Hello Mike and All,
Thanks to Mike Allsopp from all of BEE-L!  I was hoping a person with your
experence would step forward. I especially appreciate your honesty as I know
you are a friend of Dee and Ed Lusby as I hope I still am.
I agree with Mikes posting on all but a couple minor points not worth
talking about really.

If we on BEE-L get lucky maybe Barry Sergeant and Lardus Erasmus might give
their opinion  on those points.

Dr. Kerr felt that to create a *Super scut bee* he would have to remove the
scut from South Africa. The thinking caused the release in Brazil.

The Apicrown joint venture  proves to me that in hypothesis Dr. Kerr was
right about the  *scut* having  the material to be  a  super bee. maybe a
scut with SMR genes  is the answer.

Sadly varroa is alive and well in both scut and capensis colonies in South
Africa.  Both have survied this long (in my opinion) by swarming away from
varroa when mite loads reach the threshold level.  Small cell size has
little to do with controlling varroa with African bees in my opinion and
apparnetly Mike  Allsopp, Barry Sergeant and Lardus Erasmus feel they same
way if I correctly understand their postings on BEE-L.

 However all of us agree that the Lusbys bees are  suviving  varroa  and the
reason why is important.

For those on BEE-L which did not take the time to read the African Bee
briefings  I will add that  for the last 20 years , full time scientist
(biochemist) and part time  major beekeeper Lardus Erasmus  has been
breeding queens  of South Africa. Barry Sergeant is part of the project.

The project is called Apicrown and an open invitation was made to all
attending Apimunda in South Africa to visit and observe the queens. The
original source for the queens were  wild scuts (talked about in the
briefings)  about 20 years ago.

I believe Lardus and Barry wrote the African Bee briefings together. Barry
may have written the first bee briefing himself but I am sure Lardus helped
with the second as he signed his name at the bottom.

Sincerely,
Bob Harrison