I'm just back from the Wisconsin Honey Producers Fall Convention, and I'm glad I went. I attended all of the Friday sessions and the Saturday morning sessions, and left at noon on Saturday so I could make the 3 1/2 hour drive home in daylight. I ran into Jeff C. there on Saturday and I believe he was staying for the afternoon sessions. Each of the speakers, Dr. Marla Spivak, Dr. David Tarpy, and Ross Conrad held two sessions per day. They each shared different aspects of their current research to bring beekeepers up to date on a number of issues. One item of notable interest was David Tarpy's talk on the quality of commercial queens. I know we've all wondered about that because the queens we get in our packages don't seem to be as vigorous as they used to be, or we think they should be. The University of North Carolina purchased 12 queens from 12 queen breeders in spring, having an undergrad purchase them as "Joe, the beekeeper" so that it would be a blind study. "Joe" got the same queens anyone else would get, not "cherry picked" queens. The breeders did not know they were going into a study by the UNC, but were informed after the study. They then measured, weighed, dissected, and analyzed the queens and compared their results to similar tests done starting in the 1940's. (I thought I had a photo of the data screenshot, but don't). What they found, much to their surprise, is that today's commercial queens are equivalent in all areas to queens from the samplings done in the past with one notable exception. Today's queens had 0% nosema spores. The queens had an average of 15.4 matings, the spermathecas were full of viable sperm, body size and weight were comparable. The results were unexpected because we all know there are often issues with package bees and we thought it was due to inferior breeding. So the focus is changing from the queens themselves to the colony. Questions like "what's causing ‘shotgun’ brood patterns with healthy queens" and "are workers cannibalizing brood and if so why"? I imagine the research will go in many directions and take years of tests and study, but they did determine that it's not the queen breeding that's at fault. One person asked if it could be a genetic issue, but apparently genetic testing is beyond the financial means of researchers at this time. Very expensive.
Marla Spivak spoke about bee health and the need for an increase in plants suitable for honeybees. Much has been lost through large monoculture plantings and the use of Round-Up. It turns out that large prairie restoration projects aren't the answer for honeybees because honeybees prefer non-native plants like Dutch Clover and Birdsfoot Trefoil. Researchers at UMN are working to identify the pollen content in honey to determine the favored plants, but it's a painstaking and arduous task. Ross Conrad spoke about his Natural Beekeeping methods with an emphasis on Varroa control and nutrition. He mentioned the fact that plants are producing less, and less nutritious, pollen due to elevated CO2 levels in the atmosphere. This has caused plants to produce higher amounts of sugar and lower amounts of protein. Not a good situation, and one that we have no control over. Marla added that researchers are working to identify the compounds in pollen that bees need for optimum health so that it might be synthesized, but that is in its infancy. Ross shared a story of a beekeeper that lost half of his colonies (around 250) and his others were dwindling and he didn't know why. He thought it might be nosema ceranae (which has no observable symptoms) so he tried feeding them 2:1 syrup with 4 times the amount of Honey-Bee-Healthy (essential oils) than is recommended. The bees refused it, so he drenched them with a cup of the solution. Just poured it into the hive over the bees. He repeated this several times over several weeks and the bees recovered and thrived. Apparently this technique is being used by others with non-vigorous and dwindling colonies and it's working. This is something that we need to find out more about. (I wish I had known about this as I watched hive G1 dwindle and die out while refusing syrup in September, I would have given it a shot.) These are just a few of the highlights and we'll discuss current findings in greater depth at future meetings. Fun Fact: Most propolis is gathered from Cottonwood leaf buds, not pines. Surprise! There were also presentations by both the Wisconsin Honey Queen and American Honey Queen, outlining their year's activities in spreading the word about honey. The Wisconsin Honey Queen was present at some of the Wisconsin Bee Clubs' activities (Dodge-Jefferson Beekeepers for one) and it might be something to consider for one of our outings. Our next meeting is November 18 at the Caestecker Library in Green Lake at 9:30 a.m. This will be our first time there so we’ll need to find our way around. Hopefully Linda DeNell will have a welcoming committee with coffee and Danish. Or just someone to point the way. We will be discussing more about gaining 501c3 status, and our 501c3 committee is meeting with the Dodge-Jefferson Beekeepers for a club meeting/pot luck on November 12 to discuss how it works for them. Things like insurance and grants may be part of the bigger picture, and that’s part of what the committee hopes to learn. See you then. Gerard
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ECWBA NewsletterSince 2009 Archives
March 2019
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