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Beekeeping Events 2014

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Official Number In!

CDFA Reports

2013 Apiary Shipments to California

3,321

Report Pesticide Incidents! Bee kills should immediately be reported. Contact the National Pesticide Information Center (NPIC) by clicking on the pic or directly to the EPA at beekill@epa.gov. Only with documentation can changes within the industry be made.

Beekeepers and Growers: Don't Delay Your Contracts!

Joe Traynor, PAm Board member and pollination broker, warns beekeepers to secure their 2015 almond contracts by September. Traynor advises this, "so you don't get shut out of the game or have to rent bees at unsustainable prices." PAm has a sample almond pollination agreement.

PAm participated in the Grassland's Conference held in Manhattan, KS this past summer. The recordings have just been released. This venue was an unique opportunity for PAm to raise awareness about habitat loss for honey bees. Click on the pic to read more.

BUZZ Worthy Articles

Catch the Buzz - Research Reveals True Value of Cover Crops to Farmers and Environment

Good Fruit Grower - Bees Live In A Toxic World

Good Fruit Grower - Practices To Help Ensure Successful Pollination

Emergency Response Kit

Bee Informed Partnership offers this service to aid beekeepers with crashing hives that require immediate attention. Through ERKs, beekeepers gain a better understanding of the factors that contribute to their colony loss and what factors that may be ruled out. To order kits call (301) 405-3799 or askbeeinformed@gmail.com

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Project Apis m.

6775 Chardonnay Road

Paso Robles, CA 93446

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April 2014

Requeening - Spring Rite of Rebuilding

In many parts of the country, Spring has sprung in the apiary yard. With the exodus of honey bee colonies from the almond orchard, beekeepers are preparing for next years' pollination season. Colonies are being split, half receiving a brand new queen, with the older queen in the other half being replaced. The rite of rebuilding starts with the queen. Reproductive quality and longevity of queens has been a beekeeper concern in recent years. A strong queen production industry exists, but queen producers are limited by the genetic diversity of available breeding stock. The Honey Bee Act of 1922 prohibited the importation of honey bees. With just a few exceptions, additional material for breeding purposes has not been available for 92 years! The 1 million queens per year needed for requeening commercial colonies had come from less than 500 queen 'mothers.' Honey bee stock improvements have been made with WSU's Dr. Steve Sheppard and his team who travel to Old World countries to collect germplasm. With funding from PAm, a new cryopreservation unit has been purchased with holding capacity of 40,000 semen samples. Diversity at long last will now become more available. Long live the queen!

Meg Ribotto, Editor

PAm Purchases Cryopreservation Unit at Washington State University

With funding from Costco, PAm has purchased a cryopreservation unit for WSU in Pullman, WA. Above is Dr. Steve Sheppard and Germplasm Repository Manager, Brandon Hopkins, showing off the unit that will house domestic and international germplasm samples. Costco, with their Kirkland Signature brand, has made an investment in honey bee health with 2% of their honey sales going to PAm.

No Bees - No Food

PAm Board Member, John Miller

John Miller gives a TEDx talk on the University of North Carolina campus. John is the owner of Miller Honey Farms and a fourth-generation beekeeper who manages bees for honey production and crop pollination. Learn how honey bees put food on your table and how the global decline in bees may affect food production in this 12:45 minute video.

Commercial Beekeepers - Sign Up!

National Management Survey 2013-2014

Starting April 1st through the 30th, the Bee Informed Partnership (BIP) will be collecting information from U.S. beekeepers. Follow this link to sign up. The online survey is conducted each year to quantify the colony losses suffered by US beekeepers over the winter. It is important that beekeepers who manage colonies for crop production participate. The 2-part survey only takes a few minutes to complete. A majority of last year's participants were backyard beekeepers and manage a small fraction of the colonies represented in the survey. For this reason, we need better data representative of national commercial losses. Sign-up this month!

BDG Donates $100K to PAm

Since 1976, Blue Diamond has helped fund research in more than 70 projects focused on the health of bees, pollination and colony health. BDG recently donated an additional $100,000 to Project Apis m. Why PAm? The company released this statement, "Project Apis m. is committed to providing growers with healthier bees resulting in better pollination and increased crop yields. Blue Diamond believes in their mission of pursuing science-based solutions to honey bee challenges." PAm works closely with the almond industry. Dan Cummings, PAm Board Member, also serves on the BDG Board of Directors. Christi Heintz and Meg Ribotto contribute to BDG's Almond Facts magazine, The Bee Box. Thank you Blue Diamond for your support!

April Bee Husbandry

Requeen maintaining genetic quality to meet your objectives.
Select stocks that are productive and disease and pest resistant.
Encourage high drone densities during mating season to provide well-mated queens and genetically diverse colonies.
Discourage stocks that are excessively defensive.
Control swarming by making nucs and/or splits.
Check hives for pests and diseases. Early detection is key.
Use diagnostic services for objective colony assessment.
Follow regional guidelines for action thresholds for Varroa and Nosema control.

Project Apis m | | christih@cox.net | http://www.ProjectApism.org
6775 Chardonnay Road

Paso Robles, CA 93446