Hi all

You should be able to access photographs of pedigreed AM scutellata
at the following web address:

http://www.algonet.se/~beeman/za/za-1.htm

The tens of thousands of bees in the hive are, of course, so-called
African killer bees. The human in the pics is, fortunately, far from dead.

These pictures were kindly taken by P-O Gustafsson, who was out in
South Africa from Sweden to attend the recent Apimondia meeting.

The pedigree scutellata queen in the pictures was instrumentally
inseminated. One of the results of a seven year closed breeding
programme, she was photographed happily laying an egg in comb
exposed to open air.  As pointed out in the captions to the pics, this
line of pedigreed scutellata has been upsized to produce a worker cell
around 5.2mm. These bees are docile, and outproduce wild/feral
scutellata by at least 33%. As such, it may be stated that these are
probably the most productive honeybees in the world. None of the
bees you see in the pictures have been treated for any pest/disease
whatsoever, be it varroa or anything else.

There are other pics of South African beekeeping at:

http://www.algonet.se/~beeman/

Just click on pictures, and then South Africa, etc.

Best regards to you all

Barry Sergeant
Kyalami
South Africa