> Researchers hype as bad at times as the media!

What did researchers actually say 20 years ago? I think the following shows a very level headed realistic picture:

QUOTED MATERIAL:

Brazilians found a way to use Africanized bees for the intended purpose: to strengthen their beekeeping industry. Initially many beekeepers abandoned the craft. But the Brazilian government embarked on a campaign to teach potential beekeepers how to cope and to instruct the public about how to avoid the bees and handle attacks. 

Now a new generation of apiculturists has emerged. Indeed, in some parts of Brazil that were once· unable to sustain European honeybees, people earn their livelihood through keeping Africanized bees and harvesting their honey.

The potential of Africanized honeybees to hybridize successfully with European honeybees is good news for beekeeping. We anticipate that frequent requeening of commercial colonies and drone flooding in commercial queen-breeding areas would serve to dampen the acquisition of unwanted African traits. 

We should note, though, that there are dissenters who contend that hybridization efforts will fail to prevent the eventual widespread introduction of dramatic African traits into honeybee populations. These observers hold that Africanized bees will inevitably come to dominate in regions that initially show signs of hybridization. Our evidence does not support that view. 

Africanized Bees in the U.S. 
Thomas E. Rinderer, Benjamin P. Oldroyd and Walter S. Sheppard
SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN December 1993

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