I have a single colony of italians in the backyard and would like to set up at
least two more hives this spring.
 
The current queen is going into her second year and late last year the workers
were more hostile than normal.  I was thinking of replacing the queen in the
existing hive.
 
I have always had Italian honey bees.  Since I am considering re-queening the
existing hive and getting a couple new hives as well I was contemplating
getting a different type of bee.
 
Looking at the catalogs I note that there are several types available.
Caucasian
Midnight
Starline
Double Hybrids
ARS-Y-C-1 Carniolan
 
Being an Italian focused beekeeper for many years I was wondering if it might
be a good time to try a different strain.
 
Would you be able to give me a quick run down about the different types of
honey bees that are commercially available; their temperaments, honey
production, resistance to disease, etc. - compared with Italian's?
 
If you send answers to my personal; address ([log in to unmask]) I
will collect all the responses and send a single DIGEST message to the list of
the results.
 
Thanks!!!
jeff