State Steps Up Tests to Isolate Killer Bees

SACRAMENTO — Although conceding that the threat from Africanized honeybees is not as serious as first thought, state Food and Agriculture Director Clare Berryhill on Wednesday ordered stepped-up testing of commercial hives in a 400-square-mile quarantine area of Central California.

The program, which involves taking bee samples from each of an estimated 9,200 commercial hives in the zone, was ordered in the hope of isolating the ill-tempered killer bees that are believed to have emerged from a single colony found last month in an oil field 45 miles northwest of Bakersfield.

As soon as the sampling and testing is completed, Berryhill said beekeepers will be required to move their hives elsewhere. That will permit officials to more easily locate and destroy all wild bee colonies there and in a larger, 7,850-square-mile area around the discovery site.

“We want to make darn sure that no hives are moved out of there that possibly have been invaded by the African bees,” Berryhill said. He added that the testing should be completed within three months, although he cautioned that the estimate may be optimistic.

Bee experts say a complete series of tests on a sample of 50 bees can take as long as 30 hours.

The Africanized bees in Kern County are believed to be an isolated colony brought into California in oil drilling equipment shipped from South America. The bees are a genetically altered species accidentally released in Brazil in 1957 and have been migrating northward ever since. They are expected to arrive in the United States in substantial numbers by 1989. The fierce insects are considered more dangerous than domestic bees because they are easily excitable and attack in swarms, although their sting is no more venomous.

The Africanized bees also have been blamed for agricultural losses elsewhere because they are prone to displace domestic varieties and are not as efficient in pollinating crops or producing honey.

Berryhill’s plan for dealing with the killer bees is generally in line with recommendations made Tuesday by a state-appointed panel of bee experts who played down the seriousness of the situation, asserting that the negative characteristics of the insects will disappear as they mate with far more numerous docile bees in surrounding commercial hives.

Those experts said they already have seen evidence of that change in the underground comb where the Africanized bees were discovered.

Berryhill, who initially described the situation as “mind-boggling” and “a hell of a serious problem,” said Wednesday that he is “pretty much convinced” that the scientists are right.

“I didn’t even understand before that these bees would interbreed,” he said. “I’m not the expert in the field and you have to rely on your scientific people that their knowledge is sound.”

Several members of that advisory panel had been working with Berryhill from the beginning. But he said a consensus about the reduced threat was not reached until they met for the first time on Tuesday.

Until now, a team of 25 scientists and other state agriculture officials have been testing commercial hives in the quarantine zone only when the bees appear to exhibit more aggressive behavior typical of the Africanized variety. Thus far, scientists said, they have not positively identified any Africanized bees outside of those in the underground hive where they were first discovered.

Members of the scientific advisory panel told Berryhill that it would not be necessary to test bees from every hive. But beekeepers and members of a state apiary board asked for complete testing to be absolutely sure that their hives are free of the alien insects.

Of particular concern to beekeepers are a variety of mites often associated with the Africanized bees that are capable of killing whole colonies of domestic bees. Those mites have not been found on any of the Africanized bees taken from the original comb.

Some of the beekeepers also want the state to be more aggressive in hunting down and destroying wild bee colonies in the quarantine zone and in a vast territory surrounding it. Wild bee colonies are considered more likely to breed with Africanized bees.

While Berryhill agreed to expand the wild bee search to a 7,850-square-mile area, he said the state does not have the resources to lay traps on that large a scale and will have to rely on reports from residents of unusual swarm activities. “It would be a nightmare to cover that kind of an area,” Berryhill said.

Once found, the wild bees and any Africanized bees identified by scientists will be killed using Resmethrin, an insecticide recommended by the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

Beekeepers in the area appeared generally satisfied with Berryhill’s order, although some said their hives are filled with honey and soon will run out of room unless the state allows them to remove it immediately.

Food and Agriculture officials late Wednesday said they would attempt to work out a certification process that would allow honey to be removed from the quarantine area before the testing is completed.

‘An Excellent Plan’

“I think this is an excellent plan that sounds very logical and practical,” said Jeff Sampson, president of the Kern County Beekeepers Assn. “Until we establish over a longer period of time that (the quarantine area) is clean, why leave your hives there to possibly become infested?”

Exaggeration of Threat

Sampson said he was convinced all along that the threat posed by the single colony was exaggerated but that it would spur the state to do something in advance of the expected arrival of killer bees from South America at the end of the decade.

Roberta Schram, who owns 1,777 hives in the quarantine area, said she expects to suffer some financial loss in relocating her hives but conceded that testing and moving the bees is far more acceptable than destroying all the commercial apiaries in the area.