Re: Racial differences among bees. I think the term race should be dropped altogether, but especially with bees. There are certain types, with characteristics, but actually, great differences occur between hives, so I would hesitate to attribute characteristics to "type" rather than individual colony. Unless you have a lot of experience with one type and can compare this with equal experience with another, I would avoid such generalizations. There are very few pure types any more, and there are a lot of hybrids with distinct characteristics, like the "Russians" or the "African Bees". If you study biology, you know that terms like species, sub-species, variety, type, are debated endlessly. With molecular biology looking for genetic differences between these categories, the water seems muddier than ever. pb