Africanized Killer Bees arrive in Orange County!

Now I have been hearing that the killer bees were on their way here since 1980, and I must say: those warnings were rather frightening to an eight year old. It would seem that everyone forgot all about them over the last 10 years...everyone except the bees, who were slowly making their way here. To little fanfare, they attacked last week. Nobody noticed, except for this small blurb in the Orange County Register. According to this article, they've been here since 1999. I had no idea.

Wednesday, August 18, 2004 Santa Ana bees were Africanized

Thousands of bees that boiled from a massive hive in Santa Ana last week were Africanized bees, state tests showed.

State agricultural officials performed DNA tests on the bees, which stung more than a dozen people after children threw rocks at their hive in an apartment building wall. A four-block area was cordoned off Aug. 12 while firefighters doused the estimated 120,000 bees with water. Bee exterminators followed up later.
Orange County was declared fully colonized by Africanized bees in 1999. County Agricultural Commissioner Rick LaFever said the bees' DNA is checked only after multiple-sting incidents. Africanized strains are more aggressive than domestic bees.

– Pat Brennan

I wonder if they eat mosquitoes.