Hi Peter & Chris

> No, I was wrong. A. m. m. and the others (carnica and ligustica) are
> about the same size. Tropical Apis mellifera tends to be smaller. All
> the African types tend to be smaller than the European ones.

This is too general a statement to be useful...

Each of the races has a range of cell sizes that it can use or 
accommodate to. Each range is represented by a 'normal distribution' 
bell shaped curve. The curves for each racial type overlap considerably. 
This is further complicated by the curve for AMM being of greater range 
than the others, to the extent that it almost encompasses the curves of 
the other races.

The centres of the curves are represented in the Eva crane cell size 
figures that can be found in Bee-L archives under the subject heading 
'Cellsize...More Information' message 033035.

One of my gripes about the usefulness of FABIS is that the upper range 
for AHB overlaps considerably with Ligustica and the lower portion of AMM.

Now on top of this comes the conjecture...

I am of the opinion that the wide range exhibited by AMM is actually 
caused by two subsets of genes that perhaps ought to be considered as 
different sub races. I have no proof, all I have is an ever growing 
suspicion based on two types in each category of behaviour being found 
among stocks that are already well documented as to pedigree.

Similar to the authors of...
Phylogeographical autocorrelation of phenotypic evolution in honey bees 
(Apis mellifera L.)
I am of the opinion that we will find out a lot more about this subject 
over the next few years, I am not worried whether I am right or wrong, 
but I would like more concrete answers than we have at the moment.


Regards & Best 73s, Dave Cushman, G8MZY
http://website.lineone.net/~dave.cushman or http://www.dave-cushman.net
Short FallBack M/c, Build 6.02/3.1 (stable)

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