stock. AHB is invasive to the EHB and the qualities that allow them to be as such, make them poor bees to keep. They abscond, they usurp, they swarm, they are aggressive. Not a wise decision to keep them with out question.


Great knowledge and information. Thanks Mike.


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## jwcarlson (Feb 14, 2014)

McBain said:


> With all that in mind, you may be wondering if there are any pros to having Africanized bees. Well, approximately 44% of my hives are feral/AHB cutouts or swarm captures, so I have lots of experience keeping them and can think of many pros and cons which I'd love to have input from the community about. Before I get into that, I would like to talk about the infamous survivor stock that some people have, others claim to have and still others deny exists.


44%...

4 of 9, right? "I have lots of experience keeping them" over the last couple months? How long have you been keeping bees?

I think the total number of Africanized colonies and the number of years you've been keeping that many are extremely important numbers to accompany your post, but they seem to be absent.


I could have one AHB colony for two months and make a post identical to yours, but I'd have 100% AHB! Think of how knowledgeable I would be!


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## texanbelchers (Aug 4, 2014)

I am told that every honey bee bred in Texas has some level of AHB influence. I haven't done any genetic tests, but I haven't seen any bees that you can approach in shorts & a tee shirt. I don't want to pay for bees, so I work with what I collect and I have to agree with Mike17l. They can be very unpredictable. The colonies that produce the most honey/wax/bees for me tend to behave more like Italians are described. The more defensive colonies tend to brood up only enough to swarm even when given ample space. They also tend toward multiple swarms to the point that the original hive has a virgin queen and barely any bees left.



mike17l said:


> ...The feral bees in this area are extremely variable. I do cutouts and keep many of those bees. They are very prone to swarm or abscond. Some do not produce as much wax or honey. They can be as pissy as all get out or as nice as a puppy....They abscond, they usurp, they swarm, they are aggressive.


For reference, I've been keeping since August 2014. After toying with KTBH, long hives, and deeps, I currently have 9 colonies in 8-frame medium boxes.


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## bucksbees (May 19, 2015)

I can walk through my yard in shorts and tees, even now. However they dive bomb my wifes hair.

The one cutout I did this year, the bees sit on my hand and groom themselves, they are smaller, and I want to say the cell size was 4.3 when I took them out.

I did have one defensive hive, but they got split and requeened with Michael Palmer queens. After 2 months they are a breeze to work with and built back up to 6 frames(deep).

AHB is confirmed in our area but not alot. 60 miles to our south I hear more reports of it.


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## clyderoad (Jun 10, 2012)

McBain said:


> *It's a little bit hard for me to take you seriously cyderoad, because a lot of what you do on this form is criticize anyone you disagree with.* Just one quick example is the way you argued with tech.35058 because he did not agree with you: Honey or Syrup? This leades me to the conclusing you are just here to get people fired up and you are not very interested in the issues being presented. You probably didn't read this entire post, because you didn't bring up a thing I said in the OP.
> One thing I have observed about you and your posts clyderoad, you rarely touch the real issues of the posts that I, or other beekeepers you disagree with, write. You mainly stick to belittling our ideas and saying stuff like You cannot argue with the truth of anything I say, the only thing you can do is criticize my opinion and criticize my operations, that you don't understand the full spectrum of anyway. You have probably never even seen an AHB, coming from NY and all.
> 
> For those reasons, I have a really hard time taking you seriously, but thanks for the post because you always make me think. = )


Well, many people get agitated and defensive when a voice or two does not conform to or confirm one's proclamations. 
There was a post script on a members tagline at one time that read something like "just because it's new to you doesn't mean it is new or revolutionary". Another says 'Let me never fall into the vulgar mistake of dreaming that I am persecuted whenever I am contradicted.' Both seem to apply here.

You fail to see the difference between pointing out inaccuracies and/or story telling and criticism. 
I'd rather inaccurate information over BS though. Easier to remedy.
I'm all for a discussion, but not when bullet points are presented as facts. BSing doesn't fly with me.

I wonder if you'll even pay attention to what Mike171 had to say? What say you other than 'great knowledge and information'?


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## Fusion_power (Jan 14, 2005)

For crossreference, the word "you" is best avoided. It is interpreted as an attack by most people. "Should" is another word that triggers our minds the same way. You should avoid using these words together! usage is intentional.

I don't know much about africanized bees even though I've worked with them several times over the last 10 years. It is easy to lump them into a single description of runny, swarmy, highly defensive, etc. What is important IMO is to recognize that they are highly variable and potentially carry some very useful genetics. As they cross with European bees, the problem traits are reduced and the potential to select for desirable traits goes up.

I do "NOT" like working with defensive bees. It forces the beekeeper to focus on other things than beekeeping.


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## razoo (Jul 7, 2015)

Fusion_power said:


> For crossreference, the word "you" is best avoided. It is interpreted as an attack by most people. "Should" is another word that triggers our minds the same way. You should avoid using these words together! usage is intentional.
> 
> I don't know much about africanized bees even though I've worked with them several times over the last 10 years. It is easy to lump them into a single description of runny, swarmy, highly defensive, etc. What is important IMO is to recognize that they are highly variable and potentially carry some very useful genetics. As they cross with European bees, the problem traits are reduced and the potential to select for desirable traits goes up.
> 
> I do "NOT" like working with defensive bees. It forces the beekeeper to focus on other things than beekeeping.


It would seem to me that Russian bees have more of the traits we beekeepers are looking for, more so than AHB bees. 
It would surely make more sense for us to include more Russian genetics than ahb?


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## Zephyr (May 4, 2016)

AHB I guess arent all that bad. No different than ours just very territorial. I bet that aggression makes them better at attacking things like mite covered brood and beetles but unless they're pulling 50% mite infected brood minimum then I dont want no part of it. A mauling aint worth some honey. 

It's alot like other livestock too. Bulls turned to steers because they're easier to manage and dont hurt each other which prevents unnecessary losses. If half the AHB foragers die early from stinging a mammal or getting into fights with something, they arent being as productive as they could be and how do we alter behavior? Just like the breeding stock, the undesirables get the chopping block or in bees, a pinch until the new stock produce desirable offspring.


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## Colobee (May 15, 2014)

My solution to AHB crosses is a night or two in the deep freezer. Fortunately I have that option... They have no place in MY apiary. My condolences to those who have no choice. I'd probably give up beekeeping before I'd put up with THAT kind of grief every time I went to work my bees. Geez, I might even have to go find my gloves 

I think you hit the nail on the head with the "Manifesto" reference, Clyde... :lpf:


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## McBain (Aug 23, 2016)

jwcarlson said:


> 44%...
> 
> 4 of 9, right? "I have lots of experience keeping them" over the last couple months? How long have you been keeping bees?
> 
> ...


I don't know where the 44% came from, but here is the the deal:

Back in mid-summer I got a shipment of pure bread VHS queens and had a 33% introduction success ratio (close to 1 out of every 3 in the original shipment actually exist today). Some stopped laying all together after a few weeks, some never actually laid at all, some disappeared, etc, etc. 

All the BeeWeaver queens were accepted and live to date, but I only got them a couple months ago so there is no historical data.

I don't know which 'them' that means... them as in BeeWeaver? Not much experience at all. Them as in standard European stock? My family has kept that for generations long before my time. 

No no I was misunderstood about what I meant by 100% survival ratio. Nobody has 100% success on the survival of all their colonies (for very long). I did not write that meaning 100% of my AHB colonies always survive.

I look at the capture process in two steps with two different factors of risk.

Capture ratio: did the swarm stay or did the cutout stay. (My capture ratio has historically been close to 66% success)

Survival ratio: did the swarm survive and successfully begin building/laying/etc. (Survival ratio has always been close to 100%)

I've had my fair share of hives die for various reasons, sorry for the confusion and hope that clears everything up so we can focus on the issues. I've got some more reading to do ; )


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## jwcarlson (Feb 14, 2014)

McBain said:


> I don't know where the 44% came from, but here is the the deal:
> 
> Back in mid-summer I got a shipment of pure bread VHS queens and had a 33% introduction success ratio (close to 1 out of every 3 in the original shipment actually exist today). Some stopped laying all together after a few weeks, some never actually laid at all, some disappeared, etc, etc.
> 
> ...


44% was from your OP... 44% of your colonies are AHB you said. I want to know how many that is and for how long you've kept them. That's all. The question you avoided answering...

And "them"?!?! These are quotes from your OP... or are you just copy-pasting it from somewhere else?



McBain said:


> *Please read this entire post before responding:*


Have you considered your own advice?



McBain said:


> Well, approximately 44% of my hives are feral/AHB cutouts or swarm captures, so I have lots of experience keeping them


To which I responded:


jwcarlson said:


> 44%...
> 
> 4 of 9, right? "I have lots of experience keeping them" over the last couple months? How long have you been keeping bees?
> 
> ...



Hell, I even QUOTED your post inside of mine and you still couldn't figure out where 44% and "them" came from...?


Everything else is window dressing. 100% of my AHB colonies die within ten minutes and they make no honey. They swarm every 30 seconds and they killed all the dogs in my neighborhood. My grandpa and my dad both had the same experience. 

See how silly it sounds when we make a bunch of crap up?


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## McBain (Aug 23, 2016)

jwcarlson said:


> 44% was from your OP... 44% of your colonies are AHB you said. I want to know how many that is and for how long you've kept them. That's all. The question you avoided answering...
> 
> And "them"?!?! These are quotes from your OP... or are you just copy-pasting it from somewhere else?


Right, now I understand the question fully. By the way, you cannot find any of my post elsewhere (or at least not that I know of), so to answer your question, I was not just copying it off a google search, but thanks for the vote of confidence toward my integrate.

To answer your question, 44% is exactly as you said, 4 of 9 colonies in total. I've been keeping AHB for only two seasons and have enjoyed every minute of it thus far. (I keep them at a remote location far away from people, just like I recommended.) 

I don't understand the rest of your post, so I hope that nailed it. ; )



Fusion_power said:


> For crossreference, the word "you" is best avoided. It is interpreted as an attack by most people. "Should" is another word that triggers our minds the same way. You should avoid using these words together! usage is intentional.


Thanks, I'll do that in the future and sorry if it came across as an attack, that was not the intention.



razoo said:


> It would seem to me that Russian bees have more of the traits we beekeepers are looking for, more so than AHB bees.
> It would surely make more sense for us to include more Russian genetics than ahb?


I strongly agree that Russian bees do have some beneficial traits, especially their hygienic nature and proposals production. However, their largest population build up is in the late summer going into fall, that would be the only con I can see when using them. Do you keep Russian colonies?



clyderoad said:


> I wonder if you'll even pay attention to what Mike171 had to say? What say you other than 'great knowledge and information'?


I read what he said, appreciated the background and personal wisdom he added and understand his viewpoint even though I disagree with his conclusion. I respect him and the work that he does with South Texas Apiaries, preventing exterminators from just wiping out colonies unchecked. 



Very fun post thus far all! Look forward to hearing more thoughts.


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## rolftonbees (Jul 10, 2014)

When you choose to play with AHB s you are potentially making this choice for many others around you. 

100 yards away, sure. My bees fly further than that.


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## jwcarlson (Feb 14, 2014)

McBain said:


> Right, now I understand the question fully. By the way, you cannot find any of my post elsewhere (or at least not that I know of), so to answer your question, I was not just copying it off a google search, but thanks for the vote of confidence toward my integrate.
> 
> To answer your question, 44% is exactly as you said, 4 of 9 colonies in total. I've been keeping AHB for only two seasons and have enjoyed every minute of it thus far. (I keep them at a remote location far away from people, just like I recommended.)


So after two seasons of having four or less colonies of AHB you've decided that they're the answer to everything and that European bees are a diseased scourge.

How many AHB colonies did you have last year?


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## mike17l (Jun 22, 2012)

McBain said:


> I read what he said, appreciated the background and personal wisdom he added and understand his viewpoint even though I disagree with his conclusion.


That will change when you've kept more than 4 AHB colonies for more than two seasons...


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## JWChesnut (Jul 31, 2013)

Classic arrogant newbee. What a scourge.

I attended beekeepers funerals from AHB incidents when I trained beekeeping in Central America. 
That is all I will say on this self-illustrating silliness.


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## Michael Bush (Aug 2, 2002)

>What are your thoughts on keeping AHB's?

If you can avoid them I would. If all the feral stock around you is AHB, I would select for gentleness. Trying to keep EHB in AHB country leads to vicious F1 crosses that are unworkable and dangerous.  I think we should all keep the nicest bees we can for our area. It's dangerous to too many people to keep vicious bees.


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## mike17l (Jun 22, 2012)

Michael Bush said:


> >What are your thoughts on keeping AHB's?
> 
> If you can avoid them I would. If all the feral stock around you is AHB, I would select for gentleness. Trying to keep EHB in AHB country leads to vicious F1 crosses that are unworkable and dangerous. I think we should all keep the nicest bees we can for our area. It's dangerous to too many people to keep vicious bees.


For me F1s are as gentle as most italian bees. F2s are usually a little testy, and not for the back yard keeper, F3s might as well be flying sacks of hate.


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## gruntworker (May 20, 2013)

I went to meetings at the Az beekeepers association for years before ever purchasing a hive. https://www.azbeekeepers.org/meetings-and-events.html. There were always a good number of people talking about having AHBs during some of these meetings. Most often they kept these on farms or out the the city. I took a sociology class almost too long ago to remember but I remember the the process of normalization. If a group of people see something as ubiquitous it becomes more acceptable. There are a lot of people out here that keep hybrids and they share the knowledge. 

My hive re-queened itself this spring when i was on a medical trip for a family member. I came back and the new queen was already laying tight clusters and she was laying a lot of eggs each day. I knew that there was a good possibility of some hybrid genetics from local drones and I was curious how the workers would turn out. I had heard that the first generation generally was almost as gentle has my Italians and she was filling these frames so quickly I wanted to try it out. My own fear/conscience made me purchase a new queen.

My hive is on the edge of a county island in the middle of about 4 acres. I felt sure I could keep my bees from hurting anybody. That said, when they swarmed they wouldn't be my bees anymore. My guilt and responsibility however,would follow them to somebodies shed, attic, or perhaps tree. We read about attacks fairly often in the phoenix area. I couldn't stomach the thought that those bees may have originated from my hive. So for 50 bucks I eliminated my guilt and get the bonus of beekeeping in shorts and a t-shirt.


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## McBain (Aug 23, 2016)

rolftonbees said:


> When you choose to play with AHB s you are potentially making this choice for many others around you.
> 
> 100 yards away, sure. My bees fly further than that.


Yes, you are correct in saying that my bees fly further than 100 yards. Some varieties of AHB guard a 100 yard radius around the hive, that is what I was referring to.

This can be difficult to get people to understand because of the way the media hypes things up. The AHB is non-aggressive in most cases, it is only when provoked within their 100 yard radius that they even bother with people.

In NC you have many forest areas, wetlands, etc. Throughout your state there are feral colonies that keep most of the flowering plants alive from season to season.

In Arizona we have deserts filled with cacti and other flowering plants. It is the feral AHB's that keep those plants alive from season to season. 

You may have feral EHB varieties living in trees or different places less than a mile from your home, I have feral colonies of AHB's less than a mile from my home (as I know where a few feral AHB colonies are close by).

*Here is the main point*, there are strains within the AHB family that, when close to civilization, cause problems. I say some strains within the family because there are others that do not cause problems when in the midst of civilization. 

I know a lady who lives within the city who told me of a colony that began building in between two walls of her house close to two years ago. It's never caused an issue to anyone in her residential neighborhood. Never once.

Me keeping AHB in a secluded location away from civilization endangers far less people than the feral swarms that live undisturbed between people's walls, in my opinion.



jwcarlson said:


> So after two seasons of having four or less colonies of AHB you've decided that they're the answer to everything and that European bees are a diseased scourge.


Who put those words in my mouth? I think keeping feral European bees *where they belong* is the best thing for mankind and the bees. Because you can find *no feral (wild, existing without intervention) varieties of European bee here* I do not think we should import them, just as you should not be importing AHB's. Why? Because you cannot find Feral AHB's in Iowa, believe me. Do you agree or are you going to bee ordering AHB's in the near future? ; )

Let me give all of you some detailed history here. I care about bees, beekeepers and the future of beekeeping. I have no alternate motives, I don't sell equipment, I don't sell my own variety of 'standard' bee, I post with the intentions of helping people think and improve. I'm challenged to think every time I post and I hope others can be challenged to think as well.

With all that in the back of your mind, I was thinking to myself one day 'why is it that we, keepers within the beekeeping community, struggle so much with pests?'. The other thing I could not understand is the fact that there are thousands of feral colonies which have been surviving worldwide without the aid of beekeepers. 

Most of you have already heard that before. 

I've always been fascinated by feral colonies, one example is a colony I know of at a local state park. 

The colony is in an open rock face about 75 feet above a trail at the park. It is easy to observe from the ground below and I often check up on it to see how things are going. Three years now, I've been checking and every time I see them, they have more and more comb. It got me thinking, these bees pollinate the same flowers my bees go to, and yet, for the three years I have been observing them up there, they have never died from anything. (I was thinking about that only weeks after my largest 'standard' European colony died due to a mite infestation).

There is at least one other colony at the park that is within a tree right next to the trail. It has a 97 - 100% chance of being Africanized, but they never bother people on the trail (which is less than 2 feet from the entrance to the colony). 


Now that you understand what motivates me (and what does not), I would like to return back to a few key issues. Everyone skipped over these for some reason to debate with me about my personal opinions. By the way, my opinions are not so 'set in stone' to the point where they can never change. If facts are presented that show something I think to be completely false, I'm not too proud to accept facts. I'm all about finding truth and digging into the facts. 

Do we agree or disagree on these five points from the OP, and why?



McBain said:


> 1)*One thing you need to know: *Africanized bees *do not attack people* while they are swarming. Even though the media says stuff like 'a swarm of bees attacked', it was not a swarm. If you are at the situation you, as a beekeeper, will know it is not a swarm, rather all these attacks come from *well established hives.*
> 
> 2)*Think about this: *The experimental AHB hives (located in Rio Claro, Brazil) were 5,731 Miles (9,224 KM) from the current location of my AHB hives here in Phoenix Arizona. Over the past 59 years the bee has survived disease, predators, moths, mites and mankind in their quest to spread over the continents.
> 
> ...


Can't wait to hear about those five points from everyone!



gruntworker said:


> My hive is on the edge of a county island in the middle of about 4 acres. I felt sure I could keep my bees from hurting anybody. That said, when they swarmed they wouldn't be my bees anymore. My guilt and responsibility however,would follow them to somebodies shed, attic, or perhaps tree. We read about attacks fairly often in the phoenix area. I couldn't stomach the thought that those bees may have originated from my hive. So for 50 bucks I eliminated my guilt and get the bonus of beekeeping in shorts and a t-shirt.


You have a good point and it is good to be concerned about the safety of others. If you don't feel confident that your location is safe, there are no laws against requeening. The downside is it will just lands you with a variety that is less fit to survive in this region and will most likely struggle more from pest related issues.

The other thing is there are most likely AHB colonies close to you anyway. No one can stop those feral colonies from camping in someone's shed or attic. Just a thought.


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## Fusion_power (Jan 14, 2005)

> 5)Results for AHB: Because Survival of the Fittest has been at work in the AHB for 59 years, they have become stronger as a whole because queens are only able to mate with drones that have stronger genetics.
> Results for the European Bee: We have artificially suppressed the extinction of weak hives and the result has been a widespread weakening of European stock.


This is presented as a statement of fact when it is actually an opinion. "Stronger" is not the right word. Africanized bees originated in a tropical climate. They are adapted to the tropics. Get them 30 degrees away from the equator and put them in a high humidity environment and they are no longer adapted. So no, it is not stronger genetics. They survive mites in large part because of their swarming tendency which gives lots of brood breaks that prevent mite reproduction.

I disagree with your statement because it incorrectly ascribes the africanized bee's place in the local ecology. Africanized bees have millions of years of adaptation to a tropical climate, not 59 years as you state. On a genetic level, very little changed over 59 years. New challenges were encountered in that time frame which caused a shift in population genetics. Some of those changes came about as a result of crossing with European bees. Some of them are from de-selection of characteristics that were already present. The result is a bee better adapted to local conditions, but in no way does this mean they are the best bee for that environment. In fact "best bee" is a moving target. Do we want bees that survive on their own? Bees that make a lot of honey? or bees that expend all their energy swarming? What constitutes the "best bee"?

As for European bees being weakened, that too is a mischaracterization. Take the European bees off treatments for 5 generations and voila, you will have mite resistant European bees. I have not treated my bees in 12 years now and they are thriving. There will come a day when bees all across the U.S. will be mite resistant. It will take a few more years. Meantime, keep the bees you choose. I choose to keep the bees that are adapted to my climate.


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## AHudd (Mar 5, 2015)

>"Now that you understand what motivates me (and what does not), I would like to return back to a few key issues. Everyone skipped over these for some reason to debate with me about my personal opinions."

Since you asked,

When personal opinion is presented as fact and is backed up with anecdotal evidence that can not be taken seriously, it casts doubt on the rest of the evidence presented. 
For instance this quote. >"There is at least one other colony at the park that is within a tree right next to the trail. It has a 97 - 100% chance of being Africanized, but they never bother people on the trail (which is less than 2 feet from the entrance to the colony)."
How does one arrive at such a precise figure as 97-100%? I'm no mathematician, so I could probably be dazzled with some fancy cypherin'. Also, how could one possible know they "never" bother people on the trail? One would have to spend all days of bee flying weather at the trail to know this. Or possibly, all people are inspected for bee stings as they exit the trail and the results are sent to you.

It is very difficult for new beekeepers to separate the wheat from the chaff. Most of the time acting on the wrong info only results in an economic loss, but I think what is being advocated here is dangerous. 

The people on BeeSource will take you to task for presenting opinion as fact. I was of a certain opinion on a few topics, because I took peoples opinions as fact, before I came to BeeSource. While I still do not necessarily agree, 97-100% , my opinions have been tempered by others reality.

Please share your opinions, but present them as such.

Alex


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## frustrateddrone (Jan 31, 2015)

Here is my experience of Africanized bees that are 1st hand moments. I kept Africanized bees by a cut out I did. I was a new bee keeper less then a month of purchasing a 5 frame nuc box. Not to be confused the 5 frame is separate from the Africanized cut out. I consulted about 5 removal companies and each gave an account of what they recommended. Some knew way more then others. I did the cut out got my bees and things were fine. When they built up though that's when the problems started. Defense zone and reaction increased. Unpleasant to have them in the bee yard as anything you did they pretty much reacted. 

Conclusion is that a lot of people have never kept Africanized bees and speaking of them is what is written and from others have posted. The joy of bee keeping is working with manageable bees. Africanized bees are pretty much unmanageable due to the fact they are so defensive once they build up. If someone was to pay me say $500 I might consider it. If someone paid me in cash $1000 to manage 1 Africanized bee hive sure.
Keeping Africanized bees you've absolutely got to be experienced in it because even in a full suit it is nerve wracking. Alarm Pheromones are always present and you can't really just walk away either. It took me awhile to realize that a hose with a sprayer in the air was about the only way to get them off of me. I can work with any bees now that I have had my near year dealing with them. 

You've got to be a bit wacked out to not re-queen an Africanized bee colony for any long term bee keeping. Most around me that do cut outs know that Africanized bees are what they're getting and re-queen every cut out or swarm.


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## texanbelchers (Aug 4, 2014)

McBain said:


> This can be difficult to get people to understand because of the way the media hypes things up. The AHB is non-aggressive in most cases, it is only when provoked within their 100 yard radius that they even bother with people.


It appears that the biggest problem in this discussion is definitions. Unless you do genetic testing (or a lot of very specific measuring maybe?) you don't know if a given colony has been truly "Africanized". So, what most people, including beekeepers and media, go by is behavior and location. If you are in an AHB area like TX or AZ, you can assume they have some of the genes. If the colony is "highly defensive" to the point of aggression, you may assume they are AHB. If they swarm over and over and over with a cup of bees each, you may assume they are AHB.

As a beekeeper you can choose to keep whatever bees you'd like, unless it is restricted by law. The reality is you are responsible and may have civil issues. Personally, if they exhibit the traits above that would indicate AHB, my experience is that they don't have any of the benefits you attribute to AHBs. I do have some that are a bit more defensive than I like and I always smell the strong alarm pheromone. However, they aren't really nasty and they haven't exhibited swarm tendencies or the queen would be taking a bath. I wouldn't call them AHB.

Among others I removed this summer were 4 unmanageable colonies. These had really bad behavior in residential areas and I wouldn't want to work them. How bad? If these were near your trail, nobody would be in the park bad. If you glanced at them from 50 yards, they would sting, not bump, bad. So bad I spent more time vacuuming my veil than the comb (at least until the numbers were down). Those I call AHB!


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## Nordak (Jun 17, 2016)

Cons are far too many. I respect the AHB for what it is. I would not dare keep AHB in my backyard. 

When I was 3 years old (I don't remember this obviously) I was out playing with my brother and sister who were supposed to be watching me. I decided apparently that it would be a great idea to shove a stick in the entrance of one of Dad's hives and rattle it around. Ended up going to the hospital over it. Bees everywhere according to Mom. That was back in 1980 with Italian hives. Replace those Italians with AHB and I might not be posting this right now. Be careful what you're advocating, advice from someone with their own 3 year old now.


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## gruntworker (May 20, 2013)

You have a good point and it is good to be concerned about the safety of others. If you don't feel confident that your location is safe, there are no laws against requeening. The downside is it will just lands you with a variety that is less fit to survive in this region and will most likely struggle more from pest related issues.

The other thing is there are most likely AHB colonies close to you anyway. No one can stop those feral colonies from camping in someone's shed or attic. Just a thought.[/QUOTE]


Lets preface the rest of this comment with the fact that there are far too many variables to understand. 

There is a trait that the AHB's have that many people attribute, at least partially, to their success, aggression. It allows these bees to defend themselves more readily against bears, raccoons, etc. That said, there is one creature that makes this trait a poor adaption, humans. Arizona used to have grizzlies. They showed little fear of humans and were much more aggressive than the black bear. Grizzles are gone; extricated every one. 

In the urban sprawl of the Phoenix area lots of the people want to save the bees in their back yard. This desire is greatly reduced when those same bees start attacking their kids or animals. I am curious how sharing the environment with humans changes the bees genetics. It's hard to quantify aggression within a species. I am stuck with perusing reading materials. Some materials say only 15-20 percent of the hybrid hives are dangerously aggressive. Others estimate they are 4 to 10 times more likely to attack in force. My thought is that the aggressive ones will get culled much quicker when they are in contact with us. Human interaction may eventually lead to a gentler bee. 

I am going to try not to have swarms. It is one of the reasons I am starting small. I have a lot to learn. That said, If my hive sends a swarm out to live among my neighbors I don't want to endanger them. The presence of other dangerous bees in the area doesn't alleviate my responsibility.


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## Pondulinus (Jun 24, 2015)

In Norway we (reportedly) have the largest population of "pure bred" northern european black bees. Cross breeding between black bees and carnica or buckfast usually results in highly defensive bees and in many places you commonly need to wear a helmet, sweather and pants underneath your beesuit when tending second generation mutts. Boots is a must. These bees can also attack you if you get close to the hives and they are stressed (100 yards or so) and follow you for long distances.

I wonder how much of the danger we contribute to AHB is real and how much is media made.


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## Tomas (Jun 10, 2005)

I’ve worked with Africanized bees in Honduras for the last 25 years. I have no other choice. It is the only bee that is available for me.

It’s a love-hate relationship. They have their good points, such as their resilience to diseases and pests and they can make good crops of honey. But having to always deal with ornery bees can get old.

I wrote several posts on Africanized bees a while back. Take a look at them.

Musings about Beekeeping with Africanized Bees 
http://musingsonbeekeeping.blogspot.com/2015/07/musings-about-beekeeping-with.html

More Musings about Beekeeping with Africanized Bees 
http://musingsonbeekeeping.blogspot.com/2015/07/more-musings-about-beekeeping-with.html

Even More Musings about Beekeeping with Africanized Bees 
http://musingsonbeekeeping.blogspot.com/2015/08/even-more-musings-about-beekeeping-with.html


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## Fusion_power (Jan 14, 2005)

> I wonder how much of the danger we contribute to AHB is real and how much is media made.


 I'd like to answer Pondulinius as a person who has worked black bee hybrids and also africanized bees. There is literally no comparison. Black bee hybrids will sting once where the africanized bees will sting 1000 times. I remember being chased from the bee yard well over 100 yards by a dozen black X bees. I've seen them buzz me 3 days later just because I got within 50 meters of the bee yard. Countering that, I've been chased from the bee yard by half a colony of africanized bees and 3 days later, half a colony came out after me when I got within 50 meters of the hive. Do not make the mistake of thinking an extra sweater and pants will keep you safe from africanized bees! You must be fully suited up with boots, taped pants and sleeves, sting proof gloves, and a heavy duty veil to protect your face. I am not talking about the africanized bees in the U.S., I saw them in Mexico in a much purer form.

With that said, they are workable so long as the beekeeper is properly prepared and respects their instincts.


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## Pondulinus (Jun 24, 2015)

Thank you for your answer, I can not really argue with you as I have not worked either AHB or nasty black bee hybrids but wont your example qualify as an extreme? As i understand it, beekeepers in tropical south- and middle-america have to work with AHB and most would chose to do so even if they had a choice, as AHB produce so much more honey. I understand that a full suit is needed but if 1000's of bees were on you each time you opened the hive I dont think anyone would find that manageble. Also you would loose too many bees? I do get that AHB has a higher "baseline-defensiveness" but if every hive was like that, wouldnt more people have been killed? I have carnica bees and i dont know of anyone that keep black bees in my area, but I still have to wear a full suit, gloves and boots most of the time. I also use lots of smoke and I still get stung.

Every year here in Norway, when the summer starts and there are little to write about, you will see ticks, YJ and vipers on the front pages of all the major news papers. Headlines are usually simmilar to "This year it will get really bad!" or "if you get bitten/stung by one of these you might die!". When approching fall they usually write about the "MONSTER-FLY!", which is deer fly..... So maybe I have been a little damaged by my surroundings, thinking that the media always makes everything a million timse worse than it is.

Anyway, for people living in AHB territory, there is no other viable solution than to work with what you got. It sucks, but killing AHB hives or requeening with EHB queens etc. would really just be like pissing against the wind. As long as the AHB is better adapted to your region and displace EHB everyone should just cut their losses and start breeding local stock for good traits instead.


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## texanbelchers (Aug 4, 2014)

All of my hives are "feral", that is all removals or swarms of unknown source, and I suspect they all have AHB genetics. None of them are terribly defensive or I'd be looking for a new place to sleep at night.  I think we can influence what is around by selecting or deselecting traits no matter what the mix or the limited hive count. To think otherwise I would be defeated before I start.


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## Pondulinus (Jun 24, 2015)

Thank you Tomas, I haveread through your blog-posts and found them very interesting. That was a nice glove by the way;-)


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## Richard Cryberg (May 24, 2013)

The real issue is not Africanized versus not Africanized. All else being equal who cares? The real issue is aggression. It is simply irresponsible for anyone to keep bees that are overly aggressive. There are only two acceptable routes to take with overly aggressive bees. Either kill them fast or requeen them fast. Any other action is simply irresponsible. 

Now, I will admit my definition of overly aggressive might differ from someone elses definition. So, just to keep the definition simple any hive that can never be worked in a Tee shirt with no gloves is overly aggressive and should be killed or requeened. That does assume the person working the hive is competent and knows when and how to use a smoker. Working such a hive should result in no more than one or two stings on average with bare arms and bare hands and often none when there is any honey flow at all.

There are no pros to aggressive bees. Only 100% cons.


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## Pondulinus (Jun 24, 2015)

In that case, all my bees are overly aggressive. Don't really see why i have to kill them instead of just wearing a suit. 

I also think you are wrong on the pro/con thingy. Bees with some temperament tend to protect the hive better against pest like YJ and such


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## D Coates (Jan 6, 2006)

Richard Cryberg said:


> Now, I will admit my definition of overly aggressive might differ from someone elses definition. So, just to keep the definition simple any hive that can never be worked in a Tee shirt with no gloves is overly aggressive and should be killed or requeened. That does assume the person working the hive is competent and knows when and how to use a smoker. Working such a hive should result in no more than one or two stings on average with bare arms and bare hands and often none when there is any honey flow at all.


My definition as well. I do work mine bare handed and in a T-shirt. If I consistently have a hive that gives me a couple "unearned" stings every time I work them I make note to inspect deeply. Accidentally pinching a bee and getting stung during an inspection is an earned sting. Assuming the aggression isn't a symptom of another issue, that queen is as good a pinched. I like walking the hives in my apiaries to see the board traffic every few days. I don't feel I should have to suit up nor light the smoker to do this. African or not, aggressive hives/queens are not tolerated in my apiaries. I don't want/need that type of trouble.


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## mike17l (Jun 22, 2012)

McBain said:


> 1)One thing you need to know: Africanized bees do not attack people while they are swarming. Even though the media says stuff like 'a swarm of bees attacked', it was not a swarm. If you are at the situation you, as a beekeeper, will know it is not a swarm, rather all these attacks come from well established hives.
> 
> 2)Think about this: The experimental AHB hives (located in Rio Claro, Brazil) were 5,731 Miles (9,224 KM) from the current location of my AHB hives here in Phoenix Arizona. Over the past 59 years the bee has survived disease, predators, moths, mites and mankind in their quest to spread over the continents.
> 
> ...


1. Yes they can, I have seen swarms put people in the hospital in South Texas.

2. umm. ok. Not sure what your point is.

3. EHB survived here for a longer period of time, before AHB showed up. That does not mean AHB are better for us to manage.

4. AHB do not make bread. But they do have some advantages that help their spread. Males fly higher and faster than their EHB counterparts. AHB colonies swarm often. AHB swarms can usurp a weak (numbers) colony, be it EHB or AHB. 59 years is not long enough to allow for permanent changes in DNA. They started for the most part, exactly how they are today. 

5. Pure opinion, no response needed.


The fact is, AHB are bad to keep because they are unpredictable. They swarm and a new queen takes over and everything changes. To purposely keep them, when you have the option not to, with out very specific goals (make them gentler, produce more honey, mite resistance, ect) is at the least, irresponsible.


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## Richard Cryberg (May 24, 2013)

Pondulinus said:


> In that case, all my bees are overly aggressive. Don't really see why i have to kill them instead of just wearing a suit.
> 
> I also think you are wrong on the pro/con thingy. Bees with some temperament tend to protect the hive better against pest like YJ and such


Show me one single study that shows aggressive bees protect better against yellow jackets. If you always HAVE to wear a suit your bees should be killed for the betterment of bee keeping unless you are so allergic that a sting would send you to the emergency room. Keeping aggressive bees is simply irresponsible and gives all bee keepers a bad name to the public. I got stung a couple of hundred times this summer I suppose as usual. Not bad when you consider I am in most hives for at least a superficial inspection every couple of weeks and have over 30 hives. I expect to get stung when I pick up a hive tool and squash a bee with my hand. I expect to get stung when I brace a box on my leg when lifting it and squash a bee. I also expect the occasional bee to be just having a bad day and it stings me. Having to suit up every time you work your bees results in many people neglecting their hives and ending up with a dead hive that would have been saved if it was more workable. Your drones also pollute the local genetics with aggressive genes that should not be tolerated. I own a full suit. It was given to me. I tried it on to see if it fit. It has been on a hanger ever since then and will stay there unless I have to work something like an over turned truck load of bees. Any hive I can not work in a Tee shirt is a dead queen real fast. If I can not find her quick I would kill the whole hive. It is easier to raise more bees than fight bad behavior that should not be tolerated.


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## Pondulinus (Jun 24, 2015)

Why is it irresponsible to keep my bees? I dont think they are agressive! I routinely walk through my apiary, straight infront of every entrance and the only time i got stung was after dark the day after we corrected our ant-issiue. Most people here use a full suit, or atleast a jacket with veil and I dont see how that can possibly lead to neglect. 

As for the "polluting the gene-pool" - most beekeepers know that other peoples bees get around and if that is a problem one should either quit, buy queens or move virgins to get mated in an controlled environment. You cant complain to your neighbour about what stock he runs or which queens he chose to breed from.

As for the YJs, i have not seen a scientific paper about that but I see it in my apiary and many posts in here say the same. For me it seems quite logical that super-docile bees will be less defensive against pests than more testy bees would.


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## mike17l (Jun 22, 2012)

Richard Cryberg said:


> Show me one single study that shows aggressive bees protect better against yellow jackets. If you always HAVE to wear a suit your bees should be killed for the betterment of bee keeping unless you are so allergic that a sting would send you to the emergency room. Keeping aggressive bees is simply irresponsible and gives all bee keepers a bad name to the public. I got stung a couple of hundred times this summer I suppose as usual. Not bad when you consider I am in most hives for at least a superficial inspection every couple of weeks and have over 30 hives. I expect to get stung when I pick up a hive tool and squash a bee with my hand. I expect to get stung when I brace a box on my leg when lifting it and squash a bee. I also expect the occasional bee to be just having a bad day and it stings me. Having to suit up every time you work your bees results in many people neglecting their hives and ending up with a dead hive that would have been saved if it was more workable. Your drones also pollute the local genetics with aggressive genes that should not be tolerated. I own a full suit. It was given to me. I tried it on to see if it fit. It has been on a hanger ever since then and will stay there unless I have to work something like an over turned truck load of bees. Any hive I can not work in a Tee shirt is a dead queen real fast. If I can not find her quick I would kill the whole hive. It is easier to raise more bees than fight bad behavior that should not be tolerated.


Yeah, that's simply not possible in some parts of the world. We don't all live in an ideal world. If I work bees here with no suit, I will get torn up at some point. It does not matter how I work them or what the queens are, it will happen, sooner or later.


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## Richard Cryberg (May 24, 2013)

Pondulinus said:


> Why is it irresponsible to keep my bees? I dont think they are agressive! I routinely walk through my apiary, straight infront of every entrance and the only time i got stung was after dark the day after we corrected our ant-issiue. Most people here use a full suit, or atleast a jacket with veil and I dont see how that can possibly lead to neglect.
> 
> As for the "polluting the gene-pool" - most beekeepers know that other peoples bees get around and if that is a problem one should either quit, buy queens or move virgins to get mated in an controlled environment. You cant complain to your neighbour about what stock he runs or which queens he chose to breed from.
> 
> As for the YJs, i have not seen a scientific paper about that but I see it in my apiary and many posts in here say the same. For me it seems quite logical that super-docile bees will be less defensive against pests than more testy bees would.


If you can walk thru without getting stung those bees sure sound like you can work them without gloves or in a Tee shirt. At least learn to work without gloves. It will make you a better bee keeper.

I see yellow jackets, bald faced hornets and European giant hornets in my apiary every day in summer. Mainly they are after dead bees. After all, they are meat eaters. I have never had a hive that had the slightest problem defending against all of those. When I have heard of hives fail to defend the usual reason was there were hardly any bees left due to rampant varroa induced virus infections as a result of poor bee keeping by the owner probably made worse by robbing by stronger hives nearby.

I also know the nicest hive around can get ugly when there is a dearth, particularly if it is 95+ deg F and humid and may not be workable in a Tee shirt. Really strong hives are always more problem than a five frame nuc. I regularly open nucs and forget to even smoke them. I never make that mistake on a hive piled up six or seven feet tall and bees all the way to the top.


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## D Coates (Jan 6, 2006)

mike17l said:


> Yeah, that's simply not possible in some parts of the world. We don't all live in an ideal world. If I work bees here with no suit, I will get torn up at some point. It does not matter how I work them or what the queens are, it will happen, sooner or later.


I don't think any of us do. Eventually you'll run into a nasty hive. What's your definition of torn up? To me it's a dozen to a couple dozen clearly coming from one hive. I wear a veil but other than that it's jeans and a t-shirt. If I've got a hive that's whooped my rear they're on my radar for splitting and requeening.


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## mike17l (Jun 22, 2012)

D Coates said:


> I don't think any of us do. Eventually you'll run into a nasty hive. What's your definition of torn up? To me it's a dozen to a couple dozen clearly coming from one hive. I wear a veil but other than that it's jeans and a t-shirt. If I've got a hive that's whooped my rear they're on my radar for splitting and requeening.


A few dozen from one hive can be considered normal. Torn up, is 200 stingers in a glove. That can happen here with no notice.


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## D Coates (Jan 6, 2006)

mike17l said:


> A few dozen from one hive can be considered normal. Torn up, is 200 stingers in a glove. That can happen here with no notice.


Oooooffff.... Yea, I want nothing to do with 200 stingers in a glove. I've not worn gloves in 4-5 years. It's not because I'm tough, I feel I do a better job without gloves and I try to stay as cool as possible while working. Hats off to you for working bees that aggressive. If my bees were that hot I think I'd take up an easier hobby like rabid badger juggling, or competitive minefield clog dancing.


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## mike17l (Jun 22, 2012)

D Coates said:


> Oooooffff.... Yea, I want nothing to do with 200 stingers in a glove. I've not worn gloves in 4-5 years. It's not because I'm tough, I feel I do a better job without gloves and I try to stay as cool as possible while working. Hats off to you for working bees that aggressive. If my bees were that hot I think I'd take up an easier hobby like *rabid badger juggling, or competitive minefield clog dancing*.


HAHAHAHA!!!!

Actually, I only get stung like that on the real aggressive ones when I wear leather gloves. Normally, I wear 7 mil blue nitrile gloves. They can easily sting through them, but they do not like landing on them and normally do not sting through them. It is as close to gloveless as I am willing to get. Another problem the aggressive hives can cause is covering the face protection to the point, of hindering vision, it happens...

Normally, you can watch for and recognize increasing aggression and ultimately be able to requeen. But, you can always open a hive and get into something unexpected.


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## lharder (Mar 21, 2015)

Tomas said:


> I’ve worked with Africanized bees in Honduras for the last 25 years. I have no other choice. It is the only bee that is available for me.
> 
> It’s a love-hate relationship. They have their good points, such as their resilience to diseases and pests and they can make good crops of honey. But having to always deal with ornery bees can get old.
> 
> ...


That was good reading. Did I miss something, but it looks like you don't do much selection for gentleness yet. Any thoughts on this? 

We are missing lots of information because of language barriers. South and Central America are big places, and it would be neat to see how beekeeping is done in all these places and how much influence selection has on their traits. We do know that Brazilian beekeeping is far better off with Africanized bees now that they have adapted to them. They were having problems with Euros which is why the African bees were brought in to begin with. Beesource needs a African topic where beekeepers from Africa and South America can discuss management. Lots of learning could be done. 

I still haven't seen a detailed study on the genetic differences between Euros and the source of African genetics. It would be a interesting to see geographic infiltration at a unique trait level (both ways), vs a simplistic African vs Euro comparison.


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## jadebees (May 9, 2013)

This is an interesting thread. But much more fear than good info. 

I catch local feral bees in NE. Arizona. Most are defensive. If you open they will fly at you. I was exposed to feral bees in my youth in both New England and Florida. Those bees were also defensive. The only T shirt ,bare hands bees were domestic packages. This was 20 years before AHB arrived.

You need a good suit and gloves here. No T's & bare hands. Not many colonies are agressive, meaning, attacking for little or no reason. But a standard suit & 9 mil Harbor Freight nitrile gloves work fine. But get them aroused and ....it's on!

This area is difficult for bees. The only ones that survive here without constant intervention are the more AHB influenced colonies. At least 3/4ths of ferals here show the traits.

AHB smell different. They swarm on a different schedule. They grow differently.Keeping more smaller colonies helps. Selecting for gentleness generally gets you weaker bees. Keeping true survivor feral bees like domestics often makes worse problems than you see with domestics. Seldom will you see or get a 2 box deep sized feral hive around here. That may be 1 in a 100. 

I've been keeping them 10 years now. They have very useful traits for here. But require a different style of beekeeping.

Adaptability to your environment is the true intelligence.


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## McBain (Aug 23, 2016)

Fusion_power said:


> This is presented as a statement of fact when it is actually an opinion. "Stronger" is not the right word. Africanized bees originated in a tropical climate. They are adapted to the tropics. Get them 30 degrees away from the equator and put them in a high humidity environment and they are no longer adapted. So no, it is not stronger genetics. They survive mites in large part because of their swarming tendency which gives lots of brood breaks that prevent mite reproduction.
> 
> I disagree with your statement because it incorrectly ascribes the africanized bee's place in the local ecology. Africanized bees have millions of years of adaptation to a tropical climate, not 59 years as you state. On a genetic level, very little changed over 59 years. New challenges were encountered in that time frame which caused a shift in population genetics. Some of those changes came about as a result of crossing with European bees. Some of them are from de-selection of characteristics that were already present. The result is a bee better adapted to local conditions, but in no way does this mean they are the best bee for that environment. In fact "best bee" is a moving target. Do we want bees that survive on their own? Bees that make a lot of honey? or bees that expend all their energy swarming? What constitutes the "best bee"?
> 
> As for European bees being weakened, that too is a mischaracterization. Take the European bees off treatments for 5 generations and voila, you will have mite resistant European bees. I have not treated my bees in 12 years now and they are thriving. There will come a day when bees all across the U.S. will be mite resistant. It will take a few more years. Meantime, keep the bees you choose. I choose to keep the bees that are adapted to my climate.


If you recall earlier in the post, I said wrote to jwcarlson and said:



McBain said:


> I think keeping feral European bees *where they belong* is the best thing for mankind and the bees. Because you can find *no feral (wild, existing without intervention) varieties of European bee here [In Arizona]* I do not think we should import them, just as you should not be importing AHB's. Why? Because you cannot find Feral AHB's in Iowa, believe me. Do you agree or are you going to bee ordering AHB's in the near future? ; )


I believe importing AHB's where they do not belong is foolish, (where they do not exist in the wild) and it is, I believe, equally foolish to import standard European bees where they do not belong and expect stellar results. 

*When a person takes a northern variety of standard European honey bees and brings it into the desert, it creates a big problem. The standard European bees struggle with melt downs here in the summers.* Basically the hive overheats and everything just melts inside. Obviously keeping northern varieties in 115°F (46°C) does not work so well. Why? Bees that have adapted to heat survive it with no meltdowns but bees that have adapted to cold climates, do not survive well in hot climates.

I don't see the big problem with swarming. Even if a hive swarms 1 - 3 times in a year, that does not mean you have a weak 'home base colony', especially if you make 1 - 3 splits per year yourself. The bees know when the best time to swarm is. If they are going to do it, why not just make a split and strengthen a new colony as well?

I have no doubt that we can achieve TF European bees, as a matter of fact, the Treatment Free thread is full of people who don't use chemicals. I'm not talking about their stock, they should be the people selling stock locally. I'm talking about 'standard' stock which has been treated and artificially sustained using chemicals. I noticed in your post that you actually agree with my ideas:



Fusion_power said:


> Africanized bees have millions of years of adaptation to a tropical climate, not 59 years as you state. [[Later]]--- Take the European bees off treatments for 5 generations and voila, you will have mite resistant European bees.


Clearly you don't even agree with the 'millions of years of adaptation' needed theory either seeing those two statements side by side. 5 generations of AHB easily could have, and did adapted to their climate over the past 59 years. Regardless of the timeline, there is no denying that survival of the fittest has been at work in the AHB and has been artificially suspended from its work in standard European stock. 





AHudd said:


> Since you asked,
> 
> When personal opinion is presented as fact and is backed up with anecdotal evidence that can not be taken seriously, it casts doubt on the rest of the evidence presented.
> For instance this quote. >"There is at least one other colony at the park that is within a tree right next to the trail. It has a 97 - 100% chance of being Africanized, but they never bother people on the trail (which is less than 2 feet from the entrance to the colony)."
> ...


Coming from two different parts of the country, you and I start with two different common knowledge bases on the topic of bees. I'm sure there are things you know every detail about that I have never experienced and I start with a different common knowledge of beekeeping because of where I live as well. It is commonly known and agreed upon by local beekeepers that in the state of Arizona, there is a 97 - 100% chance any feral colony is Africanized. - Translation: There's rarely a beekeeper in Arizona who doesn't know 97 - 100% of all feral colonies are AHB. 

There are plenty of interesting numbers presented in this Risk Takers Youtube video. Please note that this is a show, and almost every video on here is extreme AHB examples to get good ratings.

Now, with all that in mind I have not inspected every person coming off the trails, however, being a member of the park, I keep in close touch with the staff and recieve the newsletter. People actually go to the park and take a guided 'bee walk' and look at these colonies at work. To my knowledge, no one has died or even been stung. 



frustrateddrone said:


> It took me awhile to realize that a hose with a sprayer in the air was about the only way to get them off of me. I can work with any bees now that I have had my near year dealing with them.
> 
> You've got to be a bit wacked out to not re-queen an Africanized bee colony for any long term bee keeping. Most around me that do cut outs know that Africanized bees are what they're getting and re-queen every cut out or swarm.


Another thing you can do is get into your vehicle and turn up the air conditioning. The bees will instantaneously go to the windows and leave you alone. 

I can see why one would think it is wacked to keep AHB's. *However, let's talk for one quick second about superficial breeding because as I reviewed this post, I noticed that I forgot to share some important reference facts that helped lead me to my current conclusions about standard stock.*

There is much we can learn from superficial breeding in general. The easiest place to look is in the dog family. The Rottweiler has been bred by humans since the Roman Empire, today it has the highest cancer rate in the dog family.

Another example is the Bernese Mountain Dog. It has been bred for it's lovable nature and beauty, today 45.7% of all Bernese Mountain Dogs die from cancer. [View Report] 

*It is understood that all dogs came from one original variety within their family and have adapted to what that family is today. Dogs that continue to remain undomesticated, while more dangerous and less predictable, continue to thrive and are self-taught hunters and survivors. The Australian Dingo, the Grey Wolf and the Coyote are a few examples. *

Many dogs within the family have been domesticated by care from humans and have lost the ability to survive on their own for that reason. Think of a Chihuahua, you think that could survive on it's own in the wild? Not a chance. It would be devoured by other, stronger dogs, fall prey to hawks, get eaten by a snake or roadrunner, etc. The only reason Chihuahua's are not extinct, is because people artificially sustain their family line by continuing to provide for them. Even if the Chihuahua could survive predators, it would never be able to actually hunt down food because it would need to be trained to do so. It has lost the original genetic information that allowed to to hunt on it's own (back when it was larger of course).

Why does any of that matter? Let me quote and fill in the blanks:

1) Dogs that continue to remain undomesticated, while more dangerous and less predictable, continue to thrive and are self-taught hunters and survivors.
2) AHB which continues to remain undomesticated, while more dangerous and less predictable, continues to thrive on it's own and is a self-adapted specie. (As I already stated, many times the media hypes things up into this monster when it's really just a coyote in disguise.) More dangerous in both cases really isn't so bad. Feral dogs generally run from people and the AHB can only fly 15 mph, people can run 30 mph on average. The OP says:


McBain said:


> I do not think bee attacks are something to be laughed about, so please don't take this wrong. *However, according to The Arizona Republic, 7 out of 10 bee related deaths (excluding allergic reactions) are due to people causing their own death: Running into the path of a car and drowning are the top two. (The Arizona Republic) * Number 1 thing to remember: Don't panic weather you are in a bee suit or a hiking trail. If you panic, you will die.


 You can easily escape a 'bee attack' by just sprinting or better yet, don't throw stones into a feral colony! 


Understanding the risks of superficially bred dogs and the strength of undomesticated varieties, let's move on and talk bees.

According to Bee Informed "Beekeepers across the United States lost 44 percent of their honey bee colonies during the year spanning April 2015 to April 2016" [Bee Informed] 

My translation/opinion of the previously stated facts:

For the last 1,540 years, mankind has superficially bred the Rottweiler. Today the breed suffers the highest cancer rate. The Bernese Mountain Dog has been superficially bred for beauty and attitude. It suffers a 45.7% cancer rate. The 'Standard' European honey bee has been superficially bred since the 1600's (and that's just as far as I know) and so far this year we have suffered 44% loss/death on such colonies.

We have designed a bee we like, but one that is highly impractical for it's use. For comparison, it's like we have designed a Chihuahua and expect it to hunt down a racoon! Not going to work out so well for us or the dog/bees involved. 

Some interesting stuff to think about.




Tomas said:


> I’ve worked with Africanized bees in Honduras for the last 25 years. I have no other choice. It is the only bee that is available for me.
> 
> It’s a love-hate relationship. They have their good points, such as their resilience to diseases and pests and they can make good crops of honey. But having to always deal with ornery bees can get old.
> 
> I wrote several posts on Africanized bees a while back. Take a look at them.


Thanks for the post. I really enjoyed reading your website! Do you agree with the above comparisons? 

In closing I think Jadebees said it best:


jadebees said:


> I've been keeping them 10 years now. They have very useful traits for here. But require a different style of beekeeping. Adaptability to your environment is the true intelligence.


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## WesternWilson (Jul 18, 2012)

In a recent club meeting, a beekeeper impishly informed us all that he had quietly brought in "Africanized" queens. Note that we are all urban, back-yard based beekeepers and his apiary is in a small neighbourhood filled with dogs and children. 

Putting aside the issues of temperament, I know this beekeeper is hoping to come up with a bee that can run treatment free. But from what I have read about Africanized bees, you are really gaining Varroa tolerance at the cost of colony size and honey production. 

Bees are fascinating creatures and I might keep them even if they didn't increase or make honey. But most of us would not. I am not comfortable with creating a bee (and saturating local DCA's with the drones) that are not in any way productive. Ditto if that bee is snarky and tough on pets and toddlers.

This drive to solve the Varroa problem, that presents itself in our small community in the form of regular setups of "survivor" yards and treatment free attempts, is understandable given the fact we seem only to have succeeded over the years in making Varroa more and more virulent. Beekeepers are frustrated.

But we might consider, particularly in light of recent technological advances in genetic engineering and Varroa culture in the lab, shifting our focus to the very real possibility those advances give of altering the Varroa in a significant way, significant enough to reduce their impact on honey bees. I firmly believe we will soon aspire to eradication of this very tough, resourceful pest.

The honey bee genome is fine as it is, and was for all the years of domestication pre Varroa and tracheal mite. Perhaps we should leave it alone and focus on the real problem, Varroa.


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## gruntworker (May 20, 2013)

"AHB which continues to remain undomesticated, while more dangerous and less predictable, continues to thrive on it's own and is a self-adapted specie. (As I already stated, many times the media hypes things up into this monster when it's really just a coyote in disguise.) More dangerous in both cases really isn't so bad. Feral dogs generally run from people and the AHB can only fly 15 mph, people can run 30 mph on average...."


I cant read this and not reply. The media does often hype things up. The sensationalize. They report many bee attacks as africanized when they aren't. They sell... 

However, WE cant down play things to create a happy middle ground. Bees aren't coyotes. There have been two deaths do to coyotes in the last 30 years. There are multiple bee deaths each year. Fifty stinging deaths per year on average if you throw in wasps as well. Most people cant outrun them. There is no man that runs 30 mph on the entire planet. You live out in the Phoenix area with me. We get articles in the paper like this https://www.washingtonpost.com/news...eing-stung-more-than-1000-times-in-ariz-park/ all the time. 

The danger isn't severe but it is real. The varying views on this page are a great indication of the juxtapose positions we have because the issue is a real one. HOw do you measure up a human life? How does it factor into risk vs reward? We hide behind nebulous data such as: Not all of them are dangerous; They are out here anyway. We rationalize keeping them because it is good for the species because they are the "better" bee. 

In truth, I could never tell a man who makes his living from beekeeping that he shouldn't keep some hot bees at the edge of town. The man would never listen anyway. He would keep doing what he loves and taking care of his family in the best way he knows. That said, I love keeping my bees and I would tell my neighbors to kill off a hot hive.

Can we at least admit they are an issue? They present a danger, however small. And if we can admit that each of our actions either adds to or reduces this danger. An issue that requires reflective thought and perhaps some painful altruism. Painful to the tune of a lost hive, or a purchased queen, or driving an extra 10 miles to work the bees.


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## Richard Cryberg (May 24, 2013)

McBain said:


> and the AHB can only fly 15 mph, people can run 30 mph on average. The OP says: You can easily escape a 'bee attack' by just sprinting or better yet, don't throw stones into a feral colony!
> 
> 
> Understanding the risks of superficially bred dogs and the strength of undomesticated varieties, let's move on and talk bees.


You sure are happy to make up facts. The fastest man alive is Bolt. He can run a bit over 20 mph. I doubt if the average human can run more than about 7 or 8 mph. In view of all the people who can not run two steps I think that guess is high. When I was in high school I could run a quarter mile in 54 seconds which is a bit under 17 mph. You want to take a guess how many high school kids can run that fast? Or do you just want to make up facts?

Aggressive bees are just like aggressive dogs. In either case if they attack unprovoked they should be killed. If you as the bees owner refuse to behave like a responsible adult the law should step in and solve the problem of protecting society.


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## clyderoad (Jun 10, 2012)

the OP says "you and I start with two different common knowledge bases on the topic of bees"

After reading this thread and the vague attempt by the OP to learn about bees on the fly I am convinced the OP has
no common knowledge base about bees what so ever. I find it hard to believe the OP actually has bees or works for
a commercial outfit in Arizona.
Nothing adds up.


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## tanksbees (Jun 16, 2014)

Michael Bush said:


> >What are your thoughts on keeping AHB's?
> 
> If you can avoid them I would. If all the feral stock around you is AHB, I would select for gentleness. Trying to keep EHB in AHB country leads to vicious F1 crosses that are unworkable and dangerous. I think we should all keep the nicest bees we can for our area. It's dangerous to too many people to keep vicious bees.


Michael,
Can you explain why an F1 cross is unworkable and dangerous more so than straight AHB? What is the genetics behind this?

Thanks,
Mark


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## gruntworker (May 20, 2013)

tanksbees said:


> Michael,
> Can you explain why an F1 cross is unworkable and dangerous more so than straight AHB? What is the genetics behind this?
> 
> Thanks,
> Mark


I was curious about this as well. My fist hive I purchased came from a guy who creates nucs in the Mesa area. He has saturated an orange grove with Italian hives and lets his bees mate in our area. Given our native AHB I asked about this. He felt that his bees dominated that region and most of the bees would mate with his drones. This seemed reasonable even though I hear AHB drones fly faster. Shear numbers have to play into it as well. regardless he told me that his bees have been gentle and easy to work. The purchased hive was very gentle. 

He went on to tell me that first generation crosses were almost as gentle as pure italian but aggression rapidly increases second generation on. I planned on ordering more bees from him until i ordered a Mite resistant queen from cali that really seems to be mite resistant ( or weekly powdered sugar treatments are amazing) . Are first generation crosses more aggressive than 2nd or 3rd?


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## McBain (Aug 23, 2016)

WesternWilson said:


> In a recent club meeting, a beekeeper impishly informed us all that he had quietly brought in "Africanized" queens. Note that we are all urban, back-yard based beekeepers and his apiary is in a small neighbourhood filled with dogs and children.
> 
> Putting aside the issues of temperament, I know this beekeeper is hoping to come up with a bee that can run treatment free. But from what I have read about Africanized bees, you are really gaining Varroa tolerance at the cost of colony size and honey production.
> 
> ...


First off, I do not support this beekeepers actions. He should be using localized stock, not a southern variety which does not survive (to my knowledge) above Utah. This man you are speaking of has forgotten the entire reason why the AHB is doing well. The AHB does well because of it's localized climate, localized pests and localized problems. No AHB's get shipped around like our 'standard' European bees do.

Second, I'm assuming you do not have first hand experience handling AHB, correct? It has been said they require a different style of beekeeping. That style *excludes* your backyard. Everyone must have skipped over this: *AHB and backyard do not mix, period.*

Third, when using the AHB's there is no significant trade between honey production and pest protection, that I've seen. As a matter of fact, is it not possible AHB's may perform better in hot climates (where they belong) because they do not need to haul as much water back to the hive as northern varieties do? When a large percentage of your hives population is pulling water instead of nectar, you are not producing as much honey.

Third about Genetic Modification. You only need to read as far as Tom's blog to find out that the *AHB's already know how to deal with varroa.* Tom has been keeping AHB's for the past 24 years according to his site.

"I don’t really have a problem with mites—either because of the Africanized bees’ hygienic nature or because the mite cycle is always broken when they swarm. I don’t feel the need to treat for them. I remember the commercial beekeeper I worked with back in the States. He was always treating with this and that and spending a bunch of money. He had to or otherwise he wouldn’t have the strong colonies or the desired honey production. It was a lot of extra money and a lot of extra time and a lot of extra worries—I’m glad I don’t need to do that." (View Post)

*Genetic modification is unnecessary* and is potentially dangerous. Studies done at the Southern Methodist University show that fruit flies which are kept on an Organic diet live longer. Organic: Produced or involving production without the use of chemical fertilizers, pesticides, or other artificial agents. 

"RESULTS: -- the flies who ate organic generally performed better on a number of health measures.

Specifically, diets of organic potatoes, raisins, and soy were all associated with significantly longer lifespans, with no difference seen between organic and conventional bananas. Flies raised on organic versions of all four foods were more fertile.

Organic raisins, though, were outliers, associated with poorer outcomes in tests of stress and "starvation resistance.""

For thousands of past years, all living creatures have consumed fully organic diets, until recent times. Turn these results around and you get this:

"RESULTS: -- the flies who ate non-organic diets generally performed worse on a number of health measures.

Specifically, diets of GMO potatoes (approved by the USDA in 2014), raisins (one of the 'dirty dozen' for residual pesticide) GMO soy (96% of all soy grown in the U.S.A. is GMO) were all associated with significantly shorter lifespans, with no difference seen between organic and conventional bananas. (Perhaps this is because Bananas are not generally commercially sprayed... Imagine that)

Genetic modification is a dangerous game we do not fully understand. With no long term effect studies completed which would prove or disprove safety of GMO's and with all truly independent studies showing only danger and hazards, I believe staying away from genetic modification is the best option at this time. Also consider that the slimiest corporation on the planet, previously known as Monsanto before they were purchased by Bayer, is the one producing this stuff. Who's interests do they have in mind? Your interests and safety or the safety and security of their paychecks and profits? 

It is in the best interest of the GMO/Bayer industry to kill off the bees. If they kill the bees the world instantaneously becomes dependent on their self-pollinating GMO toxic products that do not need bees. If bees disappear tomorrow, their pay checks increase tenfold.


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## Richard Cryberg (May 24, 2013)

Mclian said "(Perhaps this is because Bananas are not generally commercially sprayed... Imagine that)"

Here you go making up facts again. Commercial bananas are one of the most heavily sprayed of all Ag crops. In fact the only crop I can think of that is sprayed as much as bananas is peanuts.

How about no more making up facts and confine your comments to things you actually understand? You seem to have a real bad habit of making up facts.


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## Michael Bush (Aug 2, 2002)

>Can you explain why an F1 cross is unworkable and dangerous more so than straight AHB? What is the genetics behind this?

F1 hybrids of anything tend to have a lot of vigor, hence that term, "hybrid vigor". This is because it often brings out certain traits. Those traits, in the case of bees, seem to often include defensiveness as well as productivity. This happened back when the AMM was being replaced by Italians back in the late 1800s on. Before there were any fears of "killer bees" we had a lot of feral crosses that were vicious. I ran into some doing cutouts back in the 1970s as did other beekeepers from what they say. The Midnights and the Starlines were specific lines (Starlines were two lines of Italians and Midnights started as two lines of Caucasians and later a line of Caucasians with a line of Carniolans) which had been worked out that would not become defensive when doing an F1 cross but would get increased productivity and vigor in that first cross. In these cases, often the second cross would get very defensive when it crossed with the local bees.


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## WesternWilson (Jul 18, 2012)

With all due respect, I would like to see a careful study of this phenomenon as it relates to the Africanized bees and crosses with other races of bees. 

The use of the term "vigour" as it relates to first generation out-crosses is a bit archaic. In the language of the day it simply meant to imply a lack of the lethal/deleterious gene combinations that are always a risk in highly inbred populations, rather than extra pep in the offspring. That term also applied originally to species ie. plants, that have a far more direct and simple mode of gene expression than is the case with the more complex situation with honey bees.

There is a great deal of anecdotal advice in bee literature relating to how defensiveness in bees can be a function of only one or two defensive drone fathers causing an increased rate of alarm predisposition in **some** guard bees, aka daughers of the defensive dads, who then release alarm pheromone and inspire their otherwise peaceful sisters to defensive behaviour.

That alone would explain why Africanized parentage on even one side would result in peppery colonies. The pepperiness would be hard to eradicate in subsequent generations once it appeared in the queen line, no matter what the matings down the road. And some, depending on the concentration of "hot" genes in the successful drone pool, would be more or less snarky than the original cross (no pun intended!). 

Short story, easy to breed in, tough to breed out, unlike colours in marigolds (if the local drone pool has a quotient of "hot" genes, for whatever reason).


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## Fusion_power (Jan 14, 2005)

Defensiveness is likely the result of a few dominant alleles. It is not really that difficult to breed out. My bees were excessively defensive in 2005 and even up to 2011. Today they are very manageable.


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## Nugget Shooter (Mar 28, 2016)

Interesting thread for me since a first year beekeeper and that said I currently manage 4 feral colonies along with my first two which are both Italian and see very little difference in behavior aggression wise. Little cranky during dearth, but otherwise they are what I would call calm so far. They are within 100 feet of our house and our rentals and no one has been bothered. Also we have a feral colony living in a old oil bath saw that has been there 12 years or so without ever stinging anyone on the property.

Temps are very near the same here in Morristown as in Phoenix and it rarely gets below freezing in winter. To hear the news you would think every bee in the state was AHB, but the other local beekeepers some having kept honeybees here for 30 years or more have seen few issues. Down South 100 miles it is different though and there are many more AHB colonies. I guess I will learn more as I gain years more experience and thanks for a great and educational thread.


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## WesternWilson (Jul 18, 2012)

Fusion and Nugget, agreed....if the local DCA's are clear of troublesome lines. With the current vogue among treatment free adherents for acquiring Africanized genes to gain hygienic behaviour, I am concerned DCA's in far flung places may begin to raise the snarkiness quotient area-wide. A problem for beekeepers depending on wild matings, particularly if they are urban or are selling bees into urban locations.


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## mike17l (Jun 22, 2012)

tanksbees said:


> Michael,
> Can you explain why an F1 cross is unworkable and dangerous more so than straight AHB? What is the genetics behind this?
> 
> Thanks,
> Mark


By definition, AHB are hybrids. 

When dealing with the feral bees in south Texas (assuming they are not hybrids), In my experience, there is no issue with the F1 cross. The F2 can be managed by most keepers. The F3 generally requires requeening.



Richard Cryberg said:


> Mclian said "(Perhaps this is because Bananas are not generally commercially sprayed... Imagine that)"
> 
> Here you go making up facts again. Commercial bananas are one of the most heavily sprayed of all Ag crops. In fact the only crop I can think of that is sprayed as much as bananas is peanuts.
> 
> How about no more making up facts and confine your comments to things you actually understand? You seem to have a real bad habit of making up facts.


He has pulled most everything he has stated out of a hat... His AHB experience is from a few select hives.


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## mike17l (Jun 22, 2012)

Double post


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## McBain (Aug 23, 2016)

Richard Cryberg said:


> Mclian said "(Perhaps this is because Bananas are not generally commercially sprayed... Imagine that)" Here you go making up facts again. Commercial bananas are one of the most heavily sprayed of all Ag crops. In fact the only crop I can think of that is sprayed as much as bananas is peanuts. How about no more making up facts and confine your comments to things you actually understand? You seem to have a real bad habit of making up facts.


While they are commercially aerial sprayed, *they do not contain the high concentrations of pesticides that the 'dirty dozen' items do. In addition, there are no GMO bananas*, and that is the real issue and reason for the study. 

Too bad people always focus on the mole hills and disregard the mountains. I noticed no one touched any true thoughts presented in the previous post. Help me understand why some people believe Genetically Engineered Organisms (designed by a company that would actually benefit from destroying the bee populations worldwide) actually benefits people and bees when results from truly independent sources tell us otherwise? 

*Specifically, diets of GMO potatoes (approved by the USDA in 2014), raisins (one of the 'dirty dozen' for residual pesticide) GMO soy (96% of all soy grown in the U.S.A. is GMO) were all associated with significantly shorter lifespans, with no difference seen between organic and conventional bananas.* There are no GMO bananas, therefore there should be no difference in this experiment.

I can't wait to hear how anyone can tell me how GMO's benefit bees or people. *All creatures are made out of similar cellular structures. If fruit flies die quicker on a GMO diet, is it not to be expected bees and people should also die quicker on a GMO diet? * Please tell me where I am in error. 





Richard Cryberg said:


> You sure are happy to make up facts. The fastest man alive is Bolt. He can run a bit over 20 mph. I doubt if the average human can run more than about 7 or 8 mph. In view of all the people who can not run two steps I think that guess is high. When I was in high school I could run a quarter mile in 54 seconds which is a bit under 17 mph. You want to take a guess how many high school kids can run that fast? Or do you just want to make up facts?
> 
> Aggressive bees are just like aggressive dogs. In either case if they attack unprovoked they should be killed. If you as the bees owner refuse to behave like a responsible adult the law should step in and solve the problem of protecting society.


Yes, I was incorrect about the speed of the average person a few posts back. However, I have personally outrun my own bees before so I must be an exception to the rules.

Fact check: Bolt has actually clocked in at 28 Miles per hour. If that's a bit over 20, your right. About the idea most people cannot run faster than 7 - 8 miles per hour. I jog at 7.5 so I'm sure the average person (when getting stung by bees) can surely sprint faster (unless you are confined to a wheelchair). So if most people cannot run that fast I can only accredit that to a GMO diet causing the body to decay faster than the Organic diet people have consumed for thousands of years.

'Aggressive bees are just like aggressive dogs. In either case* if they attack unprovoked they should be killed*' I agree! Thanks for saying that because it ties into the next thing I want to talk about.





gruntworker said:


> I cant read this and not reply. The media does often hype things up. The sensationalize. They report many bee attacks as africanized when they aren't. They sell...
> 
> However, WE cant down play things to create a happy middle ground. Bees aren't coyotes. There have been two deaths do to coyotes in the last 30 years. There are multiple bee deaths each year. Fifty stinging deaths per year on average if you throw in wasps as well. Most people cant outrun them. There is no man that runs 30 mph on the entire planet. You live out in the Phoenix area with me. We get articles in the paper like this https://www.washingtonpost.com/news...eing-stung-more-than-1000-times-in-ariz-park/ all the time.
> 
> ...



Yes, you are 100% right and you make good points. Bees kill far more people than coyotes. The danger is real and the danger is an issue in some cases. 


It is my personal belief that we are far beyond the point where we can reduce the danger presented by AHB's because we decide to use good European stock. The feral European stock is mostly gone from our state if not entirely gone in its original purity. Bees are different here and I do not believe we can reverse that regardless of how many European queens we import. Let me explain why I say that.

My comercial friend requeens every one of his 1500+ hives once per year minimum. So, if we are to assume that by importing thousands of European queens we can change AHB stock and make it friendly, this is a very good large scale test, correct? 

Since AHB arrived back in the day to present, this requeening process has been going on. Today, there continues to be strong AHB influences in every one of his bee yards. (I define strong AHB influence as follows: Once you are working in a yard you would die without your equipment on.) Every one of those AHB colonies has been requeened with gentle European queens but you would never know that unless I told you.

Results: Are his hives influencing the surrounding areas? Perhaps. Is it a noticeable difference in the grand picture and is it changing AHB stock to the point where it is friendly? No. Remember, this has been on going since the arrival of the AHB. It didn't change the AHB significantly back then and it still isn't really having an effect now. 


*Now with regard to the article.* I do remember when that happened up at Usery and it is very horrible to think that the guy died because of it. Now, I said in the previous reply above that I agree with this statement: "In either case* if they attack unprovoked they should be killed*". This raises the serious question: was this really an unprovoked attack? You have the right to your own view, but my view is that it was not an unprovoked attack. Let me explain my reasoning. *There are only 3 possibilities that I can see here:*

*1) It was a swarm of bees that attacked him for no reason.*

I strongly doubt this is correct because of all the times I've been inside swarms on average days:
For those of you who want more than my experience, (which, if I may add, is very valid and justifiable): http://musingsonbeekeeping.blogspot.com/2015/07/musings-about-beekeeping-with.html - Right down near the bottom.

A) I was at a park and a swarm flew through a bunch of people on the play equipment and landed on the equipment. No one died and no one was stung.
B) I was bike riding when a massive swarm flew through someone's side yard, all around me and landed on the house across the street. I was not stung and I did not die. All I could see was a cloud of bees for about 2 minutes as they landed.
C) I was bike riding again when a swarm crossed the street 500 feet in front of me and landed on a power pole. I was not stung and I did not die.
Must I go on?
D) I was in my commercial friend's yard when a swarm moved into a stack of empty boxes. No one was stung, no one died.
E) I was throwing the football in the street near my home when a swarm flew past overhead. No one was stung, no one died.

For those reasons, I do not believe this was 'a swarm of bees' that attacked the man. Agree or disagree? 

*2) It was an established hive that attacked him unprovoked.*

I doubt this is the correct answer. I have walked up to my meanest AHB hives and blocked the entrance before just to see what they would do. They do not attack and once I take my hand away from the entrance I am still not attacked. I have walked right up to feral colonies in the wild without a suit on and was not attacked. 

Think about your bees? Do they ever just up and attack you for no reason? No. It's only once you open the lid that they come out.

Although I could be wrong, I strongly doubt he was just up and attacked by this feral colony (not swarm). I don't see why the colony would waste thousands of its worker bees stinging a guy to death unless he posed a serious threat to the colony. Why there people? Hundreds of people hike the trails each day? Why would the colony chose to attack these two for no reason? It just doesn't make sense to me. 

Why do bees sting? Protection of the brood, honey and queen, correct? Why on earth would bees sting someone unless they threatened one of those items?

What else could have possibly happened?


*3) The man provoked the colony and was attacked out of defense.*

For the record yes, I did read the report which says: "Without provocation or warning, a large swarm of bees descended on both of them as they continued on the trail..." However, the police were not there at the time of the attack and they did not witness whether or not there was provocation on the part of the two hikers. This report is only the testimony of the survivor of the 'attack'. 

In a logic class I learned that when interrogating a witness, you must assess whether or not the witness has a reason to lie. Who was the only witness? His girlfriend. Does she have a reason to lie? Yes. Why? To keep the death of her late boyfriend from looking like it was his fault and making him out to be a real dummy. 

There are many different possible scenarios that could have happened. 

1) The report says it was an uninvoked attack. Basically two hikers just out of the blue get attacked by thousands of bees for no reason. By the way, I was just talking with some hikers who told me there is still a hive on that trail. I haven't seen it myself and don't know if it is the same one, but according to them there is still a massive colony on the trail. If that hive truly is dangerous why haven't more people been killed by it?
2) Bestler or Sonya threw a rock that cost a life. Simple as that. I've seen AHB colonies empty to the point where there are very few bees on the frames and that's just from taking off a couple deeps.


I was not at the scene of the crime, so to speak so I can only go by what is known: The Report says: "When Sonya alerted another hiker to the attack, the man went back to check on Bestler only to find him at the center of a thick, dark cloud of insects." 

Let's review: You're telling me an unprovoked, feral colony attacked him so viciously that when Bestler went back he found a thick cloud of attacking bees? That does not sound like anything but an AHB defensive effort to deal with a threat. 


Please don't take any of that the wrong way because I believe we should work to prevent such incidents from happening in the future. You cannot change the past, you can only learn from the past and protect the future. If people in AHB zones are better informed about the dangers of tampering with feral colonies and bees in general because of situations like this, the knowledge may just save people in the future who want to 'see what they can get away with'.






Michael Bush said:


> >Can you explain why an F1 cross is unworkable and dangerous more so than straight AHB? What is the genetics behind this?
> 
> F1 hybrids of anything tend to have a lot of vigor, hence that term, "hybrid vigor". This is because it often brings out certain traits. Those traits, in the case of bees, seem to often include defensiveness as well as productivity. This happened back when the AMM was being replaced by Italians back in the late 1800s on. Before there were any fears of "killer bees" we had a lot of feral crosses that were vicious. I ran into some doing cutouts back in the 1970s as did other beekeepers from what they say. The Midnights and the Starlines were specific lines (Starlines were two lines of Italians and Midnights started as two lines of Caucasians and later a line of Caucasians with a line of Carniolans) which had been worked out that would not become defensive when doing an F1 cross but would get increased productivity and vigor in that first cross. In these cases, often the second cross would get very defensive when it crossed with the local bees.


*
In all seriousness, isn't it interesting the changes that happen to standard European bees once they are free of human intervention? Think about it. If a bear got into your colony right now, would it recieve enough stings to flee? (I define 'enough' in this case as follows: 8,000+) I highly doubt any of you keeping standard European stock would even get two dozen stings in on a bear. 

Look at this guy dealing with a gental colony that is massive: https://youtu.be/iWiCUQlFRFA 

No suit nor gloves and he disassembles the entire thing like nothing doing. If he were a predator, he just destroyed this colony and they are doomed to death and they did nothing to stop him. The funny thing is we created this bee variety and now we cannot figure out why our bees suffer so bad from everything. If they refuse to defend against your interference, they refuse to defend against predators and they refuse to deal with pests, but boy do we get good honey production. We lose all the profits in treatments and losses, but boy do we get good honey production. 

Whenever mankind interrupts the natural cycle and makes things 'better', the only thing we do is make things way worse and then create a miniature bandaid to patch up missing limbs, so to speak. 

Instead, we should use defensive stock that deals with pests. This will not only save our colonies, it will promote a stronger variety of bee.*

Very interesting stuff, thanks for posting that.



Fusion_power said:


> Defensiveness is likely the result of a few dominant alleles. It is not really that difficult to breed out. My bees were excessively defensive in 2005 and even up to 2011. Today they are very manageable.


Just out of curiosity, can you define excessively defensive and very manageable for me? 

- Thanks. 



mike17l said:


> By definition, AHB are hybrids. When dealing with the feral bees in south Texas (assuming they are not hybrids), In my experience, there is no issue with the F1 cross. The F2 can be managed by most keepers. The F3 generally requires requeening.
> 
> He has pulled most everything he has stated out of a hat... His AHB experience is from a few select hives.


AHB are most certainly hybrids that have been *surviving without treatment for 59+ years.* 

I'm just using very simple logic to figure all of this stuff out. Simple logic: Naturally in the wild we see feral colonies thriving while our domesticated (view video above) hives continue to die at an ever faster rate. If you don't like my experiences, perhaps listen to beekeepers with tones of experience who agree with me: http://musingsonbeekeeping.blogspot.com/2015/07/musings-about-beekeeping-with.html

I can't be the first person who has thought of this stuff and I am most certainly not the best educated nor experienced beekeeper. If I knew all the answers, I would not be asking questions on Beesource, I'd be selling books. = ) 

Thanks for all the replies and I can't wait for more responses.


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## Michael Bush (Aug 2, 2002)

>Instead, we should use defensive stock that deals with pests. 

If we all did that we would soon see beekeeping outlawed.


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## mike17l (Jun 22, 2012)

McBain said:


> Yes, I was incorrect about the speed of the average person a few posts back. However, I have personally outrun my own bees before so I must be an exception to the rules.
> 
> Fact check: Bolt has actually clocked in at 28 Miles per hour. If that's a bit over 20, your right. About the idea most people cannot run faster than 7 - 8 miles per hour. I jog at 7.5 so I'm sure the average person (when getting stung by bees) can surely sprint faster (unless you are confined to a wheelchair). So if most people cannot run that fast I can only accredit that to a GMO diet causing the body to decay faster than the Organic diet people have consumed for thousands of years.


Or the old, or young, or sick, or injured, or fat, or whatever. Because you can Bolt can outrun bees, does not mean everyone can. Especially if there are obstacles in the way.




McBain said:


> It is my personal belief that we are far beyond the point where we can reduce the danger presented by AHB's because we decide to use good European stock. The feral European stock is mostly gone from our state if not entirely gone in its original purity. Bees are different here and I do not believe we can reverse that regardless of how many European queens we import. Let me explain why I say that.
> 
> My comercial friend requeens every one of his 1500+ hives once per year minimum. So, if we are to assume that by importing thousands of European queens we can change AHB stock and make it friendly, this is a very good large scale test, correct?
> 
> ...


No one would argue that AHB can be pushed back by using more EHB queens. I have said it before, AHB are unpredictable. They can be mite resistant or not. They can be good honey producers or not. They can be gentle or not. They cannot be predicted, especially in newly occupied areas, such as the United States. EHB are predictable. I know what I will get every time I open the box.






McBain said:


> *Now with regard to the article.* I do remember when that happened up at Usery and it is very horrible to think that the guy died because of it. Now, I said in the previous reply above that I agree with this statement: "In either case* if they attack unprovoked they should be killed*". This raises the serious question: was this really an unprovoked attack? You have the right to your own view, but my view is that it was not an unprovoked attack. Let me explain my reasoning. *There are only 3 possibilities that I can see here:*
> 
> *1) It was a swarm of bees that attacked him for no reason.*
> 
> ...


Keeping AHB promotes this. If you intentionally keep AHB, you are at fault. This cannot be said any other way. I have seen swarms attack people. I have been the first responder to an attack by a swarm on a 92 year old woman. I have seen AHB colonies attack unprovoked. It happens. At the very least, it takes minimal provocation for an attack. Again, they are unpredictable. They may be hunky dory one day, and the next day you walk 10 feet away and they come boiling out. They are unpredictable. They are unpredictable. They are unpredictable. Do I need to say it again?





McBain said:


> AHB are most certainly hybrids that have been *surviving without treatment for 59+ years.*
> 
> I'm just using very simple logic to figure all of this stuff out. Simple logic: Naturally in the wild we see feral colonies thriving while our domesticated (view video above) hives continue to die at an ever faster rate. If you don't like my experiences, perhaps listen to beekeepers with tones of experience who agree with me: http://musingsonbeekeeping.blogspot.com/2015/07/musings-about-beekeeping-with.html


How many hives do you have again? How long have you worked with AHB? How many AHB removals have you done? 

Stick with people who have done this before. 4 hives is anecdotal at best. 

Yes, I read your link. Did you? He said he would rather have EHB, but it is impossible in Honduras. It is not impossible anywhere in the US. 




McBain said:


> I can't be the first person who has thought of this stuff and I am most certainly not the best educated nor experienced beekeeper. If I knew all the answers, I would not be asking questions on Beesource, I'd be selling books. = )
> 
> Thanks for all the replies and I can't wait for more responses.


You have been given answers, but they do not agree with the minimal evidence you have experienced in your 4 hives. 




I will add, because you fail to comprehend. AHB are unpredictable, well except their swarminess. You can count on AHB to swarm or abscond. A colony that swarms or abscond often doesn't produce honey. They can in Honduras because it is tropical. Most of the US isn't tropical, we have seasons. Seasons mean short times to produce. Swarmy bees don't produce.




Michael Bush said:


> >Instead, we should use defensive stock that deals with pests.
> 
> If we all did that we would soon see beekeeping outlawed.


Yup.


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## WesternWilson (Jul 18, 2012)

Putting aside debates about genetic engineering (which I wish they would do on Varroa...) and land speed records, can we agree that AHB introductions into urban areas, particularly those which do not presently suffer from AHB incursions, are unwise?

There are several treatment free beekeepers in my area, and I have also seen this in bee chat boards and heard it at club meetings, that are interested in acquiring AHB bees out of a desire to keep bees that have "Varroa tolerance". What is often missing from that discussion is any mention of the drawbacks in keeping AHB, namely their defensive nature, their propensity to swarm, and attendant low yields of marketable bees and honey.

What is the point of gaining perceived Varroa tolerance at the cost of everything else we keep bees for?

I would like to see the beekeepers eager to spread AHB genes around stop and think a bit. I would much rather they participated in local breeding programs selecting from the best performing European bees in their area, focusing on good temperament, vigour and productivity.


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## Richard Cryberg (May 24, 2013)

Now Mclain makes up more facts. He claims bananas are not a GMO crop. Guess what. THERE IS NO SUCH THING AS A WILD BANANA. Bananas are totally unable to cross breed with their ancestors and are totally unable to produce seeds that will reproduce another banana. They can only be propagated vegatatively. Their wild ancestors are only eaten after being cooked as uncooked they are inedible by normal people. Bananas are by any definition of GMO a man created Gentically modified organism. They are actually fairly easily genetically modified organisms to create in the lab.

PLEASE stop making up facts.

Bolt probably can run 28 mph for the last ten meters of a 100. For the whole 100 meters he runs a bit over 20 mph.

Only a fool keeps highly aggressive bees that require a full suit to work all the time. The only reasonable thing to do with highly aggressive bees is kill them or requeen with a gentle queen. Requeening is generally more work than worth the effort so cyanide is generally the proper answer.


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## Michael Bush (Aug 2, 2002)

>Now Mclain makes up more facts. He claims bananas are not a GMO crop. Guess what. THERE IS NO SUCH THING AS A WILD BANANA. Bananas are totally unable to cross breed with their ancestors and are totally unable to produce seeds that will reproduce another banana. They can only be propagated vegatatively. Their wild ancestors are only eaten after being cooked as uncooked they are inedible by normal people. Bananas are by any definition of GMO a man created Gentically modified organism. 

Only by your definition. Not "by any definition". Most people use the term GMO to distinguish between simple selective breeding (not GMO) and inserting genes from a different species (GMO). By that definition (the most commonly accepted one) bananas are NOT GMO. So please don't say "by any definition" when it is only by YOUR definition. You are apparently trying to destroy the entire purpose for HAVING a term for things that have had genes spliced into them so you can pretend that it's nothing new, when it IS something new. Muddling up the meanings of terms does not contribute to a discussion about the things referred to by that terminology. Selective breeding is not GMO. GMO is not selective breeding. One cannot have a discussion about GMO if you take away the meaning of the term and pretend they are the same thing. Selective breeding does not modify genes. It selects for genes that are already there. GMO inserts genes that were not already there.


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## Richard Cryberg (May 24, 2013)

Bananas were not developed by selective breeding.


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## Michael Bush (Aug 2, 2002)

>Bananas were not developed by selective breeding.

Of course they were. They are now propagated by offshoots, but at one time they were propagated by seeds and they were bred to be what they are from genes supplied by the bananas, not by genes from some other species. Hence they are NOT GMO.


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## Richard Cryberg (May 24, 2013)

Michael Bush said:


> >Bananas were not developed by selective breeding.
> 
> Of course they were. They are now propagated by offshoots, but at one time they were propagated by seeds and they were bred to be what they are from genes supplied by the bananas, not by genes from some other species. Hence they are NOT GMO.


1. Do you do realize that you have tens of thosands of cells in your own body that carry DNA, integrated into your chromosomes, that did not come from either of your parents? That DNA experiment was done by horizontal DNA transfer between species with your body as the recipient. Every human has such cells. And every such integration is a brand new experiment that has never been tried before by mom nature. Exactly the same types of DNA insertion can be done in the lab by a variety of techniques. There is no way at all to determine how that DNA transfer was accomplished by simply looking at the DNA sequence. So, YOU are a GMO product. As is every living human. In most cases, but not all cases, this horizontally transferred DNA is not in the cells that make sperm or eggs in animals so those GMO experiments die when the individual dies.

2. You are simply wrong about bananas being developed by man thru selective breeding. That is not where bananas came from originally. You must do DNA manipulations of the ancestor to make bananas and this DNA manipulation can either be done in a lab or done by accident by mom nature. There is absolutely no way to tell if the accident was done in the lab or by nature.

3. Bananas must be propagated vegatatively as they do not produce seeds. Just like your body has cells with horizontally transferred DNA incorporated into the chromosomes so do bananas. But, unlike your body in bananas those GMO modifications are transmitted to the clones produced by vegatative propagation.

4. Your definition of GMO is an organism that contains DNA derived from other species. Bananas are such organisms and thus according to your definition are a GMO crop.

This is all really simple high school level knowledge stuff. I am surprised you seem to not know it.

By the way, cattle are also GMO products according to your definition. A full 30% of the DNA in cattle is a result of horizontal transfer from snakes. So, the next time you eat a burger feel comfortable you are also eating snake.


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## razoo (Jul 7, 2015)

The way I understood it, GMO includes _*any*_ form of modifying the genes using genetic engineering techniques. 
"Transgenic organism" is a specific type of GMO that inserts genetic material from an unrelated species. So the first mouse whose genes were modified by inserting foreign DNA material into its embryo is referred to as a "transgenic mouse"
This is different to the broader definition as typically GMOs are organisms whose genetic material has been altered with or without the addition of genetic material from an unrelated organism.


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## JWChesnut (Jul 31, 2013)

The attached is a much better review of banana cultivation than the competing rants without citations.

http://www.promusa.org/blogpost363-Who-s-breeding-bananas


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## JWChesnut (Jul 31, 2013)

Richard Cryberg said:


> Only a fool keeps highly aggressive bees that require a full suit to work all the time.


I am fairly certain the infamous Dee Lusby hives meet this criteria. Even the always self-promoting Solomon Parker came away from his first encounter with the Dee Lusby bees last February announcing he would never permit those bees in his apiary. The online reports of that "conference" described folks running away fearing for their lives.


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## Michael Bush (Aug 2, 2002)

>The attached is a much better review of banana cultivation than the competing rants without citations.

Rants? Really? About bananas? I didn't see any. We are having a discussion about terminology, specifically the term "GMO" in the hopes of facilitating the ability to have a discussion about GMO. I don't really care about how to cultivate bananas since they don't grow here...

>I am fairly certain the infamous Dee Lusby hives meet this criteria.

And I'm fairly certain they don't. At the old place in Tucson she had thirty or so hives scattered around the yard. None of us wore gear and we walked within two feet of most of them just going from the house to the workshop etc. Now you start throwing boxes around without the use of smoke, and they get pretty defensive... we worked a lot of hives the first time I visited for two weeks and I never saw Dee or Ed put on a pair of gloves...


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## JWChesnut (Jul 31, 2013)

Michael Bush said:


> None of us wore gear and we walked within two feet of most of them just going from the house to the workshop etc.


Your loyalty is quaintly heroic
.
Every other online reference to the Lusby bees remarks on their extreme agressiveness.
The online reports had Sam Comfort climbing into protective gear, and remarking its the first time ever they've seen him get frightened of a set of bees. Solomon Parker's response to encountering these bees for the first time is especially tellling. 

Bush want's us to "believe" many impossible things.

The hives that are always visited on these tours can be easily geolocated on Google Earth. 31.694867°N -111.273679°. These have not been rearranged in a decade. On the ground video shows them as tumbledown, rotting boxes. 

Southern AZ boxes, unmanaged for a decade, will requeen with feral bees. Southern AZ ferals are Africanized. 

Interestingly, most of the other Lusby apiary locations (from pre-2006) have quietly vanished from Google Earth. This indicates the Lusby reports of the hives coming down with CCD, and third party reports of loss of colonies are likely accurate, and the apiary count has shrunk to residual levels.


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## Riverderwent (May 23, 2013)

1. I know a lot more about banana propagation than I did two days ago.
2. Overly aggressive bee colonies, whether European or AHB, should be killed or requeened.


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## Barry (Dec 28, 1999)

JWChesnut said:


> easily geolocated on Google Earth. 31.694867°N -111.273679°.


That's 31.594867°N


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## Nugget Shooter (Mar 28, 2016)

Just for the record I live in Central AZ in the desert North of Phoenix and we have 6 active hives, 4 are colonies of feral bees which are much smaller size wise (bees) than our 2 colonies of Italian bees. That said our smaller feral bees are no more or less aggressive than the Italian bees here in our yard and we also have a colony of feral bees in a old saw that has occupied it for 13 years also non-aggressive and in a carport in a row of rental cabins and they got me interested in beekeeping actually.









Media here would have people believe all our local honeybees are "killers" and just waiting to attack because drama sells. There are many beekeepers in our area both commercial and hobbyists seeing few if any real AHB issues, though further South there are occasional verified cases. Funny how sometimes folks reading articles can be so sure of things when those living here are not experiencing it. Funny how that works....

Not arguing anything or trying to be a know it all, but like most others we can work our bees without gloves or being attacked by mobs of angry bees. We simply wear a suit and use smoke when working inside the hives with bees quite calm except during dearth....


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## gruntworker (May 20, 2013)

McBain said:


> Yes, you are 100% right and you make good points. Bees kill far more people than coyotes. The danger is real and the danger is an issue in some cases.
> 
> 
> It is my personal belief that we are far beyond the point where we can reduce the danger presented by AHB's because we decide to use good European stock. The feral European stock is mostly gone from our state if not entirely gone in its original purity. Bees are different here and I do not believe we can reverse that regardless of how many European queens we import. Let me explain why I say that.
> ...


Alright i cant keep commenting here but I'll wade in one more time. First Kudos to your friend who apparently purchases and re-queens 1500 hives from out of state sources. I would love to talk to him about it if possible. If he has a web site or company name I would love to get in touch with him and ask him a few questions. Is it Dan Punch by any chance? If you asked me if he has an effect on the environment I would say, "yes". He undoubtedly dilutes the area of pure African genetics. What that means I don't know but I would guess nobody real knows as there are too many variables to even guess at. At the very least he isn't sending out 100's of dangerous swarms out into the environment every year. Maybe his efforts saved a life! Who knows the ripples of effect that stem from from his choices? They are currently studying what signs or smells a European hive gives of to cause an African hive to usurp control. If the answer turns out to be a simple one like a natural oil that may mimic or bolster a certain pheromone then hopefully his work will be even more effective.

I have to admit I don't like your response to the article. Ill add that I chose that one because of the guy was a younger hiker and I imagine he runs faster than the average human even if he wasn't a great athlete. You offered some anecdotal 
evidence about your personal experience and then a possible character attack (throwing a rock at a hive). It wasn't malicious and I have no doubt you believe it. I think, however, that when a death is involved and you have emergency personnel on hand with a responsibility to protect the public, the truth would come out. I'll offer my own anecdotal evidence to the contrary. I have gathered a number of docile hives that were most likely Africanized when i gathered them. That said, I was in home depot 3 years back and they had a shed in the garden area. I saw a couple hundred bees in or around the shed. There was no hive. There was no cluster. My guess is that they were scouts and that the swarm was going to arrive soon. They immediately started to slam into my face and pursued me as i left the area. Home Depot moved the shed inside and the swarm never arrived. No hive. No honey. Aggressive bees in early spring.

That's the gist of this whole topic for me. They are aggressive and unpredictable. If you have to keep them, keep them. If you don't you shouldn't. Even the article you referenced is embedded with 14 stories of bee attacks. Why? If you don't have to keep them... why? You aren't helping them adapt. you aren't perfecting the genetics in the area. You have 5 hives that you could re queen for less than $200 with mite resistant bees from a close source. They will swarm less and those swarms will be less dangerous. Guys like us don't have to. We earn our money from another source. I love the hobby as I am sure you do. I realize we have arguably domesticated bees. That we have created a symbiotic relationship (perhaps another relationship ... commensalism perhaps). During the process we have stopped some of the changes that result as a reaction to the environment. We have done this because the new environment is ours. They have to live with us; our kids, our wives, our pets. We have made dogs because wolves eat our neighbors.

I just want everyone to govern their actions with their intellect and not their emotions. I have to admit that i don't like that you keep them. My own beliefs factor in. I hope you are on the edge of town and nobody is around to receive an off swarm. I don't generally have strong emotional reactions to peoples actions when the effects of those actions are most likely nominal. As a family man with 3 jobs and a kid with medical issues I will most likely stop posting in this section. It is not a good use of my time. I would still love the contact of that bee keeper though. 

Good luck


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