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Hi all
 
I have been following this thread with interest.  I would add to Michael
Reddell's comment that I read in one of Brother Adams's books that the
agressiveness of worker bees in a hive is predominantly determined by their
fathers, i.e. the drones that the queen mated with.  Indeed most breeders
select for gentleness (among other traits), but if the queens are
open-mated the first generation (F1) will most llikely react per the genes
of the less controlled source.
 
If that queen is used to produce daughter queens, then those daughters have
the gentleness of their mother and the unknown of their father in equal
probability.  I also remember from the same book that it is only the F1
generation that shows this tendency to predominantly inherit agressiveness
from the drone.  Hence, later generations inherit predominantly from THEIR
father's not their grandfathers in preference to their grandmothers.
 
I ask David Eyre and others to add to this and/or correct.  David, do you
do anything to saturate your mating area with drones with desirable traits
for open mating?  And thanks for your recent posting on an easy method of
queen rearing.
 
... george