During the first week of March, a vicious group of bees swarmed a house at Baird - killing a dog and causing a family to flee their home. The line of bee traps that many motorists may see while traveling the Albany Highway between Abilene and Albany in Shackelford County are part of a precautionary effort to determine if some Africanized bees have moved farther northward than earlier thought. Africanized bees were first detected in the United States near Brownsville in October 1990. Since then, the bees had been thought to have spread through roughly the southern half of Texas.
Africanized bees look just like regular honey bees, but they are highly aggressive.
The Texas Apiary Inspection Service keeps a close tab on the bees. State bee inspectors continue to monitor a series of bee traplines that extend across the state - including the ones north of Abilene. E.W. Scripps Publications , All Rights Reserved. Site users are subject to our User Agreement . We also have a Privacy Policy .