MS NBC Reports "The angry Africanized breed of bees is gradually colonizing
Los
Angeles County."
 
Is this the truth or more hype by one reporter to sell news to the large
population of the LA area?  Years ago a report in a national daily said that
the dreaded T mite had been found in California bees. It was false but
prophetic as within a year T mites had been found in California bees which was
no big surprise to any one who has made any effort to study the 3 or is it
4 so
called acrine mite pests of bees. The report on angry Afro bees came with the
story of a desert beekeeper who had a hive of bees get out of hand after he
disturbed them and his response was to flail at the attacking bees with a tree
branch which resulted in the bees stinging he and his wife 100 times before he
took shelter in his house. I believe this is still an isolated incident and
could have happened with any race of bees and has happened in the past.
 
One must be aware that bees at this time of year in that area have always been
notorious for being on the tooth but this fact will never be advanced as the
fact as his bees in the past have passed the test for having the dreaded AFRO
genes which may or may not have anything to do with their aggressive behavior
as some would suggest that have experienced keeping bees in this and other
similar areas of California, and other So. Western States including Northern
Mexico where all bees are aggressive compared to what you would consider the
norm.
 
Anyone who has worked bees in some of our more exotic late summer and fall
nectar flows here in California knows that there are times when bees are
indeed
more aggressive and special care must be taken or they will indeed get out of
hand and punish the beekeeper and any bystanders, this has nothing to do with
their ancestors but is an environmental condition found in doing desert
beekeeping all over the US if not the world.
 
Here in California we have been blessed with the diversity of our bees over
the
last 100 years with bee stock brought into our gene pool in the past from all
over the world including African bees from Africa. Some remnants of these
population can still be found in secluded areas from boarder to boarder in all
shades of breeds not only from Africa, but bees from Greece, the Caucus,
Italy,
and even Egypt which may still be part of Africa so I have been told. Others
will look you in the eye and tell you all of these bees which are mostly but
not totally part of our feral population have all been killed by vampire
mites.
If this was true then its time to open our boarders to new importations
because
it is apparent that in the past our diverse populations of bees is what
contributed to the successful management of all honeybees
including their behaviour. The dilution, if you believe, of the bad bee genes
may have been dependent on their presence.
 
Some Bee Scientists (BS) must believe today as in the past a few good queens
are being tested but as in the past these efforts are so feeble compared to
the
scope of the problem as to be totally ineffective in solving any problems
other
then giving a few bee breeders a leg up on value added marketing. This has led
to a chemical dependency in the bee industry but so far no one has suggested
any chemicals to control the AFRO bees other then those intended to kill them
and as no DNA test considers the bees behavior and its impossible to
distinguish aggressive bees from non aggressive bees by any know regulatory
test in use today  then their solution is to make them all dead including the
feral stocks that could improve bee behavior.
 
I am sure we will see more stories on bees in our press, and most will not be
positive but it is not the time to give up and walk away from keeping bees and
in fact it may be the time for grater involvement in keeping bees at least
until your bees kill your family pets, kids, and neighbors, God forbid. Then's
when I would say we should all bow down before the BS artists that have
predicted our bad end, many on our social payroll without providing the
solutions we have paid them for, which is what you should expect with the
incestuous relationship between science and regulation as practiced here in
the
American Republic.
 
ttul, the OLd Drone
 
Follow the bee news at:
http://beenet.com/bnews.htp
 
 
 
 
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(w)OPINIONS are not necessarily facts. USE  AT OWN RISK!