Definitely bee temperament changes from day to day, time of day, year to time of year, no question. If it is a cloudy day, there are more bees at home, same as if you go in a hive early in the morning, late in the afternooon. Sunny day, less bees around the colony for us human to deal with. Think about it. You will find it makes perfect sense. When they have honey saved, they are going to defend it, if there are yellowjackets (I hate yellowjackets, I am on a death mission of these nasties) and other predators, they are defending.
When you think about bee behaviour, it is logical, very logical, put yourselves in their place and see then what you think, they have a very similar world to ours, in many ways.
I worked my 8new colonies last week (4 packages, Kona Italian queens, 4 nucs, Kona Italian Queens, my old overwintered colony (now a crossbreed of Carniolan/Italan probably). Not one sting, all very calm and just doing their own business. Beautiful sunny day, 1:00 PM to 4:00 PM.
I sustained a sting at the very end of the event. On my ankle, just a little bee that had crawled up my foot and got stuck in the cotton of my sock. Not her fault, she thought my ankle was hurting her by not letting her go (she didn't realize that it was kind of a fuzzy thing and her legs probably got stuck in the fabrice, the poor little thing, I felt so bad).
I had not worn gloves, only used baby powder and reapplied that a few times.
I do not like to wear gloves. Gloveless I can feel even when I come close to touching a bee. AND I always look very closely before I put down my fingers or hands that a bee is not in the target area.
Gloves are clumbsy and when you squish a bee, then you are in for it. The alarm phermone is released and the bees are "on guard" and you're gonna get it for sure. My thoughts, take it for what it is worth, hopefully more than two cents :roll: Have a beautiful day, a great life, love your life and live it well. Cindi