A few years ago, I sat in on the AIA meetings.  At that time, the  debate 
by the states revolved around:
 
1) How do we detect AHB, what measure do we use?  There are several  
methods, but most take a fair amount of time and the costs add up fast,  and
 
2) Do we come down aggressively on any suspected colonies, eliminating them 
 - and have a lot of mad beekeepers who will say, our bees were ok;   OR
3) Do we only eliminate the worst colonies - and have someone get stung,  
die, and have the family sue us for failure to protect the public?
 
Since AHB are hybrids, that vary as to the degree of Africanization, one is 
 looking at a sliding scale.
 
Glad I'm sitting in the middle of a state with real winter.  That  might 
help. With luck, we will dodge the bullet.
 
 
I've gotten myself in trouble joking that Montana ought to advertise -  
eliminate AHB, bring your colonies to MT for the winter, pick up what survives  
in the spring.  Assuming AHB is cold intolerant (which may not be true), we 
 could let our cold eliminate the AHB's. 
 
That's consistent with the hypothesis put forward by Bill Wilson when  
Disappearing Disease hit MT, WY, and the Dakotas some decades ago.  He  traced 
the losses to bee lines produced experimentally using sperm imported from  
Brazil.  Wilson concluded that this yielded a genetic defect - the AHB bees  
vacated the hives in winter.
 
Jerry

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