Ingredients:

Main
3-3.5 lbs of short ribs
3 cups of diced potatoes
2 cups of diced carrots
Green onions (optional), thinly sliced
Toasted sesame seeds (optional)

Sauce
1 red apple, cored & chopped (I used a honey crisp)
1/2 onion, chopped
1/2 cup beef stock
1/2 cup soy sauce, regular (kikkoman)
1/4 cup brown sugar
2 tbsp honey
1 tbsp minced garlic
1 tsp sesame oil
5 whole black peppercorns (optional)

Thickener
2 tbsp corn starch (or potato starch)
2 tbsp water

Directions:

Rinse the bone-in short ribs under cold water, mainly around the bone area to remove any bone fragments. (If you have some time, you can soak in cold water for 10 minutes while changing water a few times.) Gently pat down the ribs with some paper towels. Or you can leave the bones IN, for added flavor. Totally up to you!
Pre-heat a large skillet over medium high heat and place the ribs. Brown all sides for about one minute. Transfer them into the slow cooker crockpot as they finish.
Blend the sauce ingredients in a mixer or food processor until smooth. Pour over the meat. Add the potatoes and carrots. Close the lid and cook for eight hours on low heat. (You could cook for five hours on high heat if you’re short on time, but I find that it results in less flavorful and less tender meat.)
30 minutes prior to the end of the cooking time, make the starch thickener by combining the water with the starch flour. Whisk well and pour it into the slower cooker. Turn the heat to high and simmer for the remaining time.
You can serve over rice or, as is. Garnish with green onions and/or toasted sesame seeds. Enjoy!

Indoor beehive storage buildings designed for beehives now house nearly a million beehives. Over 400,000 of those hives are stored in Idaho alone. A new building recently opened in Laurel, Montana. New buildings opened in Idaho and North Dakota in 2021.

87% of perhaps two million hives pass through Truckee California bug station annually. That is over 4,000 loads of bees going through one lane at one bug station, with two overwhelmed Pest Exclusion agents, ledgering every single load of bees.

In 2019, a pilot project to pre-inspect beehives in the originating state was introduced. The idea is to expedite passage through Truckee. The idea is to minimize the traveling publics exposure to loads of beehives stacked up, sometimes 12 trucks deep. The idea is to alleviate the two overwhelmed inspectors from donning hat, veil, and flashlight – lifting nets, peering into loads [sometimes well after dark or prior to dawn] attempting to detect fire ants, hive beetles and weeds and field debris. Both pre-inspected and uninspected loads wait their turn to present paper work, to be legered. The idea of pre-inspection is to address these bug station clusters when a swarm of bee hauling semis arrive…and swarms of semi’s bottleneck at Truckee.

This is especially important now; from January 10 to February 10 about 2,000 of those 4,000+ loads pass through the Bug Station. One unintended consequence of the current pre-inspection program is that drivers of these pre-inspected loads wait their turn with other loads of uninspected hives.

This wait-in-line bottleneck creates needless delays, a key goal of Almond Board of California, Blue Diamond Almond Growers Cooperative, the Apiary Inspectors of America, and the North Dakota Commissioner of Agriculture, and California Department of Food and Agriculture all collaborating to reach a Memorandum of Understanding on the Beehive Pre-Inspection Program. After North Dakota and California implemented the pre-inspection program, other states quickly recognized the opportunity.

How can this process be improved?

When a load dispatches from an indoor facility, a Bill of Lading accompanies the load. Attached to that document is a certificate of facility pre-inspection. After a building is inspected, and found free of ants, beetles, weeds, and cow patties, a certificate for the number of hives in the building is issued. Each time a load dispatches from the building, the number of hives on the semi is deducted from the eligible total. After all the loads are shipped, the permit totals are reconciled with the number of hives actually shipped, to ensure the shipper complies with the terms of the pre-inspection.

This part of the process works great.

Opportunity for improvement lies in how the information is shared.

Could the Bill of Lading with the attached identifying detail be scanned and sent to the Department of Pest Exclusion – or directly to a Bug Station email account dedicated to pre-inspected operations? The number of indoor wintering buildings is less than 50.

Before shipping pre-inspected hives commences, a folder for each indoor building operator could house all the relevant data for that operator – In Truckee – Readily Available. As each load ships, an email alerts Truckee. The tractor number, the trailer number, the number of hives, a phone number point of contact, the destination, as much data as the participant can provide would fit in one email attachment – or fit on an Excel spreadsheet attachment.

Simpler yet, a bright yellow placard in the windshield could visually signal to the Bug Station inspector that This Load Has Been Pre-Inspected. The placard could display the operator’s I.D. number so the inspector could visually match the load to the in-house spreadsheet.

Another possibility is to print QR codes [think of restaurant menu QR codes replacing those sketchy paper menus quickly passing into extinction] to match the number of pre-inspected loads. The shipper attaches a QR code to the Bill of Lading so the Bug Station Inspector scans the QR code – the information is captured, immediately – then reconciled with the shipper-authorized number of eligible, pre-inspected hives.

An important component of any pre-inspection program is compliance. For example – over 10,000 loads of certified weed-free hay pass through Truckee annually. If a load shows up in the dairy, say 300 miles down valley from Truckee – and is found to be infested with noxious weeds – a sanction occurs. If the load of hay is rejected – it can’t be set on fire on site – it gets rejected. The shipper of formerly certified weed free hay looses certification – and access to the biggest dairy hay market in America.

Indoor building operators adhere to a higher standard of inspection. Indoor wintering operators should enjoy the benefit of expedited passage; and conversely, if they game the system, loose access to the program.

The pre-inspection program grew out of a need to address a serious bottleneck in a specific place for a specific purpose. The stakeholders adopted a pilot program that worked, and now enjoys Memorandum of Understanding status between the agencies, the almond growers, the truckers, and inspectors.

Above are a few possible solutions to refine the process – and get those rigs rolling.

They say that necessity is the mother of invention. In the pursuit of developing new technology that would enable bees to carry potentially beneficial fungal powders into their hives, we created an entirely new product that addresses several problems in modern beekeeping.

The original goal of the joint research project between Best for Bees and Dr. Peter Kevan’s team at the University of Guelph was to demonstrate that bees could carry powders into a beehive. Apivectoring, also known as bee vectoring, was pioneered by Dr. Kevan and associates 20 years ago. Pest and disease-fighting fungal powders coat honey bees or bumblebees as they exit the hive. The bees then deliver the fungus to the targeted crops’ flowers during regular pollination visits. Bee vectoring is now being implemented successfully to combat pests and diseases of several types of crops.

Figure 1
Bee vectoring (inspensing) illustration with the Protectabee outlines a bee returning from forage, walking through powder, and spreading powder throughout the hive.
Illusration by Cara Ward

Honey bees also struggle with many pests and diseases of their own, including Varroa mites, foulbrood diseases, and small hive beetle. Dr. Kevan recognized the potential of bee vectoring to combat threats within the hive. The process of moving powders into the colony, which his team coined inspensing (Fig. 1) (while outspensing refers to vectoring to crops), is complicated as bees are very efficient at cleaning out foreign materials. Creating a system that would outsmart the bees and effectively move powders within the hive proved challenging.

At the beginning of 2020, Dr. Kevan enlisted the services of a private research company, Best for Bees, to oversee research and development of the “inspenser.” Initial trials with a ramp-based prototype used in prior studies were less than satisfactory.

Since the two-year funded project depended on a successful device, Dr. Erica Shelley, founder and CEO of Best for Bees, recognized that an entirely new system was required. Borrowing from old-time bee escape boards using cones to direct bees away from honey supers, she realized that incorporating a separate entrance and exit at the front of the hive could be devised. However, the bees could easily bypass the powder by walking above it inside the device. After engineering many prototypes, she discovered a design that solved the problem and christened it the Protectabee.

The research team then set out to determine if the Protectabee would permit the bees to spread the powder throughout the hive efficiently. Bee transport of the powder was tracked via microscopic fluorescent beads in a carrier powder. In six hours or less, the bees emptied the powder from the drawer (Fig. 2). Using microscopy and UV light, the researchers determined that a minimum of 80% of the comb contained fluorescent powder (Fig. 3a).

Figure 2
Before: 45ml of carrier powder + fungi (B. bassiana) added to drawer. After: 6 hours after adding the drawer to a beehive. Rice is used as a desiccant to keep powder dry.

Figure 3a
Percentage of comb samples with fluorescence twenty-four hours after adding fluorescent microbeads and carrier powder to Protectabee drawer.

With proof of concept and a functioning device, the researchers set their sites onto vectoring antibiotics and fungi.

Antibiotics are used prophylactically to ward off American and European foulbrood before possible infection. Ontario’s recommended Spring application is to sprinkle the antibiotic/powdered sugar combination on top of the brood frames three times, two weeks apart, at least four weeks before the main honey flow. This timing can be tricky for beekeepers who live in cold or wet climates, not to mention labor-intensive.

As one of the wettest summers on record in Ontario, applying antibiotics inside the hives was a constant struggle. However, an advantage of the Protectabee is that the drawer can be pre-loaded before arriving at the apiary and simply slid into the device’s front without being impacted by adverse weather.

The research team determined that the Protectabee delivers dosages of antibiotics that correspond to concentrations of conventional applications (Fig. 3b). These findings are exciting as the Protectabee offers an entirely new and easy way to administer antibiotics efficiently into a hive.

Figure 3b
Percentage of comb samples with oxytetracycline twenty-four hours after adding Oxytet and carrier powder to Protectabee drawer.

The biggest threat to bees in many parts of the world is the Varroa destructor mite. The mite feeds on young larvae, transmitting diseases that weaken the hive. Overtreatment has led to widespread resistance to conventional miticides. Developing an easy and effective mite control is one of the bigger goals of the Protectabee project. Possible candidates for mite control include fungi that act as parasites of insects. Beauveria bassiana and Metarhizium brunneum are two soil fungi that can infect Varroa mites.

Botanigard, a commercially available biological insecticide approved for bee vectoring in greenhouses in Canada, uses B. bassiana to protect strawberries against thrips, a problematic insect. Could the Protectabee effectively distribute Botanigard throughout a beehive, and would it decrease Varroa mites? Indeed, the fungus was successfully disseminated to about 50% of larvae using a single application of Botanigard with the Protectabee. Unfortunately, although mite drop increased immediately after application, Botanigard did not reduce Varroa mites long term when applied as a single dose (Fig. 4). These findings are not surprising as the warm and humid environment inside a beehive is not optimal for B. bassiana growth.

Figure 4
Average mite counts were determined before treatment using an alcohol wash (zero weeks) and at two weeks and four weeks post-treatment of Botanigard (B. bassiana) or no treatment (control).

Identifying a method for successfully introducing fungi into beehives using bee vectoring holds promise for the future. Researchers at Washington State University recently identified a variant of Metarhizium that effectively controls Varroa mites and is better suited for environmental conditions inside a hive (1). Once the Metarhizium strain has received approval, the fungi could combat mites employing the Protectabee and carrier powder as a delivery system. This combination could be an easy and effective method to improve honey bee health.

Bee vectoring offers an innovative method to introduce health improving powders into beehives with the additional benefits of reduced labor and heavy lifting, the ability to apply treatments in adverse weather conditions, and decreased hive disruption.

To learn more about Protectabee and ongoing research, visit our website at bestforbees.com. The Protectabee will be launching on Indiegogo in February 2022.

References
1. Han, J.O., Naeger, N.L., Hopkins, B.K. et al. Directed evolution of Metarhizium fungus improves its biocontrol efficacy against Varroa mites in honey bee colonies. Sci Rep 11, 10582 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-021-89811-2

I always like to start the New Year with hopeful signs for bees and beekeepers and am feeling optimistic right now that breeding efforts to control the disease impacts of parasitic mites are starting to have wide success. Controlling mite impacts on honey bees depends on several lines of attack, from effective breeding schemes for hygienic or mite-repelling bees to a battery of chemical and management controls. While nothing is permanent since the mites generally fight back, mite levels in wisely managed colonies are not much higher than they were in past decades. Still, the remaining mites seem to have a greater impact on colony health even when at low levels. This has shifted the blame to bee stress and disease as great hazards for bee losses. We know that Varroa mites move viruses around in bees, and that these same viruses are important for bee health. Why do the viruses moved by mites seem to cause more harm currently, and how can we deflect this viral curse?

Three recent studies suggest that bees are developing their own viral cures, either by actively decreasing virus loads or somehow learning to tolerate the viruses they carry in abundance. Barbara Locke and colleagues in Sweden and other European countries have been on the hunt for bees that live well with Varroa for many years. They recognized that bee survival in the face of these mites can reflect either direct attacks on mite fitness or tolerance for higher mite loads. For the latter, the sense is that survivor stocks deal with viruses moved by mites even while losing ground against the mites themselves. In a recent paper, Locke and teams from Sweden, Norway, the Netherlands, and France dug deep into the viral populations of bees known to be mite-resistant in each of those countries (Locke, B.; Thaduri, S.; Stephan, J.G.; Low, M.; Blacquière, T.; Dahle, B.; Le Conte, Y.; Neumann, P.; de Miranda, J.R. “Adapted tolerance to virus infections in four geographically distinct Varroa destructor-resistant honeybee populations.” Scientific Reports 2021, 11, doi:10.1038/s41598-021-91686-2.).

In the study, bees from all four survivor lineages tended to have slightly lower virus levels when fed equal virus amounts as larvae, when compared to a non-selected control population. Still, these results were largely non-significant, i.e., viruses (Deformed wing virus and Acute bee paralysis virus, both linked with mites) flourished in these survivor lineages. In fact, the most striking result from this study was not that survivor bees were better defended against viruses, but that they just went on with their lives even when heavily infected. All survivor lineages did better than standard bee populations when infected with viruses. This points to a tolerance effect by survivor bees, for both mites AND viruses. Perhaps these bees can keep viruses from invading vital body parts while not quashing infection entirely. Longterm survivor stock presumably holds a number of cards that are in play to limit the impacts of mites. This virus tolerance is perhaps a last line of defense when behavioral, colony-level, or physiological defenses are not quite enough.

Weaver Frame

Bees that are tough in the face of bee viruses are almost certainly a thing in the U.S. as well. This past month, I was lucky enough to be part of a published paper describing virus-fighting abilities of a mite-tolerant breeding line from Texas (Weaver, D.B.; Cantarel, B.L.; Elsik, C.G.; Boncristiani, D.L.; Evans, J.D. “Multi-tiered analyses of honey bees that resist or succumb to parasitic mites and viruses.” BMC Genomics 2021, 22, doi:10.1186/s12864-021-08032-z). This study began a decade ago, when queen breeder Danny Weaver, and his late father Binford Weaver, sent a few dozen colony samples from their beekeeping lines. These lines are never treated for mites so are analoguous to the four European survivor stocks in that way. The Weaver samples were divided into ‘susceptible’ and ‘resistant’ lines based on field traits, and all were fairly loaded with mites. They wanted to know what distinguished the survivors from the sufferers. What caught our interest was that the resistant bees had lower levels of both the mite-friendly Deformed wing virus and viruses that are not transmitted by mites….hinting at a more general trait of viral resistance.

We next pitted some of our local mite-susceptible stock against these Texas survivors. We found lower viruses overall in the Texas bees but also a much lower bump in virus levels when individual bees were parasitized as pupae by mites. Next up was an experimental infection of relatively clean (mite-free) pupal bees with Deformed wing virus, the main “plus-one” of parasitizing Varroa mites. We injected a virus dose or a control solution (salt water) into pupae from a range of breeder queens. Infected bees were followed for several days then sacrificed to measure virus levels as well as the suite of bee genes turned on in response to virus infection. Again, progeny from some queens kept virus levels in check while others gave in to high virus growth. We did not measure longterm bee health in our study but did subject infected and control bees to a battery of genetic tests to determine how they had reacted to virus exposure. Bees from resistant queens did seem to mount a better immune response when given a full virus dose. They also just seemed to drag their feet on activating genes indicative of the stress of viral infection, perhaps slowing virus growth as a consequence. In a humbling twist, some bees even from resistant stocks were highly vulnerable to these (admittedly strong) virus doses, suggesting that more can be done to push even mite-tolerant lines towards a stronger response against viruses.

Collecting injected bees.

New tools are being developed to help screen breeding stock for virus resistance and Michael Simone-Finstrom has used such tools as a main focus of his work in the USDA-ARS Honey Bee Breeding, Genetics, and Physiology Research Laboratory in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. In a paper led by postdoctoral researcher Hannah Penn (Penn, H.J.; Simone-Finstrom, M.; Lang, S.; Chen, J.; Healy, K. “Host Genotype and Tissue Type Determine DWV Infection Intensity.” Frontiers in Insect Science 2021, 1, doi:10.3389/finsc.2021.756690), these researchers injected young bees with various viral cocktails and then measured viral outcomes.

This study involved many of the key commercial bee lineages in the U.S.; ‘Carniolan’, ‘Italian’ and the mite-selected ‘Pol-Line’, “Russian’, and ‘Saskatraz’ lines. Surprisingly, there was no significant difference across stocks on the whole when bees were injected with Deformed wing virus. However, simply poking bees with control injections (salt water again) did lead to higher virus levels in some of the tested stocks versus others, suggesting that latent viruses were more risky in these stocks (you’ll have to read the paper to see how your favorites did).

This study also gives great insights into differences between the two predominant strains of Deformed wing virus in terms of how they differ in their infection means and possible impacts on bees. The two strains, ‘A’ and ‘B’ differ in the bee body parts they thrive in, and in how they interact with particular bee stocks. DWV Strain ‘B’, a recent and now widespread lineage in the U.S. also called Varroa destructor virus-1 (e.g., https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-017-17802-3), was also both more aggressive during infection and more likely to emerge from latent infections in bees simply given the salt water injections. This is a bit ominous, and suggests that selection for breeding traits against viruses might have to account for an increasing diversity of viruses.

Viruses in both bees and humans are invisible and don’t always present symptoms that beekeepers, researchers, and doctors can detect. These studies took advantage of genetic viral signals and careful experiments to show that bees from different backgrounds have some of their own defenses in hand to deal with virus exposure. This is reason to be optimistic and it will be exciting to see how breeding programs that target the impacts of viruses on bees proceed.

COLOSS Beebook Volume III
Book By:
Book Review By: Kim Flottum

COLOSS BEEBOOK Volume III: Standard Methods for Apis mellifera Hive Product Research. Edited by Vincent Dietemann, Peter Neumann, Norman L. Carreck, James D. Ellis. Published by IBRA, Monmouth, UK and Northern Bee Books, Mythoimroyd, Hebden Bridge, UK. ISBN 978-1-913811-05-1. 8.25”x11.5”, 464 pgs., color and black and white, soft cover. $80 + UK postage if purchased from IBRA or Northern Bee Books (NBB) with foreign post, and the same price from Amazon (no shipping costs from Amazon).

COLOSS is a group of scientists and researchers who are standardizing how research for honey bees is being carried out. When you think about it, this makes very good sense because, simply, any scientist anywhere can now compare, essentially, apples to apples, or, perhaps more appropriately, honey bee science results to honey bee science results. COLOSS comes from Prevention of Honey Bee COlony LOSSes.

Volume 1, which came out in 2013 studies and defines standard methods for research covering such sub-categories as anatomy and dissection, behavioral studies, subspecies and ecotypes, artificial insemination, pollination and statistics. Only available from IBRA or NBB.

Volume 2 covered studies of pests and pathogens of honey bees. It standardized how surveys are conducted looking at colony losses, and then defined how diseases, small hive beetles, mites of all kinds, viruses and all the other pests and pathogens honey bees have to deal with should be examined, categorized and reported. Only available from IBRA and NBB.

Volume 3, released in October 2021, is now available. This third volume examines techniques and methods to use when studying and reporting on hive product research.

Each chapter is set up the same way. The product is described, and then produced in such a way that each time the product is identical, or not, to the last time it was produced. It is then harvested, and preserved. And then, it is taken apart and each tiny part studied, using techniques and analyses described in the book. For instance, for Royal Jelly, there are 17 pages on production, harvesting and preserving the product. Then, there are 40 some pages looking at how to do all manner of research studies on the product. It’s a long list and here are just a few….protein and sugar content, characterization of proteins and peptides, antibody purification, staining, labeling, and on and on.

The value of this information to researchers is easy to see. Everybody does it the same way, so results can be compared and measured and used by everybody. It draws these techniques from just over six pages of references. Everything about royal jelly you ever wanted to know is here. Everything. It is a scientists go-to book for certain.

The editors have reviewed all six pages of references, and have pretty much said, by including them here, this is what others have done, how they did it, and how you should now do it because now we’ll all be doing these complicated research studies the same way.

The subjects covered are done thoroughly and in depth. The first section of each product studied is basically how to produce, process, store and use each of the products. I’ve mentioned royal jelly (67 pgs), but there’s also beeswax (108 pgs), propolis (49 pgs), brood as food (28 pgs), honey (62 pgs), venom (31 pgs), and pollen (109 pgs). Figure the first third or so of each chapter is the simple collection, processing, storing and using each of these. Now that would be a beekeepers book to keep, for sure.

Each chapter has scores of charts, graphs, diagrams and such for displaying research results. And, each has good photos and drawings for collecting and preparing each, with lots of color photos and drawings. Pollen especially has excellent pollen photos for color, drawings for size comparisons and shape and more. From a beekeeper’s perspective, this is as far as I want to go when collecting pollen for my bees, or for sale. The rest of the information in the chapter is excellent for research, however, and standardization is important.

If you produce, harvest, process, store or sell any of these products, this book will pay for itself your first season. Especially if you are producing a product that needs to meet the high standards we all expect. Processing and storage is also important for consistency in sales. Seriously consider having this book on your shelf, even if you’ll only ever use half of it.

The Beeing: Life Inside a Honeybee Colony
Book By:
Book Review By: Kim Flottum

The Beeing: Life Inside a Honeybee Colony by Eric Tourneret, Sylla de Saint Pierre, and Jurgen Tautz. Published by Deep Snow Press, Ithaca, NY. ISBN 978-0-9842873-9-0. Originally published in French in 2017, translated to English October 30, 2021, by Mark Pettus, and edited by David Liedlich and Leo Sharashkin. Hard cover, 262 pages. Large format (11-3/4” x 12-1/4”), glossy color throughout. $49.95.

Eric Tourneret and Sylla de Saint Pierre are also the authors of Honey From the Earth: Beekeeping and Honey Hunting on Six Continents, published only a few years ago. To produce that first book, they spent FIFTEEN YEARS traveling the world to capture the breathtaking diversity of bees and beekeeping traditions on six continents. Epic scenes of scaling cliffs to reach honeycombs of the giant bees in Nepal… and the truckloads of hives of industrial beekeepers in America. Artisanal straw-basket hives in Romania… and the unique honeypot ants of the Australian desert. Honey traditions in the heart of the African jungle… and moving bees by boat in Argentina. Our familiar honey bees… and the most exotic stingless bees of the tropics. This is a most stunning collection of bee photography, complete with insightful commentary from a dozen leading bee experts, including Dr. Tom Seeley, Dr. Jurgen Tautz, and Kirk Webster. Shot in 23 countries.

Now, with additional input from Jurgen Tautz, Eric and Sylla have produced yet another beautiful and stunning collection of photos, accompanied with expert biology and physiology commentary for these photos. The Beeing covers all aspects of bees’ lives: physiology, colony organization, foraging strategies, nest architecture, bee intelligence, reproduction, and much more. Discover the most up-to-date knowledge on the functioning of the colony, insights into beekeeping practices, and the challenges bees face today – all written in an easy-to-understand non-technical language.

Chapters include a close look at the queen, what makes a queen and mating; the hive as a super organism and the stages of life; bees and flowers and nectar and pollen; foragers and seeing flowers the way bees see flowers; bees and humans and pesticides and breeding and honeys; nest architecture and a place to dance; bee math and propolis. Finally, Intelligence and communication looking at memory and languages and dancing and scents; and finishing with swarming and super and half sisters and genes and temperature’s assault on character.

I’ve already noted the spectacular photography, with many, many two page spreads, some showing only two bees filling both pages, with others showing a 20 acre apiary, with hives spread everywhere.

Quite simply, there is no other book like this. It’s been called the most useful coffee table book ever produced. It is actually one of the most useful books on bees ever produced.

Henry Meets a Honey Bee
Book By:
Book Review By: Kim Flottum

Henry Meets a Honey Bee. Written and illustrated by Justin Ruger. Published and distributed by Hippie Chick Apiary. ISBN 9780578995045. 30 pages, soft cover, color throughout. $15.00

Henry Meets a Honey Bee is a children’s book that uses bright colors, age appropriate art, and fictional characters to educate children on the importance and life of honey bees, one of nature’s favorite pollinators.

Come join Henry as he takes a walk, enjoying nature, and stumbles upon the adventure of a lifetime. Henry meets Honey, the queen bee of a local hive, and learns all about honey bees from an unique point of view. Watch how knowledge transforms fear to admiration for one of nature’s favorite pollinators.

I suppose if you are going to learn about bees from a bee, a Queen is about as good as it gets. And when she turns Henry into a honey bee, the learning is even better. Henry learns of pollination, visits a hive, learns of the different kinds of bees that live in that hive, the role of the queen in the hive, how workers are cleaners, nurses, builders, coolers, guards and foragers. And he even meets a beekeeper.

This is an easy to read, well designed children’s book that shows the world of bees from the bees themselves.

The Native Irish Honey Bee
Book By:
Book Review By: Thomas D. Seeley

The Native Irish Honey Bee, Apis mellifera mellifera. By the Native Irish Honey Bee Society. This book can be purchased online at: https://nihbs.org/shop/

During the last period of European glaciation, the honey bees in Europe diversified into three subspecies that survived in three refuges in southern Europe: A. m. mellifera in the Iberian peninsula, A. m. ligustica in the Apennine peninsula, and A. m. carnica in the Balkan peninsula. When this period of glaciation ended, about 12,000 years ago, the subspecies A. m. mellifera expanded its range far to the north. Its colonies spread to northwest Europe (the British Isles and Scandinavia), to north central Europe (north of the Alps), and even to north central parts of Asia. They also adapted to each of these regions. This produced the Irish black bee, the Dutch black bee, the Alps black, the Nordic black bee, the Welsh black bee, and still more. Each of these forms of A. m. mellifera is an ecotype, i.e., a population of honey bees which possess genetically-based traits that contribute to their ability to survive and reproduce in their particular location. Broadly speaking, the workers of A. m. mellifera differ from those of A. m. ligustica (Italian bees) and A. m. carnica (Carniolan bees), in being larger bodied, longer haired, more capable of flying at low temperatures (5°C/41°F), more avid collectors of propolis, and better able to survive long winters as small colonies that are frugal with their honey stores.

These days, the largest population of A. m. mellifera is found in Ireland, and the book The Native Irish Honey Bee provides us with a marvelous synthesis of recent work on the biology and the keeping of this bee. It is also a remarkable book in that it was written and produced entirely by members of the Native Irish Honey Bee Society (NIHBS). Some are biologists, some are beekeepers, and many are both. All have love for and pride in their native honey bees, and all have shared their knowledge in the cause of conserving these bees. The Irish, by the way, have a long tradition of writing about their bees. The oldest Irish legal manuscript dates to before 1350 AD, and is called Bechbretha (Bee Judgments). It covers legal decisions dating back to 700 AD regarding such matters as the rights of the neighbors of a beekeeper to receive a share of the honey crop because his/her bees trespass on their properties. Evidently, this was a sticky matter, and it needed a legal resolution.

The book’s chapters are grouped into five sections. The first—The Native Irish Honey Bee—delves into the basic question of defining the native Irish honey bee. It is argued, quite cogently, that it is a genetically distinct population of A. m. mellifera that is adapted to living in the mild, but damp, oceanic climate of Ireland. It is not known whether this bee was introduced by Celtic-speaking people who came to Ireland in prehistoric times, or it reached Ireland even earlier, when sea levels were lower and present-day Ireland and England were part of the European mainland. One thing that is known is that the native Irish honey bee is the largest and most important surviving population of A. m. mellifera. One chapter in this first section describes the genetic analysis of 412 bees sampled from 80 sites across 24 counties (of 32 total) in Ireland, and it reports that 97.8% of the sampled bees were found to be pure A. m. mellifera. Evidently, the rate of importation of queens of non-native subspecies (e.g., Italians and Carniolans) has been low, or the colonies headed by native queens have survived and reproduced better than those headed by imported queens, or both. This genetic analysis also revealed numerous unique alleles of the bees’ mitochondrial genes. This discovery tells us the Irish population of honey bees has evolved independently since the closure of Ireland’s land bridge with Britain, thousands of years ago.

The book’s second section—Conservation— examines strategies for the conservation of A. m. mellifera in Ireland. The first chapter explains that this is a thorny matter, because the legal status of honey bees in Ireland is somewhere between that of domesticated animals and wildlife; neither status is quite right for honey bees. One conservation approach being used already to support the native Irish honey bee is to establish voluntary conservation areas reserved for these bees. For example, members of the Galtee Bee Breeding Group are keeping and breeding only native honey bees in the Galtee and Vee Valley areas. Subsequent chapters include one by Micheál C. Mac Giolla Coda, titled “Rewilding the Irish Honey Bee” in which he describes how beekeeping was in the past, and how already there is evidence from a “Free-Living Bee Survey” that there are colonies surviving on their own. The chapter “Wild Apis mellifera mellifera in Ireland”, by Professor Grace McCormack, discusses an on-going study of the genetics of wild colonies in Ireland, and reports that the workers sampled from these colonies have a probability of 0.99 of coming from a lineage of A. m mellifera queens. This is a clear sign that, in Ireland, the native Irish honey bees have greater fitness than those from elsewhere in Europe. This section of the book ends with a thoughtful chapter “Bees and the Environment, by Willie O’Byrne. He discusses changes in the farming and the floral landscape in Ireland, and offers many suggestions for farming, urban beekeeping, afforestation, and hedgerow management that will improve the lives of both honey bees and wild (non-Apis) bees.

The third section focuses on queen rearing. It includes six chapters that show how easy it is to improve your bees for winter hardiness, disease resistance, and honey production. The first two chapters, by Aoife Nic Giolla Coda and Jonathan Getty cover the biology of queens and drones, and the logistics of setting up a queen-rearing group. Next comes Michael Maunsell’s chapter on how to improve your bees. Front and center, he makes the point of “Take the bees that are native to your own area and work with these.” Even in Ireland, a relatively small island, there are great differences in climate and vegetation, and beekeepers there want bees that are suited to where they live. Maunsell notes, too, that colonies that are heavier propolisers “are generally healthier or better able to handle disease.” The next six chapters, by Tom Prendergast, Colm ÓNéill, Jane Sellers (three), and Irene Power, describe each author’s tools and methods for rearing queens and getting them properly mated. Some are traditional (collecting swarm cells and using 5-frame mating nucs) and others are modern (Jenter kits and Apidea mating nucs). All have been tested by the authors’ experiences in Ireland over several decades.

The fourth section— Four Corners— is very special, for it comprises personal accounts of some of the Irish beekeepers who have long championed the native Irish honey bee. For example, Gerry Coyne, of Connemara on the west coast, describes beautifully his early years in the 1960s of working with the native bees—”kind creatures that were docile and content carrying out their work”—using no veils, or just ones improvised from lace curtains. Likewise, John Summerville, a beekeeper with 40 years of experience in Galway, writes “we need to protect and nurture our own black native bee as she serves us well with her calm nature and ability to forage in typical Irish weather.” There is also the inspiring piece by Michéal Mac Giolla Coda that describes the origins of the Galtee Bee Breeding Group. He also explains how the protection (from non Amm drones) of the group’s mating apiary was inspired by the prehistoric fortress on Inis Mór, one of the Aran Islands off Ireland’s west coast. These three contributions, plus the others found in this section, show much that is special about the beekeepers, as well as the bees, in Ireland.

The fifth section—The Past, The Present & The Future—contains five chapters. The first, by Jim Ryan, does a fine job of reviewing the history of beekeeping in Ireland over the past 1300 years with emphasis on the period from the 1850s (following the Great Famine) to the present. Photos of beekeepers and their hives, from the 1880s to the 1920s are a special treat. The second chapter, by Eoghan Mac Giolla Coda, provides a clear and precise description of what it is like to be a commercial beekeeper in Ireland. I found his tables on such things as the monthly mean maximum temperature, the monthly mean rainfall, and his annual honey production per hive very helpful in getting a clear picture of the conditions of beekeeping in Ireland. Beekeepers will also appreciate his careful descriptions of the hives he uses, and of how he deals with the challenges of swarming, propolisation, and disease susceptibility. The third chapter, by Redmond Williams, “Preparing for the Season Ahead,” is well named, for he describes his system for doing just this. He cites the old saying “There is no point in sharpening your sword when the drum beats for battle.” The fourth chapter, by Tanguy de Toulgoët, provides a ten-point (“Ten Commandments”) program for managing colonies in Warré hives to help increase the population of wild colonies of Apis mellifera mellifera in Ireland. I like his program, and hope that it will be followed by those who are interested more in being a bee watcher (akin to a bird watcher) than in being a beekeeper. The closing chapter, by Mary Montaut, poses two questions about the future of bees: “Can our beloved bees outlast the harm which human activity is undoubtedly doing to the earth? And if so, how can beekeepers help them?” I have asked myself these two questions, and I hope that bee biologists, beekeepers, and other concerned people will muster the collective intelligence that we will need to answer these questions with “Yes!” and “Here’s how.” After reading this book, I am confident that the natural “laboratory” of Ireland, and its resilient native Irish honey bee, will play an important role in helping us find ways to protect the future of bees.

Common Sense Natural Beekeeping
Book By:
Book Review By: Dewey Caron

Common Sense Natural Beekeeping Paperback, 128 pages • $24.99 US, $32.99 CAN • ISBN: 9781631599552 • Quarry Books. You can preview the book here: https://bit.ly/3yFh0A2

The newest book by Kim Flottum, Common Sense Natural Beekeeping, co-authored with Stéphanie Bruneau, needed to be written. It very succinctly covers sustainable beekeeping using “limited chemical or human intervention.” It will be perfect for individuals who wish to Save the bees but not treat nor manage their bee colonies like conventional livestock.

New beekeepers quickly learn, and established beekeepers are well aware, that honey bees face numerous stressors. Wide adoption of chemical treatments as necessary for varroa mite control have become standard. Rather than spending our time continually at war with varroa mites, using a “battery of chemical treatments” Common Sense Natural Beekeeping covers the “middle ground between micromanagement and no management…. it allows the bees, the environment and the beekeeper to thrive.” in the words of the authors.

The authors believe we should approach yearly colony losses differently and adopt “an acceptable alternative.” Contending that natural colonies are “thriving” without our intervention, we need to learn how better to manage our backyard bees. Their approach is to return to a more natural handling and housing of bees. We need to first learn then to partner and participate in colony care rather than seek to dominate our bees. It is a stewardship of cooperation from respect, not from control.

The book is extremely well illustrated – 35 pages are photos alone. The cover is outstanding and really captures the essence of the book. Amber Day is credited with its design. There are two pages of background reading and research and a useful index. The last section includes final recommendations “Bee like a Bee would Bee” – a neat summary of the Common Sense philosophy of the book.

The first pages describe the authors philosophy of bee care. It provides back ground on the life of bees in the wild. The work of Dr. Tom Seeley, who has extensively researched bees in bee trees, is summarized. His studies form the framework that “helps us make modifications to create healthier and more habitable hive systems.”

There are three sections of information. For the first section Home Sweet Home, different bee hive designs are covered. Chapter 2, over one-third of text, describes and lists pros and cons of eight different hive designs. Real-life practitioners are included of adapters for each hive. For the Langstroth hive, cons (9) outnumber the pros (2) but eight “adaptations” are listed for how individuals might “improve the bee approval rating.” The pros outnumber cons for Warré, Top Bar, Layens and skep (modified as a sun) hives. Log hives, the Custos and Eco Tree hive are also discussed. There is a companion chapter on Hive siting entitled “Real estate decisions.”

A second section discusses three major bee stressors – bee mites, swarming and “what’s for lunch” (bee nutrition). Natural beekeeping for varroa management includes stock selection, best hive, proper nutrition and more intensive management. Each of these is light on text, more of the philosophy compared to practice. Swarming coverage includes prevention and control. Keeping bees in smaller hives and swarming is described as “natural selection to create strong and healthy colonies [that] decrease the hive’s problems with varroa mites.” The final chapter discusses the importance of a varied diet for proper bee health.

A third section includes a two page case study discussion of five individuals that are using Common Sense Natural Beekeeping. It nicely illustrates how the philosophy of gentler, sustainable beekeeping might be achieved via use of a different hive and chemical-free management of honey bees. These help illustrate how by observing the way bees live in the wild, beekeepers learn to make management decisions including hive design that incorporate the bees innate intelligence and behavior for sustainable alternatives for natural hive management.

Becoming an apiarist can make a meaningful imprint on the world. It allows you to be conscious of the umbilical cord connecting human beings and nature, as we see in the history of beekeeping in Tuskegee, Alabama.

Beekeeping in Tuskegee also served as a necessary skill that assisted in anchoring Black identity, community, and environmental connectedness.

Since the inception of Tuskegee University, its first president Booker T. Washington emphasized the importance of molding the model citizen with discipline and practical learning through the lens of agriculture.  All students enrolled at Tuskegee were once required to learn beekeeping per the curriculum.

Despite agriculture being the focus of the curriculum and designated lifeblood, at the time of its creation, there was an agricultural stagnation that plagued the town of Tuskegee and half of the United States. The South still had a dependency on “King Cotton”. Tuskegee University, at that time, Tuskegee Normal and Industrial Institute, was even housed on an old cotton plantation. The majority of students were either sharecroppers or former sharecroppers.

The boll weevil, the pest responsible for ravaging the majority of the cotton production, was running rampant throughout southern states. In addition to cotton sales being significantly less than their white counterparts, Black people were desperately trying to combat other multiple unfair systemic obstacles.

When Dr. George Washington Carver came to Tuskegee, he restructured and reframed a lot of modalities. Carver knew the lack of understanding of nature and ecological relationships caused poor farm management and a lack of holistic wellness.

Ever connected to the spiritual, Carver would talk about how nature whispers to him, and God speaks through all of its creations. Having that innate connectivity, he held great respect for all creatures. In a 1930 letter, Carver wrote, “The singing birds, the buzzing bees, the opening flower, and the budding trees all have their marvelous creation story to tell each searcher for the truth…I love to think of nature as unlimited broadcasting stations, through which God speaks to us every day, every hour, and every moment of our lives if we will only tune in and remain so…”

Similar to Dr. Booker T. Washington, Dr. Carver highly encouraged beekeeping. So much so, he attempted to convert the majority of cotton farmers into beekeepers. The high increase of beekeepers paired with his emphasis on synergy inside the ecosystem gave a unique edge and allowed higher optimization of bee productivity. He encouraged and improved practices such as; resting the soil periodically, intentional crop selection, crop rotation, and plant diversity. These practices played an enormous part in the success rate of not only soil health but also beekeeping.

There is empirical data that explains the positive correlation between soil health and the increase of honey and solitary bee populations!

Tuskegee pivoted, seeing crop increases, and increased honey production, generating substantial economic savings.

This success was also made possible through community efforts. Through the creation of the Jesup wagon, Carver and his Master’s level student, at the time, Thomas Monroe Campbell, brought lessons to farms. They traveled a total of 800 miles visiting 100 farms in 1907 alone. The Jesup Wagon became the inception of the model for the Federal Farm Extension Programs. However, due to anti-Black racism embroiled in the passing of the 1914 Smith-Lever Cooperation Extension Act, The Department of Agriculture did not award Tuskegee with pioneering the program and even took money away due to a created technicality. Though experiencing this extreme racial injustice, Thomas Monroe Campbell was successfully hired as the first Extension Agent in the United States. He headed the first Cooperative Extension Program in the nation as a Field Agent for The United States Department of Agriculture.

The Jesup Wagon (Tuskegee University Archives)

This innovation and community collaboration occurred time and time again within Tuskegee. To this day, Tuskegee University still operates the longest-running farming conference in the nation, held annually in February. Originally called the “People’s Conference”, the Farmer’s Conference began in Tuskegee on February 23, 1892. In its 130th year, the conference continues on Booker T. Washington’s mission and practice of using agriculture as a vehicle for self-actualization.

By improving community initiative, education, and trade, the formation of communities became more prevalent, as seen with George Ruffin Bridgeforth. Mr. Bridgeforth was a beekeeping instructor at Tuskegee Institute from 1902-1915 and established a highly successful all-Black community of landholders in Limestone County in 1910. Limestone County is a part of Huntsville, Alabama, present-day. Bridgeforth was one of the largest Black landowners at the time.

Black people began having the autonomy to develop wealthy towns, own land, and trade and buy from one another. This possibility was powerful in reinvigorating the self-esteem and the integrity of the Black identity.

Beekeeping Instructor, Dr. Bridgeforth teaching the Beekeeping Ladies. (The Tuskegee Archives)

Black women, specifically, were able to cultivate their autonomy within this period using beekeeping as one of the tools. Mrs. Maragret Murray Washington, the wife of Booker T, played an active role in creating space for Black women. When she came to Tuskegee, she founded her club, The Beekeeping Ladies, an all-women-led beekeeping organization. This club was nationally recognized and was even mentioned by the successful master beekeeper, entrepreneur, and writer A. I. Root in Gleanings in Bee Culture in 1874.

The spread of the farming gospel also improved community race relations. The white populace in the South was economically struggling alongside the Black population of Tuskegee and benefited from the teachings of Dr. Carver. Moreover, by learning together, trading farming techniques, and interacting with one another, these events facilitated a unique opportunity for healing and collaboration. As scholar Linda O. Hines writes, “Even Southerners who ardently supported white supremacy hailed Carver as one of Dixie’s leading citizens.” This collaboration also helped strengthen relationships that were peaceful and healthy amongst Black and white people.

There existed a small but powerful population that believed in advocating and amplifying Black voices, as seen by A.I. Root.  Although built in the pretense of superiority and yields real results of kick-starting generational wealth (read: for some), racism’s true end demolishes everyone. One risks their moral compass; lives in a state of false reality and purpose; and robs themselves of impactful encounters with diverse people when subscribing to racist ideologies. Heather C. McGhee, author of “The Sum of Us: What Racism Costs Everyone, and How We Can Prosper Together.”  mentions even the economical losses that racism yields for white people and communities as well. The key to rebuilding our world lay in the power of mutual respect, love, and honoring our similarities along with our differences.

The spirit of innovation, love of community, and love for the environment carried over through multiple generations. Dr. Booker T. Whatley, a former instructor of Tuskegee Institute (in 1974-1981), continued to carry the torch Dr. Carver and Dr. Booker T. Washington ignited. Dr. Whatley is one of the pioneers of restorative agriculture, responsible for creating the concept of Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) farm systems and U-pick farms. He also wrote “How to Make 100,000 Dollars On A 25-acre Farm,” a book used and relevant today. One of the main components that made his model possible was having 60 colonies of bees.

Picture from a TU Bee Club meeting. From left to right: Mr. Bernard Pace, Mentor; Jade Daniels, Vice President; a 2018 member; Dr. Harold Higgins, Mentor; Asmera Smith (author) President; and Hallie Bentley, Mentor

Dr. Whatley frequently taught the community and students alike, hosting open labs similar to Dr. Carver and Dr. Washington.

Mr. Bernard Pace, a current apiarist in Tuskegee, was under Dr. Whatley’s mentorship and worked with him frequently. Upon the inception of the Tuskegee University Bee Club in 2017, Pace mentored students in Tuskegee (the author included), sharing his stories, knowledge and techniques of beekeeping.

Dr. Carver and Dr. Booker T. Washington continue inspiring present-day apiarists and community leaders. Dr. Darren Spencer of Harlem Comes to Cotton LLC, Ms. Josie Gbadamosi of Shady Grove Farms LLC, Candace “Kandeaux, The Farm Plug” Clark, a community connector and the founder of Tuskegee University’s Bee Club in 2017, Dr. Harold Higgins of O.N.E Nation Farm Solutions LLC and many others who continue the legacy.

Mentors such as these are greatly needed, as Earth-conscious resurgence is what we desperately need now.

We can see the impact of the lack of respect for Earth, with phenomena such as colony collapse disorder, which affects a large population of honey bee hives worldwide. Solitary bees are also being affected, even certain species becoming endangered.

When looking at solutions, we must keep respect for our planet at the forefront. For example, when combatting varroa mites, the natural inclination is to use chemical control. However, this treatment has detrimental effects on the bees themselves, as well as the soil. The chemicals used can leach into groundwater, soil composites and affect the total ecosystem, including humans. Different techniques exist to eradicate these pests. Integrative Pest Management, even using essential oils, powdered sugar, and other methods that are more Earth-conscious.

Varroa mites, detached and dead in powdered sugar. (Oliver)

Olden practices are resurging once more, such as organic farming principles, or as Sir Albert Howard, a famous English botanist, names the act “Nature’s Farming”.

We must heed how deeply our actions impact the world. Our choices not only affect our economic fabric, the societal fabric for future generations, but for all life itself. We are all responsible for the survival of the planet and its inhabitants. The history of Tuskegee and its beekeeping history show how integral our impact can be.

By: Brittney Goodrich & Marieke Fenton & Jerrod Penn

In this article, we summarize some considerations for the 2022 almond pollination season, including results from a 2021 survey of commercial beekeepers regarding their almond pollination agreements.

Almond Industry Update
Almond prices rebounded this summer due to a lower than anticipated almond crop for the 2021-2022 marketing year, following roughly a year of low almond prices. Nonpareil inshell prices hovered around $3/lb in August 2021 according to Merlo Farming Group, 74% higher than August 2020. Prices of other varieties have increased more moderately, with shelled Monterey and Carmel both at $2.09/lb, 45% above their August 2020 prices. Relatively low competition from other exporting countries, coupled with steady growth in almond demand have kept almond prices strong despite monumental growth in production over the last two decades (Bruno, Goodrich, and Sexton, 2021).

Despite the recent increase in almond prices, the outlook for almond growers is not all positive. Consecutive years of drought in California have limited surface water availability, and the drier than average outlook for the upcoming winter shows little promise of improving water availability (National Interagency Fire Center, 2021). In addition to surface water scarcity, the first groundwater sustainability plans required by California’s Sustainable Groundwater Management Act (SGMA) were approved for implementation in June 2021. The goal of SGMA is to lower groundwater extraction levels which have reached unsustainable rates in many areas. Because plans are just beginning to be implemented and have up to 20 years to reach sustainable extraction rates, it is unclear how exactly SGMA will impact the almond industry and California agriculture in general. However, restricting water extraction will likely increase the cost of water as well as decrease the amount of acreage in production, especially in areas that rely heavily on groundwater sources for almond production.

The Almond Board of California and Land IQ estimate the removal of around 48,000 acres of almonds by September 2021, approximately 3.6% of the 1.3 million bearing acres in 2021. This is up slightly from 2020, with an estimated 39,000 acres removed. Aging orchards are the likely candidates for removal, and we have heard speculation from a few industry sources that some orchards will be removed after harvest due to water scarcity concerns. Land IQ estimates 13% of almond orchards are over 21 years old, compared to 20% of young orchards that will begin bearing in one to three years. Between June 2019 and May 2020, nurseries reported 66,000 acres of sales, with over half being for new orchards and the remainder replacing aging orchards. These numbers suggest that almond acreage is still expanding, though likely at lower rates than previous years due to the recent low prices and uncertain water availability.

Figure 1: Total U.S. colonies on January 1, estimated demand for colonies, and shipments of colonies into California, 2015-2022

Colony Demand
Figure 1 plots the estimated demand for colonies based on bearing almond acreage each year from 2015 to 2022, as well as the total colony shipments into California for almond pollination and the total number of colonies in the U.S. on January 1. Estimated demand is calculated using two colonies per acre for traditional varieties and one colony per acre for self-fertile varieties (Shasta and Independence). A consistent gap between estimated demand and colony shipments is filled by colonies that remain in California year-round. For the 2021 almond bloom, roughly 1.3 million almond acres (3.3% in self-fertile varieties) required an estimated 2.6 million honey bee colonies for pollination (Figure 1). According to apiary shipment data provided by the California Department of Food and Agriculture, other states shipped 2.1 million honey bee colonies into California for the 2021 bloom, up 16% from 2020.

As seen in Figure 1, the estimated demand for colonies in 2022 is 2.63 million colonies, slightly above that of 2021. It seems the recent increase in self-fertile variety plantings have started leveling off the estimated demand for colonies. However, the colonies that will be required for almond pollination in 2022 still represents 90% of the 2.92 million colonies in the U.S. on January 1, 2021, so at least in the short run, it’s unlikely this leveling off of demand will put downward pressure on pollination fees. Additionally, an article published in Nature found the Independence variety showed an increase in yield by 20% from allowing bee visitation (Sáez et al. 2020). This study eliminates any claims that these self-fertile varieties do not require honey bee colonies for commercial production. Growers of self-fertile varieties who do not currently place honey bees in their orchards are likely “borrowing” pollination services from neighboring orchards. In the future, growers with traditional orchard varieties surrounded by many self-fertile orchards with few (or no) colonies per acre may have to compensate by placing more colonies per acre.

Weather Impacts on Colony Supply
Much of the western U.S. and major honey producing states in the northern plains have been under severe drought conditions throughout the summer. Figure 2 shows the U.S. drought monitor for the week of July 27, 2021. As of the week of October 12, 2021, 35% of the U.S. is still in a severe drought or worse. Consequently, many commercial beekeepers have seen decreased honey production, increased costs of feeding, and poor colony nutrition, all likely to negatively impact the supply and strength of colonies for almond pollination.

Table 1: Comparison of percentage area under drought conditions in the Northern Plains Climate Hub, Weeks in July 2012 and 2021 States: Montana, Wyoming, Colorado, Nebraska, South Dakota, and North Dakota

To get an idea of potential impacts of this drought, we looked back to 2012 when a similar drought took place. In October 2012, approximately 40% of the U.S. was in a severe drought or worse, slightly more area affected than our current situation. Table 1 provides a comparison for the Northern Plains Climate Hub states (Montana, Wyoming, Colorado, Nebraska, South Dakota, and North Dakota) where most commercially managed honey bee colonies are located for honey production in the summer. This shows a similar percentage of this area was impacted by drought-like conditions, but in terms of the worst drought categories, Extreme and Exceptional, the 2021 drought has affected more of this area than the 2012 drought.

Figure 2: U.S. Drought Monitor, July 27, 2021

According to national honey yields from USDA, the 2012 honey crop was the lowest production in over 30 years. Figure 3 (next page) shows winter mortality rates and colony strength delivered at almond pollination for years 2010-2021. Following the 2012 drought, winter mortality rates were 31% according to Bee Informed Partnership (BIP), 38% higher than the previous winter. Average colony strength delivered for 2013 almond pollination dipped 20% lower than the previous year. 2022 almond pollination could see similar impacts on colony availability and strength from the 2021 drought.

2021 Almond Pollination Survey Results
In February-April 2021, we conducted an online survey of over 90 commercial beekeepers that participated in the 2021 almond pollination market to better understand their almond pollination decisions. The sample represented over 19% of hives demanded for 2021 almond bloom. The following sections summarize some key findings of interest. Some participants chose not to answer certain questions, so sample sizes vary and will be indicated in figures, tables, and text.

Almond Pollination Fees
We asked survey respondents to report the fees associated with their largest almond pollination agreement in 2021. Reported fees ranged from $130/colony to $225/colony. Fees vary due to a number of factors, a primary determinant being the colony strength requirement in the agreement. Table 2 (next page) shows the average, minimum and maximum pollination fee by colony strength requirement. Figure 4 (next page) shows box plots with the average pollination fee received separated by frame count category and whether the beekeeper had contracted directly with the grower or through another beekeeper or broker.

Figure 3: (above) Almond pollination colony strength and winter mortality rates, 2010-2021

Figure 4:  Box plots of almond pollination fees by colony strength category and whether the agreement is with a pollination broker or grower. 

Most pollination agreements (46% of those reported) required eight active frames, for an average fee of $192 in 2021 (Table 2, next page). Across all frame count categories, the average fee was $193 per colony. Agreements with higher colony strength requirements received a 10% premium compared to eight frame agreements, while six to seven frame agreements saw approximately a 4% discount. Low strength agreements (less than six frames) on average received about the same fees as eight frame agreements, however this could be due to the small number of these agreements reported.

The average fee received by beekeepers who contracted through a broker (or beekeeper-broker) was $193 versus contracting directly through a grower at $202 per colony (Figure 4). This suggests brokerage fees on average were around $9 per colony.

27% of beekeepers said at least one of their pollination agreements were incentive-based contracts that pay per-frame based on the results of a third-party inspection (See Goodrich and Goodhue (2016) for a sample incentive-based contract). For the beekeepers whose largest contract was an incentive-based contract, on average they received $191/colony for a seven frame average and $210/colony for an 11-frame average. On average, this constitutes a $5 premium per-frame over the base fee.

Table 2:  Average 2021 almond pollination fees by average colony strength requirement (N=95)

Pesticide Exposure and Agreement Specifics

We asked beekeepers if their colonies had experienced either sublethal or lethal pesticide exposure during the 2020 or 2021 almond pollination seasons. Of the 77 beekeepers who answered this question, 19% and 56% had experienced lethal and sublethal exposure, respectively, in the last two almond pollination seasons. This suggests that pesticide exposure is relatively common and is a cost beekeepers should factor in when making pollination decisions.

We also asked about language related to pesticide exposure in pollination contracts. 54% of beekeepers said that at least one of their pollination agreements contained details to prevent pesticide exposure or to receive compensation if it occurs. Table 3 (next page) below shows the percentage of beekeepers whose agreements contained language about pesticide exposure by the specific feature. The most common detail included was that the grower would not apply pesticides when bees were active (33%). 11-12% of beekeepers stated they had agreements in which they would be reimbursed if colonies had to be moved or were damaged due to pesticide applications.

Advance Payment
Beekeepers were asked if any of their growers/brokers pay some portion of the pollination fee before colonies are placed for almond bloom. Nearly half of respondents (44%) had at least one contract that pays part of the pollination fee in advance. Table 4 shows the percentage of respondents in each advanced payment category. 21% of beekeepers received advanced payments of 30% or less of the total pollination fee. 19% of participants received over 40% of the total pollination fee in advance.

Colony Theft and Agreement Specifics
21% of beekeepers (16 of 77) reported that they had colonies stolen during the 2020 or 2021 pollination seasons. Thus, it seems colony theft is a relatively common issue for beekeepers who participate in almond pollination. 10 of 91 beekeepers (11%) reported that language is included in their pollination agreements that would allow them to be compensated by the grower if colonies were stolen.

Table 3: Percentage of beekeepers with agreements containing pesticide exposure details

Contracting Timeline and Reserve Colonies
Beekeepers reported when they settled the price and quantity for their largest agreement for the 2021 almond bloom. Over half of beekeepers (56 of 90) settled their largest agreement in December 2020-February 2021. One-third settled in September-November 2020, and 9% settled before September 2020.
The majority of beekeepers do not rent out all of their colonies in advance of almond bloom. Having a reserve of colonies that are not contracted can help mitigate risks from high colony mortality or poor colony health. Figure 5 shows responses to the percentage of colonies beekeepers contract “in advance” of almond bloom, which was subject to each beekeeper’s interpretation. Roughly 10% of respondents said they do not contract any colonies in advance of almond bloom, and roughly 13% of respondents said they contract all of their colonies in advance of almond bloom. 56% of beekeepers said they have reserves of 5-25% of colonies that are not rented out in advance of almond bloom. The most frequent answer was 90% of colonies were rented in advance with 22% of the observations.

Figure 5: Percentage of beekeepers by the percentage of colonies contracted in advance for almond pollination (N=68)

Concluding thoughts
This summer’s drought may make preparing for almond pollination especially stressful for many beekeepers. Years with large winter losses and poor colony strength show the benefits of having a sufficient reserve of colonies that are not contracted in advance for almond pollination. In a year with widespread colony health issues, beekeepers will still likely be able to rent out those reserve colonies (even without meeting an eight frame requirement) once bloom nears and colony health and numbers are realized.

Almond pollination agreements seem to be ever-increasing in importance to profitability for commercial beekeepers. While seeking out the highest possible pollination fee may seem like the best way to increase profits, there are economic tradeoffs to consider. We find that losing colonies to theft and pesticides is fairly common, but few beekeepers have protections in their pollination agreements against such risks. Implementing some of these beneficial terms into pollination agreements allows beekeepers to share these risks with their almond grower, but it may come at a cost in terms of a lower pollination fee. The long-term benefits for colony health and peace of mind may be worth the tradeoff off for some beekeepers.

Table 4: Percentage of beekeepers by percentage of almond pollination fee received in advance of colony placement.

By: Clarence Collison

“In order to survive cold northern winters, honey bees crowd tightly together in a winter cluster. Present models of winter cluster thermoregulation consider the insulation by the tightly packed mantle bees as the decisive factor for survival at low temperatures, mostly ignoring the possibility of endothermic heat production. Stabentheiner et al. (2003) provided direct evidence of endothermic heat production by ‘shivering’ thermogenesis. The abundance of endothermic bees is highest in the core and decreases towards the surface. This shows that core bees play an active role in thermal control of winter clusters. They concluded that regulation of both the insulation by the mantle bees and endothermic heat production by the inner bees is necessary to achieve thermal stability in a winter cluster.”

“The temperature at the center, the periphery and the entrance of a honey bee colony was continuously determined during the summer season and the broodless time in winter. During the summer season the temperature in the brood nest averages 35.5°C (95.9°F) with brief excursions up to 37.0°C (98.6°F) and down to 33.8°C (98.8°F). Increasing environmental temperatures resulted in linear increases in the temperature of the hive entrance, its periphery, and its center. The temperature in the center of an overwintering cluster is maintained at an average value of 21.3°C (70.3°F) (min. 12.0°C (53.6°F), max. 33.5°C (92.3°F). With rising ambient temperatures, the central temperature of a winter cluster drops whereas the peripheral temperature increases slightly. With decreasing external temperatures, the peripheral temperature is lowered by a small amount while the cluster’s center temperature is raised.

Linear relationships are observed between the central and the ambient temperature and between the central temperature and the temperature difference of the peripheral and the ambient temperatures. The slopes point to two minimum threshold values for the central (15°C, 59.0°F) and the peripheral temperature (5°C, 41.0°F) which should not be transgressed in an overwintering cluster. Microcalorimetric determinations of the heat production were performed on the three castes of the honey bee: workers, drones and queens of different ages. Among these groups single adult workers showed the highest heat production rates (209 mW.g-1) (mW=milliwatt) with only neglectable fluctuations in heat production rate. Juvenile workers exhibited a mean heat production rate of 142 mW.g-1. The rate of heat production of adult workers is strongly dependent upon the number of bees together in a group. With more than 10 individuals, weight-specific heat dissipation remains constant with increasing group sizes at a level approximately 1/17 that of an isolated bee.

Differences are seen between the rates of virgin (117 mW.g-1) and laying (102 mW.g-1) queens. Laying queens showed less thermal fluctuations than virgin queens. High fluctuations in heat production rates were observed for drones. In both drone groups (fertile, juvenile) phases of high and extremely low activity succeed one another. The heat production of juvenile drones was 68 mW.g-1, that of fertile drones 184 mW.g-1 due to stronger locomotory activities (Fahrenholz et al. 1989).”

“Sumpter and Broomhead (2000) developed a model to investigate the movement of individuals in thermoregulating honey bee clusters. Thermoregulation in over-wintering clusters is thought to be the result of individual bees attempting to regulate their own body temperatures. At ambient temperatures above 0°C (32°F), a clustering bee will move relative to its neighbors so as to put its local temperature within some ideal range. Computer simulation of this model demonstrates qualitative behavior which agrees with that of real honey bee clusters. In particular, they observed the formation of both disc- and ring-like cluster shapes. The simulation also suggests that at lower ambient temperatures, clusters do not always have a stable shape but can oscillate between insulating rings of different sizes and densities.

The computer model they developed is based on the following assumptions about the behavior of individual bees: 1. Each bee bases her behavior exclusively on her local temperature. 2. Bees have a preferred range of temperatures. Inside this range a bee moves randomly. When she is outside this range she will move in the appropriate direction along the temperature gradient. 3. Below a lower threshold temperature a bee will go into a “chill coma” and will be unable to move. 4. A bee’s heat production is based on her metabolic rate which is an increasing function of temperature. Bees in a coma generate no heat.”

Infrared heat of colony

“A thermal imaging method was used to monitor thermal processes in the inter-comb bee clusters and temperature of different body parts during the wintering period. The temperature of different body parts was found to depend on the localization of bees in the nest and the external temperature. The dependence of the thermoregulatory activity of bees on the external temperature fluctuations decreased during wintering. The trends of distribution of thermal fields in clusters of wintering bees were revealed (Eskov and Toboev 2011).”

“Winter cluster volume and surface area were measured over a range of ambient temperatures (Ta) in 3 honey bee colonies representative of small, medium and large populations from 29 November 1984 to 21 March 1985 (Severson and Erickson 1990). Changes in these parameters were correlated with changes in Ta and the observed response to Ta was independent of population size. They observed decreases of about 55% in cluster volume and 40% in cluster surface area as the Ta decreased from 4°C (39.2°F) to -23°C (-9.4°F).”

“Experiments conducted over three winters have revealed a metabolism controlling function of bee-induced hypoxia in the winter cluster. Permanent low oxygen levels around 15% were found in its core. This hypoxia was actively controlled, probably via indirect mechanisms. Varying ambient oxygen levels demonstrated a causal relationship between lowered oxygen and reduced metabolic rate (MR). Under deeper ambient hypoxia the bees switched to ultra-low metabolic rate (ULMR), optional-occasional at 15% oxygen, obligatory at 7.5% oxygen. This dormancy status resembled deep diapause in insects. It stayed reversible after at least several days and was terminated under normal oxygen at 15°C (59°F). Reduced MR via core-hypoxia is essential in water conserving thermoregulation of the winter cluster. It allows bees to reconcile warm wintering in alert state—for defense of stores—with energy saving and longevity (Van Nerum and Buelens 1997).”

“During the broodless period in winter, the pollen content of the gastrointestinal tract, the degree of pollen digestion and the proteolytic activity in the midgut were investigated in bees from the margin and from the center of winter clusters of two colonies in Austria. In addition, the movement of bees within the winter cluster was examined. There was no difference in pollen content and proteolytic activity between bees from the center or margin of the cluster, nor did the two groups show a preference for staying at the center or on the margin of the winter cluster. Compared to 8-9-day-old bees in summer, the amount of pollen in the midguts was smaller by a factor of 100-1000, but the degree of pollen digestion in the midgut and the rectum was significantly greater; the proteolytic activity in the midgut was approximately a quarter. The more efficient utilization in spite of lower proteolytic activity might be due to pollen staying longer in the midgut. Foragers in summer also consume only minimal amounts of pollen but have a smaller degree of utilization than winter bees. The reduced pollen consumption rate, and efficient utilization in spite of lower proteolytic activity are useful adaptations to the reduced availability of pollen and reduced protein metabolism which bees experience during the winter (Crailsheim et al. 1993).”

“Microbial symbionts inhabiting the honey bee gut (i.e., gut microbiota) are essential for food digestion, immunity and gut protection of their host. The taxonomic composition of the gut microbiota is dynamic throughout the honey bee life cycle and the foraging season. However, it remains unclear how drastic changes occurring in winter, such as food shortage and cold weather, impact gut microbiota dynamics. Bleau et al. (2020) characterized the gut microbiota of the honey bee during the overwintering period in a northern temperate climate in Canada. The microbiota of nine colonies was characterized by metataxonomy of 16S rDNA between September 2017 and June 2018. Overall, the results showed that microbiota taxonomic composition experienced major compositional shifts in fall and spring. From September to November, Enterobacteriaceae decreased, while Neisseriaceae increased. From April to June, Orbaceae increased, whereas Rhizobiaceae nearly disappeared. Bacterial diversity of the gut microbiota decreased drastically before and after overwintering, but it remained stable during winter. They concluded that the gut microbiota is likely to be impacted by the important meteorological and dietary changes that take place before and after the overwintering period.”

“In winter, honey bees thermoregulate their hives to survive cold temperatures and maintain their physiological activity, without becoming completely dormant. During this time, nurses and foragers are not distinguishable. In late winter or early spring, as the brood rearing re-initiates, the division of labor resumes among the workers born in the fall. To understand the overall physiological changes of honey bee workers from late winter (end of over-wintering) to early spring (beginning of brood rearing), Lee and Kim (2017) collected honey bees in January and February and compared their protein expression profiles. Among the 50 and 85 proteins showing greater than two-fold differences in expression levels in the head and abdomen, respectively, 20 proteins with relatively large differences in expression level between the months were selected and identified. Most proteins were more abundantly expressed in January than February and were mainly involved in nutrient storage, energy metabolism, and biosynthesis pathways in both the head and abdomen. This finding suggested that overwintering bees require large energy storage and metabolize stored nutrition to generate high cellular energy for thermoregulation of their hive without diapause and/or to prepare for the initiation of brood rearing in January.”

“Thermoregulation is crucial for colony survival in temperate regions, but possible interference by parasites is currently unknown. The small hive beetle (Aethina tumida) and the ectoparasitic mite Varroa destructor are honey bee parasites that overwinter in host colonies. The efficiency of thermoregulation might thus be affected in infested host winter clusters, due to altered worker activity. Schӓfer et al. (2011) showed for the first time that parasites can alter honey bee thermoregulation. Moreover, the data suggested that only combined infestations with V. destructor and A. tumida resulted in higher thermal maxima in the winter clusters, whereas infestations with one parasite alone had no significant effect compared with the controls. Due to the ubiquitous mite V. destructor combined infestations with parasites or combined infections with pathogens are almost inevitable. Therefore, their data indicated that an altered thermoregulation due to multiple infestations might be another widespread factor contributing to winter losses of colonies.”

“Extreme winter losses of honey bee colonies are a major threat to beekeeping but the combinations of factors underlying colony loss remain debatable. Desai and Currie (2016) monitored colonies in two environments (colonies wintered indoors or outdoors) and characterized the effects of two parasitic mites, seven viruses, and Nosema on colony mortality and population loss over winter. Samples were collected from two locations within hives in fall, mid-winter, and spring of 2009/2010. Although fall parasite and pathogen loads were similar in outdoor and indoor-wintered colonies, the outdoor-wintered colonies had greater relative reductions in bee population score over winter. Seasonal patterns in deformed wing virus (DWV), black queen cell virus (BQCV), and Nosema level also differed with the wintering environment. DWV and Nosema levels decreased over winter for indoor-wintered colonies but BQCV did not. Both BQCV and Nosema concentration increased over winter in outdoor-wintered colonies. The mean abundance of Varroa decreased and concentration of Sacbrood virus (SBV), Kashmir bee virus (KBV), and Chronic bee paralysis (CBPV) increased over-winter but seasonal patterns were not affected by wintering method. For most viruses, either entrance or brood area samples were reasonable predictors of colony virus load but there were significant season*sample location interactions for Nosema and BQCV, indicating that care must be taken when selecting samples from a single location. For Nosema spp., the fall entrance samples were better predictors of future infestation levels than were fall brood area samples. For indoor-wintered colonies, Israeli acute paralysis virus IAPV concentration was negatively correlated with spring population size. For outdoor-wintered hives, spring Varroa abundance and DWV concentration were positively correlated with bee loss and negatively correlated with spring population size. Multivariate analyses for fall collected samples indicated higher DWV was associated with colony death as did high SBV for spring-collected samples.