Garth asked about stingless bees in Australia. Our most common one is the Trigona family. It is a social bee that is a little smaller thn a fly. It produces honey but it is not to my liking. The main reason, I believe, is that the Trigona do not have comb as such but honey pots. They make these pots out of a mixture of wax and propolis and I think the strong taste is from the propolis. I am sure that beekeepers who are used to that strawberry clover honey I saw in the Peace River country that went 4 on the pFund (Albertians will probably tell me that was a dark sample) would definitely not like the Trigona honey. There is niche market in Australia for it. The craze at the moment is "bush tucker" i.e. food from native plants and Trigona honey is in this league. The Aboriginals here in Australia used to call the honey from the Trigona "sugar bag". Honey from feral Apis mellifera hives was "white man's sugar bag". People are starting to box the Trigona and then later on split the hive to make two colonies and so on. I have been to several lectures on the Trigona and find them very fascinating. If anyone is interested in the boxing technique, it was published in the Proceedings of the Second Australian and International Bee Congress held in Australia in 1988. Hope this is of interest Garth. Trevor Weatherhead AUSTRALIA