The addition makes 157 counties in Texas now quarantined for Africanized honey bees, according to the Texas Apiary Inspection Service, a unit of the Texas Agricultural Experiment Station.

Samples of wild bees collected from Kent and Swisher counties were sent
to the Texas Honey Bee Identification Lab in College Station and confirmed
as Africanized, according to Paul Jackson, chief apiary inspector.

In Kent County, the bees were found in an abandoned air tank by a residence west of Jayton. In Swisher County, the bees were found at a home near Kress. Bees were not found in Stonewall County, but it was added to the quarantine because bees had been found in every county surrounding it.

Jackson said the quarantine allows beekeepers to move beehives within, but not out of, the zone in an effort to prevent assisting the spread.

Africanized honey bees look just like regular domestic honey bees but are more defensive in protecting their hives, according to Jackson.

The Africanized bee was first detected in the United States near Brownsville in October 1990. Africanized honey bees also have been found in Arizona, California, Nevada and New Mexico.

Other counties included in the quarantine are: Aransas, Atascosa, Austin, Bandera, Bastrop, Bee, Bell, Bexar, Blanco, Borden, Bosque, Brazoria, Brazos, Brewster, Brooks, Brown, Burleson, Burnet, Caldwell, Calhoun, Callahan, Cameron, Cochran, Coleman, Colorado, Comanche, Concho, Coryell, Comal, Cottle, Crane, Crockett, Crosby, Culberson, Dallas, Dawson, De Witt, Dickens, Dimmit, Duval, Eastland, Ector, Edwards, Ellis, El Paso, Erath, Falls, Fayette, Fisher, Fort Bend, Frio, Gaines, Garza, Gillespie, Glasscock, Goliad, Gonzales, Gregg, Grimes, Guadalupe, Hamilton, Harris, Harrison, Haskell, Hays, Henderson, Hidalgo, Hill, Hockley, Hood, Hudspeth, Irion, Jackson, Jeff Davis, Jim Hogg, Jim Wells, Johnson, Jones, Karnes, Kaufman, Kendall, Kenedy, Kerr, Kimble, King,
Kinney, Kleberg, Knox, Lampasas, La Salle, Lavaca, Lee, Leon, Liberty,
Limestone, Live Oak, Llano, Lubbock, Martin, Mason, Matagorda, Maverick,
McCulloch, McLennan, McMullen, Medina, Menard, Midland, Milam, Montgomery,
Navarro, Nolan, Nueces, Parker, Pecos, Presidio, Reagan, Real, Refugio,
Reeves, Robertson, Runnels, San Jacinto, San Patricio, Scurry, Schleicher,
Shackelford, Somervell, Starr, Stephens, Sterling, Sutton, Tarrant,
Taylor, Terrell, Throckmorton, Tom Green, Travis, Upton, Uvalde, Val
Verde, Victoria, Walker, Waller, Ward, Washington, Webb, Wharton, Willacy,
Williamson, Wilson, Young, Zapata and Zavala.

For information about honey bees on the Web, try http://honeybee.tamu.edu/