Since Dee frequently admits all their hives are open mated queens (virgins
are dropped into hives in the field), there does not seem to be any possible
way for their bees not to have a large majority of AHB genes.  Like AHB,
her's resist varroa, are small, black bees that draw smaller comb. Like
capensis (and unlike scuts), her bees have a high instance of thelytoky,
which she selects for (thereby increasing the capensis like traits in her
bees). Her bees also have a "unique" wing vein morphometry, different from
so-called "US bees" in that there is an extra vein (haven't seen this in
person, but read numerous posts of hers on this subject). As to african
genes, they have been in the US (just not so called AHB genes) for many
years, originally brought into the Louisiana labs.

Of course, there are several in her area that collect swarms (collecting
quite a bit in AHB removal money) and relocate the bees into hives out in
the desert, so her's would not be the only AHB in captivity in the state.

As to your hypothesis, considering all the surrounding evidence, it makes a
much less complex scenario that some mystical bee that has survived in the
wilds of Arizona the last several hundred years (longer in Dee's accounts,
as she thinks it is a "native" bee, dating from prior to the European
arrival in the New World). When you have two different hypothesis and the
facts favor both, the less complex hypothesis is always the one to be
preferred (wasn't that in science 101?)

K. Oland

-----Original Message-----
From: Bob Harrison

Dr. DeGrandi Hoffman SAID all bees of Arizona should be considered
Africanized in her talk. With all due respect how can Dee and Ed Lusby run
around 800 hives in the Tucson area and  say their bees are not africanized?

...

My hypothesis is not  as glamorous sounding a hypothesis as this old race of
mystical bees exist which posses thelytoky triaits and  are imune to all the
problems  of todays beekeeping.