A year ago USDA CSREES (Cooperative State Research Extension Education Service) awarded a $4.1 million grant to a group of university researchers for the express purpose of solving the current honey bee health problems confronting the beekeeping industry. Without actually nailing it down, this was a project to look into the current Colony Collapse Disorder malady and, over four years, find out what was going on. But at the same time the grant was to fund an extensive education program for beekeepers, and to develop as much information as possible so beekeepers could keep their bees healthy, and had a place to go for questions ... and answers. Moreover, 25% of the funds were to go to study non-apis pollinators, such as bumble bees, alfalfa leaf-cutting bees and the like. To date, this is the only government money to be distributed to beekeeping researchers to study this problem other than normal budgetary funds to keep the USDA projects up and running.

So what’s happened in a year? I’m glad you asked, because I wanted to know too. So I ventured to the University of Georgia in Athens to visit with Dr. Keith Delaplane, the leader of this large and varied group studying this large and varied problem. ...

read more

comment | permalink | print | email |

share

reddit digg Del.icio.us facebook newsvine stumble What is share?

The USDA and the Apiary Inspectors Of America released the results of their annual colony loss survey in late May. Perhaps you saw or heard about the release. This is the third year this survey has been done and a comparison of the three years is enlightening. Unfortunately each year the surveys keep getting more sophisticated, better timed, and have a more focused population. Thus the results are better each year, with more and better data, but it is difficult to compare apples to apples. Nevertheless, we’ll try.

The first, the 2007 survey reported an overall 31.8% loss during the winter and into the spring. That was all beekeepers reporting all losses. That means that nearly 757,000 colonies died in the U.S. that winter because there were 2.442 million colonies in the U.S. that year. Of these, 45% were lost, according to the survey respondents, to Colony Collapse Disorder. That comes to about 340,000 colonies lost to CCD that first year, or, 14% of U. S. bees died of CCD.

In 2008 the survey showed there was an overall loss of 35.2% of the U. S. colonies over winter, or nearly 860,000. That’s up 10% from the previous year. Of these 29% died from CCD, according to the published numbers, or right about a quarter million lost to CCD. That was a downward trend, which was encouraging, if you can think that losing a quarter million colonies is encouraging.

This spring’s survey showed that roughly 29% of the 2.3 million managed colonies were lost overwinter ...

read more

comment | permalink | print | email |

share

reddit digg Del.icio.us facebook newsvine stumble What is share?

Here's a thought on the current status of Colony Collapse Disorder. Long ago...well, just over 50 years ago or so, but not too far away from where I am now, a group of University and USDA Honey Bee Scientists gathered to study a problem that had been plaguing beekeepers in all parts of the country for a couple of years. Beekeepers were complaining that they were finding colonies devoid of bees, gone, empty and barren, and nothing was left behind to give a clue as to what had happened. Quick research showed that this wasn't a new problem, and indeed had occurred quite a few times over the years...well, over the years that people had been keeping records about such things.

By the time the scientists had been rallied to do something by concerned beekeepers the situation had already gone on for a couple of seasons and was heading into the third. They wanted to meet it head on for the third year to see what could be done. Of course by the time they got together it was plain that the problem was abating...and in fact it was difficult to find samples to study.

One of the scientists was heard to say that it was a real task to study what they were calling disappearing disease, because every time they got together to study it..."the damn thing disappeared."

This spring, the damn thing seems to have disappeared again. We've looked at why we think this is the case, and, indeed, beekeepers have gone a long way in improving how they keep bees healthy. Better nutrition management, cleaner homes for the bees to live in, safer mite controls being used by beekeepers and of course many of the bees and beekeepers that were susceptible to whatever it was are gone.

Late last week a press release was issued by the White House

read more

comment | permalink | print | email |

share

reddit digg Del.icio.us facebook newsvine stumble What is share?

From the perspective of probably every beekeeper in the U.S., the first day of spring, 2009, should be one of the most memorable in decades. It was on that day that Michelle Obama announced that not only would there be a garden on the White House lawn, the first since FDR was in office, but there would be, yes BEE HIVES!

The chefs at the white house are looking forward to cooking with locally grown fresh vegetables (and sharing what they can’t use with the local food banks), and being able to use honey in some of their recipes. Honey produced right outside their kitchen door.

Mrs Obama readied the garden plot on the first day of spring with the help of a couple dozen local fifth graders. They worked to remove the sod and loosen the soil in preparation of planting of the spring crops. The L-shaped plot will contain year-round vegetables once completely established, with vegetables, berries and other tasty edibles. All will be raised organically.

To complete the garden, two bee hives will be ...

read more

comment | permalink | print | email |

share

reddit digg Del.icio.us facebook newsvine stumble What is share?

Once a year the National Agricultural Statistics Service, an arm of the Department of Agriculture, counts beehives, how much honey was produced from those beehives during the previous 12 months, how much honey was left from the year before, and how much beekeepers sold their honey for. At the same time they survey honey prices at the wholesale and retail levels and adjust the overall price according to how much was actually sold. Thus, the wholesale price, which is always lower, has a greater influence on the overall price than the retail price which is always higher, but sells less in total amounts. By far the most honey used in this country is used in the baking and industrial markets...think Honey Nut Cheerios, or honey roasted peanuts for instance, and this honey is captured in the industrial sector.

When you read about the precipitous drop in the number of colonies in the U.S. in the past several years, this is where all those numbers come from....

read more

comment | permalink | print | email |

share

reddit digg Del.icio.us facebook newsvine stumble What is share?

I'm often accused of being overly optimistic. Sometimes that's true. It is today. I listened to those with their heads on straight, with long experience in the field, with years of scientific background ... and they all said basically the same thing. And I even looked at the evidence myself, listened to the bees, watched them fly. The experts said they were in good shape, the bees looked like they were in good shape, and the beekeepers said things were going the way they used to go ... just fine, thanks.

But Colony Collapse Disorder strikes most often right about now, and up until right about now things were going just fine. Finer, in fact than in years. I, in my optimism, listened to all of the experts and all of the beekeepers and even saw all of the improvements ... better nutrition, fewer mite-controlling chemicals, cleaner hives, less pesticide exposure. And it looked good. Really, it did. Or at least it did on the west coast. Mostly, the bees out there were doing fine. And with fewer trees and more bees, suddenly it sounded like the days of old ... the wild, wild west once again.

But it's those east coast bees that that didn't get the message I guess. Florida bees, strong only weeks ago, one operation went from nearly a thousand colonies to a handful ... only 50 or so ... in a mere three weeks. 1,000 to only 50. That's a loss of about 50 a day, two an hour 24 hours a day for three weeks. ...

read more

comment | permalink | print | email |

share

reddit digg Del.icio.us facebook newsvine stumble What is share?

I've made the comment that beekeeping has changed more in the last two years than in the last 20, and every day that comment becomes more and more clear. Beekeepers that suffered extreme losses from Colony Collapse Disorder did one of three things:

• They quit
• They didn't do anything, and then they quit.
• They changed what they were doing, and are still around today.

More changed than didn't, and that means they are still around today.

But beekeepers that didn't suffer from Colony Collapse Disorder, or had only a touch of the plague, made changes too, and they are still around and in fact are doing well and growing. Those changes have been huge in terms of what they have managed to do with the number of colonies they have, and even more so in terms of the paradigm shift in colony management techniques.

What's different, you ask? We've mentioned this before but it really bears repeating because it has made such a difference. Probably the major shift has been in how beekeepers monitor for, and control varroa mites in their colonies. Better techniques are being used to find and count mite populations, and safer and kinder techniques are being used to control those mites. This is good because mite populations don't build up to lethal numbers, lots of mites aren't able to pass along destructive viruses, and the control agents previously used are no longer building up inside the colony.

Beekeepers are feeding their bees more food when food is scarce, feeding them at a more appropriate time in the season, and feeding them better food. All have contributed to better wintering, better buildup, and healthier colonies.

Generally, beekeepers are more attuned to the routines of keeping their bees healthy from all of the problems bees are prone to. Individually these pests and predators have been a bane, generally, on our bees, and combined they have contributed far more than the sum of their parts.

So, we have more bees this spring. More bees than for the last 3 years it seems. It's still a bit early to sound the trumpets, but I'd suggest warming them up to declare a holiday from trouble ... so far, anyway. And it could turn again. That's how it started ... bees looked good in late January, then crashed and burned and burned and burned in February that first year. But right now, as one big beekeeper says, "most beekeepers are pretty well pleased with their bees this year. You hear of an occasional beekeeper who's having problems but nothing like last year." And losses of 2% (compared to 35% last year) aren't uncommon. One contact close to the situation was quoted as saying there were as many as 100,000 extra colonies in California right now ... but that is expected to drop as weak colonies (and there are always weak colonies) are culled. So with more beekeepers having more bees ... California almonds right now are, and you read this here first ... "over-beed."

read more

comment | permalink | print | email |

share

reddit digg Del.icio.us facebook newsvine stumble What is share?

I've just returned from the American Beekeeping Federation's Annual meeting, this year held in Reno, Nevada. It was held at one of the casinos there, which is a strange place to put 400 or so beekeepers, but that's what they did.

As with most of these operations, they force you to walk through the slot machine part of the first floor to get to almost everywhere...the elevators, the restaurants, the other entrances. They make it hard to avoid the lure of easy money.

During the day, when customers were less obvious it wasn't too distracting...the smoke was at a minimum and the noise, though noticeable, wasn't overwhelming. But in the evening when customers were everywhere...at the blackjack tables, the poker tables, and especially sitting, drinking, and smoking at many of the slot machines...the noise was fearsome. What with the whirring and whistling, the bells ringing and machines clunking and clanking and dinging...as I traveled through this cacophony of noise to get to the elevators it seemed as if I was walking through a huge cloud of mad bees, randomly swirling, madly buzzing and everywhere around me. As I moved across the room, coming closer to some sudden source of loudness, then moving away from it, the swarm of mad bees seemed to wax and wane around me...attacking, retreating, moving with me and away from me, above me and below me, all at the same time. It was an odd sensation that was not at all pleasant. Needless to say the lure of jackpots, free drinks, and clouds of smoke was lost on me. Nor did I see many of the beekeepers willingly give their hard earned money away. Perhaps they heard the mad bees too....

read more

comment | permalink | print | email |

share

reddit digg Del.icio.us facebook newsvine stumble What is share?

It's getting difficult to trust the safety of anything coming out of China anymore, isn't it? You’ve read on this site about a variety of products that were made in China ... toys, pet food, milk and the like, all of which have been found to have been manufactured using products or chemicals that are just plain dangerous. It's a long list and stretches back years before they started reporting about them here.

For most of those years beekeepers in the U.S. have been aware of problems with some of the Chinese honey that’s been imported into the U.S. And lately, beekeepers have known about Chinese transshipping, which is sending Chinese honey into the U.S. from a second, or even third country to avoid having anybody know it was originally from China. The Chinese exporters transship it through other countries to avoid paying tariffs and to reduce suspicion that it was contaminated with antibiotics, a problem common with Chinese honey.

Customs officials and FDA have occasionally intercepted loads of this not-so-sweet product that they knew had problems but their actions have gone mostly unnoticed. And the companies that imported the funny honey and have the honey confiscated are never identified. Why is that, do you suppose?

Anyway, over the New Year’s Holiday, the Seattle Post Intelligencer, a Hearst-owned newspaper (like The Daily Green), released the result of a multi-year, multi-state, multi-country, multi-agency investigative report on this problem. Andrew Schneider, the PI reporter put together a series of articles that outlined the problem, the players, and the results of illegal, contaminated honey entering the U.S. And in the process he resurrected a phrase beekeepers have known for years – laundered honey. Moreover, he detailed the techniques used ...

read more

comment | permalink | print | email |

share

reddit digg Del.icio.us facebook newsvine stumble What is share?

You can’t find a cure until you know what the symptoms are exactly, and now, finally, we do.

We’ve mentioned Jerry Bromenshenk here before. He’s involved in more projects than most and has even more on the back burner waiting for some of his time. He’s been involved with Colony Collapse Disorder from the very beginning, and has kept his nose to that grindstone ever since. He and his colleagues at the University of Montana, the U.S Army’s Edgewood Chemical and Biological Center, his own company Bee Alert Technology, and BVS, Inc. have ferreted out an amazing amount of information on this Disorder. Not yet the final answer, but they are much closer to understanding the problem than even a few weeks ago.

One windfall of all of this is that they have figured out how to examine honey bee samples for essentially every disease and problem that has been documented and do it rapidly and inexpensively. This service is just coming online for beekeepers and it will be a boon for them without question. Already this is showing beekeepers what management procedures are effective in both the short and long run, thus enabling them to make cost effective, efficient and healthy decisions regarding how they manage their bees.

Already the beekeeping community is more aware of the best management practices over time to combat the worst of the regular pests and diseases bees have, and this year, it appears so far anyway, the almond orchards should have an ample supply of bees for pollination. Of course it’s only late December and bees are fickle, fragile creatures ... and in bee time, it’s a long way to February.

These discoveries ...

read more

comment | permalink | print | email |

share

reddit digg Del.icio.us facebook newsvine stumble What is share?

Like swallows to Capistrano, or the geysers in Yellowstone, the predictability of seedless mandarin orange growers and beekeepers banging heads in December is becoming very, very predictable. It was almost exactly a year ago to the day that we first discussed this situation but here’s a short recap if you didn’t read it then and don’t want to read all of that past stuff now.

Beekeepers in California have been placing their beehives in the citrus belt part of the state forever. They stay for three to four weeks making orange blossom honey, building up, getting fat and sassy, enjoying the good life. Citrus growers benefit some from this arrangement with increased yields, but citrus trees tend to be pretty self sufficient with or with out bees, so the growers don’t mind much. And the bees and the beekeepers have been pretty happy with this arrangement. There was, as I understand it, some time ago, disagreements over pesticide applications and bees in the groves (citrus plantings are called groves, not orchards for reasons I don’t know, but if you do, fill us all in), but they have been resolved and bees pretty much go where they want, when they want.

Until recently. ...

read more

comment | permalink | print | email |

share

reddit digg Del.icio.us facebook newsvine stumble What is share?

The USDA Animal Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) hasn't, as far as I know as of Sunday, made a decision on whether to allow Australian honey bees to continue to be sent to the U.S. or not. We reported on this issue a few days ago when it finally came to light that it was the worst kept secret in two hemispheres that a new species of honey bee had been discovered in Australia as long ago as May, 2007. That bee, Apis cerana, is otherwise known as the Asian honey bee. We have what is known as the European honey bees.

Now there's not really a problem with this bee in and of itself. They are smaller than our European honey bees, and they are pretty easy to tell apart. Except there's this trade contract we have with Australia that says that if they have it, they can't send bees to the U.S. It's that simple.

What the U.S. is really worried about is not these new bees so much as the pests and predators that come along with these new citizens of that country. What viruses, diseases and other nasties lurk within is what everybody is worried about ... well, there are some other issues. Like, what is Australia doing at all its other ports to make sure this won't happen somewhere else; what is the beekeeping industry in that area; how are the captured bees being analyzed and for what problems; and how confident, really, are the Australians that they have contained the spread of this new bee? ...

read more

comment | permalink | print | email |

share

reddit digg Del.icio.us facebook newsvine stumble What is share?

Note: As this post is "going to press," as we used to say, The Beekeeper has heard that the USDA will ban bees imported from Australia. The information hasn't yet been substantiated.

Last time I alluded to the fact that pollination could be imported.

"Impossible," you say.

"How could it be?," someone asks.

"Not a chance in h***," I hear.

Wrong, all wrong. The U.S. has imported pollination from off shore for the past 3 years or so. Really.

Here's how that works. ...

read more

comment | permalink | print | email |

share

reddit digg Del.icio.us facebook newsvine stumble What is share?

The United States normally consumes somewhere between 400 - 450 million pounds of honey each year, but produces between 150 and 200 million pounds. This year's crop will be in the 150 – 175 million pound range when all is said and done. Just so you know, five years ago a 240 million pound crop would be considered normal.

Some fraction of U. S. produced honey is used in the less expensive, somewhat generic tasting industrial market – Honey Nut Cheerios for instance. We use about three times as much industrial honey as table honey ... maybe even more. We import a significant amount of industrial honey.

Table honey, by comparison, is a good tasting, high quality and more expensive product. Table honey is generally produced from more common and popular floral sources such as clover, basswood, orange blossom, alfalfa and the like, and certainly the exotic varietal and artisan honeys qualify here. But we don't produce enough for that top end market so we also have to import table honey from various countries also.

This overall reduction in honey production is due to a variety of factors but certainly includes fewer beekeepers focusing on this aspect of their business. Rather, they are putting most of their efforts into the more profitable, but more difficult pollination business, and production of table honey, thus not competing with less costly imported honey in the barely profitable industrial honey market. Then there are the continued losses each year due to varroa mites, pesticides and colony collapse disorder. As a result of reduced domestic production a couple of things have happened, one of which is that, happily, the price of table grade honey has increased substantially due to reduced supply but continued demand. Interestingly, this has caused some beekeepers to again look at increasing their production of that of honey rather than push their bees through the pollination grist mill again ... because beekeepers can be flexible to some degree the scene is always changing.

Overall however, domestic production for both table and industrial honey is slowly declining while demand for both of these products continues to gradually increase, especially for industrial grade. To make up the difference imports – no surprise - are increasing. ...

read more

comment | permalink | print | email |

share

reddit digg Del.icio.us facebook newsvine stumble What is share?