[log in to unmask] ++++ Hi all I have been following this thread with interest. I would add to Michael Reddell's comment that I read in one of Brother Adams's books that the agressiveness of worker bees in a hive is predominantly determined by their fathers, i.e. the drones that the queen mated with. Indeed most breeders select for gentleness (among other traits), but if the queens are open-mated the first generation (F1) will most llikely react per the genes of the less controlled source. If that queen is used to produce daughter queens, then those daughters have the gentleness of their mother and the unknown of their father in equal probability. I also remember from the same book that it is only the F1 generation that shows this tendency to predominantly inherit agressiveness from the drone. Hence, later generations inherit predominantly from THEIR father's not their grandfathers in preference to their grandmothers. I ask David Eyre and others to add to this and/or correct. David, do you do anything to saturate your mating area with drones with desirable traits for open mating? And thanks for your recent posting on an easy method of queen rearing. ... george