I think Brother Adam defined locally adapted in his work and writings. The first criteria at Buckfast was over-wintering Bond style. He worked with many races of bees including those that could not survive his climate. Some of these were bred into the Buckfast line and their progeny are still thriving in harsh wet winters.

Breeding criteria included build up at the correct time of year for his climate. Another was "thriftiness." Bees that reduced population after flow and before cluster. And a number of other genetic traits.

He might have had one great advantage in that races were more pure in his day. When he crossed X with Y, he knew to expect Z. The pure races tended to breed consistently. Today our bees are more mixed.

One could argue that breeders are good or bad at what they do, but not that breeding for a specific environment isn't possible.

We have two major types of beeks today; stationary and those who travel one circuit or another.

Many transients produce bees from almonds early in the year for sale to stationary hobbyists and side-liners. The production of bees is a function of fecundity and doesn't equate to honey production. Ligustica is not a particularly 'thrifty' bee. Of course most of our Italians aren't pure enough to join the mafia. They tend to be 'mutts'. Some will say "My Italians don't over winter with too large a cluster. They don't eat up their stores."

Mutts! And most of our mutts have Italian blood. A productive but un-thrifty race.

I expect that there are some good breeders and some less skilled and knowledgeable. I don't for a second doubt the possibility of locally adapted bees.

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