Hello all,
After reading the article *Killer Bees live calmly in U.S.* by Thomas Ropp I
feel i need to set the record straight. http://beesource.com

Please realize i only want to set the record straight and have spent many
hours finding the article which started the whole senario.
To make a long story short around 1976 rumors were ciculating in bee circles
Africanized bee semen was intering the country. Yes my friends the story the
story was true BUT what was being imported was semen carring a new mutant
gene(Ac). Because the semen was comming from the infamous (Dr. Kerr) wild
stories run wild. The gene(Ac) was sent into the U.S. safely through a
process called BACKCROSSING>
Quote Steve Tabor & Dr. H.H. Laidlaw:
repeated backcrossing of subsequent generations to a line will in 4 or 5
generations virtually eliminate the genes of the line that is being
backcrossed to another. This is as true for backcrossing A. adansonii onto
Italian as is the reverse. By selecting one gene for propagation,in this
case (Ac),the gene might be said to be "genetically washed"by repeated
backcrossing to the yellow line. The one gene and only very few associated
genes would persist. Since Dr. Kerr had allready backcrossed the (Ac) gene
onto Italian stock for several generations before i recieved it, IT IS
INCORRECT TO SAY I IMPORTED A.adansonii, or even the "africanized bee'.
To read for yourself and do away with the old myth.
American Bee Journal March 1977 volume 117 no.3
Page 152 The African Bee in Louisiana by Stephen Tabor 111

page 153 The Importation of Semen from Brazil into California
by H.H. Laidlaw U.of C., Davis

Bob Harrison comments;
African bees are painted with a broad brush when in fact according to
Ruttner (1975) there are three major groups with 12 african races of bees.
 A.m scutellata stands above the rest in traits not aligned with normal
beekeeping. All african bees were under the heading of "adansonii' when the
release came in 1957. Even in 1977 when the above was written. I was allways
under the impression A.m. scutellata was what was released in 1957 but many
are not reporting the A.m.scutellata color pattern in Texas and Arizona.
They talk in Texas of AHB being a dark color. In my opinion i am beginning
to wonder if we are looking at decendents of the black races of African bees
instead of the decendents of A.m.scutellata. Many of the dark races were
even used in Brother Adam's breeding program.
The name scutellata was given to bees of south africa by Lepeletier(1836)
evedently refering to the conspicious YELLOW scutellum. A.m.scutellata is a
small bee with scarce pilosity,variable pigmentation on the abdomen(one or
more YELLOW bands) mostly a BRIGHT YELLOW SCUTELLUM on the thorax and a
charactoristic wing variation. IT HAS COMMOM FEATURES WITH APIS MELLIFERA
CAPENSIS BUT IS EASILY DISTINGUISHED FROM ALL OTHER RACES(DuPraw,1965)
Hopefully there are not any A.m.capensis in the U.S. so ID  of the AHB in
Texas & Arizona if A.m.scutellata shouldn't be overly difficult i would
think.
OK Texas and Arizona beekeepers which have first hand experiance with AHB
are the AHB bees you are working with black or as above?  Researchers?.
Sincerely,
Bob Harrison