Irish Amm

[Jon]

Phil, I never remove the attendants and I have introduced hundreds of queens with attendants present. It makes no difference.
The problem with removing them is that a lot of people panic and let the queen out by mistake. Or they decapitate her with the sliding part of the cage!
The cage should be introduced with the fondant at the bottom.

[The Drone Ranger]

I was going to say something about choosing attendants but first can anyone tell me if the queen in this picture could be AMM
The more observant may notice she was DOA
Actually she arrived still able to move but being trampled by 7 or 8 workers in the cage
These attendants!!! appeared to have only their own interests a heart and couldn't give a monkeys about feeding her
The moral of the story is don't buy a pig in a poke
Or beware of Greeks bearing the latest fashions
Photo below

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[The Drone Ranger]

[fatshark]

Gavin has written a guide to identifying Amm (PDF). It doesn't distinguish between worker and queen colouration.
However, I'm sure she's too pale. The Amm I've had were a whole lot darker than that.

And a whole lot more alive

[Jon]

Definitely not Amm. They can vary from brown to black but any yellow is a sure sign of hybridisation or maybe you have a different subspecies there.

This is what they look like

[busybeephilip]

DR, from the image that Q looks more Italian/buckfast. With black bees sometimes you get some spots of yellow on the first abdominal segment at the sides but are usually hard to spot... err see. Jons image is typical of Amm