To the List:

Tim Vaughn has brought out some vary valid points in his response to an
earlier post in this thread.  I suggest that one takes Mr. Vaughn’s views
a few steps further and look at what has happened in Argentina and the
south of the Equator side of South America where the Africanized honey bee
(AHB) has tried very hard to become the dominant honey bee in that neck of
the woods.

The result has been that AHB is ubiquitous in tropical and semitropical
environs, a more temperate zone where European honey bees (EHB) and AHB
are intermingled and coexist, and last where the AFB does not exist except
in intermittent instances resulting from importation with the help of
mankind and the imported EHB is “queen of the hill”.

The Russian honey bee is an EHB and although it was found in a colder
climate than most places of the lower 48 mitochondrial polymerase chain
reaction-DNA (PCR-DNA) testing confirms its origin as largely European and
is a potpourri of many subspecies of Apis mellifera.  AHB, Apis mellifera
scutellata is a horse of a different environment, a semi-tropical/sub-
Sahara Africa that evolved in warm arid areas of east Africa (ABJ, July
2002, p. 482).  EHB and AHB are of two different ecotypes.

Within a few days the April issue of the American Bee Journal will arrive
with Part I of an article that I have penned. I caution all who may jump
at a conclusion such as that given by the earlier post in this thread.
Part II of the article should appear in the May issue will deal
specifically with the future of AHB in North America. I cannot let any
more cats out of the bag at this time other than to suggest that you read
both articles before deciding validity of the thesis.

Respectfully,

Chuck Norton
Norton's Nut & Honey Farm
Reidsville, NC

Home of www.sourwoodhoney.com

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