It may seem strange me putting in a bit from down under but for what it is worth.

We in Australia have been very conscious that we could get Africanised bees (insert killer bee if you must) here in Australia.  Our contingency planning was on the basis that a swarm may come on a ship and that swarm could start the ball rolling.  So one queen, the start of an invasion.

One year, Dr. Robert Page was invited to one of our beekeeping conferences and several of us had a specific meeting with him to discuss the threat of Africanized bees.

He said that in Brazil, there was a program in place where queen or cells, I forget which, where breed off the imported African bees and distributed to beekeepers around.  So when the "escape" happened, there were already many hives headed by Africanised bees in the area to provide a ready source of drones.  

So he assured us that if we got one swarm in Australia, the dilution factor would be at hand and we would not have any problems such as was the case in Brazil.

Also with the Africanized bees, I have been told that what happens is that the small swarm alights on a hive of European bees, waits till dark, moves in and kills the European queen and the Africanized queen in the small swarm takes over the hive.  Hence it becomes Africanised.  I cannot remember who it was but I remember at the time that I thought it very creditable because of the person telling the story.

Also I have read of importations of Africanized queens into the USA .  I seem to recall it was an article by Steve Taber.  Maybe someone who know Steve could check with him.

Trevor Weatherhead
AUSTRALIA

www.superiorbee.com.au