FFAR & AAVMC Announce 2023 Honey Bee Vet Fellows

The Foundation for Food & Agriculture Research (FFAR) and the American Association of Veterinary Medical Colleges (AAVMC) announced the 13 recipients of the 2023 Veterinary Student Research Fellowship (FFAR Vet Fellows). This unique fellowship creates opportunities for veterinary students around the world to conduct research advancing global food security, sustainable animal production and environmental sustainability.

Veterinarians trained in animal science and public health are critical to addressing many global challenges within the veterinary and agricultural fields. Through the FFAR Vet Fellows program, veterinary students can pursue research outside of the biomedical sciences and gain experiential learning opportunities with a qualified mentor. This fellowship culminates with student presentations at the annual Veterinary Scholars Symposium.

“There are few funding opportunities for veterinary students to gain the research experience needed to adequately prepare them to address climate change, emerging infectious diseases, antimicrobial resistance and other issues that threaten sustainable livestock production,” said Nikki Dutta, FFAR interim scientific program lead for Advanced Animal Systems. “FFAR is excited to support this fifth cohort of FFAR Vet Fellows to give these students a leg up on their veterinary research and public service careers.”

The 2023 FFAR Honey Bee Vet Fellows include:

Madison Rowe

Texas A&M University

Honey bees are an ecologically and economically important livestock species often overlooked in veterinary agricultural research. Rowe is studying the behavioral and reproductive effects of a detrimental gastrointestinal fungus, Nosema ceranae, in honey bee queens and workers to determine the indirect impacts of infection. This research will inform future treatments and supportive care for the disease, as well as trace potential production impacts that occur prior to colony collapse.

Courtney Wallner

Tufts Cummings School of Veterinary Medicine

Honey bees pollinate over 80% of all flowering plants, including many agricultural crops. They play an integral role in ecosystem health and food security but face numerous threats from parasitism to pesticide toxicity. In 2017, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration issued a directive that tasked veterinarians with overseeing their care, yet honey bees are the only food-producing species not traditionally taught in U.S. veterinary schools. To address this knowledge gap, Wallner is designing a honey bee medicine curriculum tailored to veterinary students and professionals to increase the number of veterinarians able to see honey bees as patients.

Foundation for Food & Agriculture Research

The Foundation for Food & Agriculture Research (FFAR) builds public-private partnerships to fund bold research addressing big food and agriculture challenges. FFAR was established in the 2014 Farm Bill to increase public agriculture research investments, fill knowledge gaps and complement the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s research agenda. FFAR’s model matches federal funding from Congress with private funding, delivering a powerful return on taxpayer investment. Through collaboration and partnerships, FFAR advances actionable science benefiting farmers, consumers and the environment.

About the AAVMC

The member institutions of the American Association of Veterinary Medical Colleges (AAVMC) promote and protect the health and wellbeing of people, animals and the environment by advancing the profession of veterinary medicine and preparing new generations of veterinarians to meet the evolving needs of a changing world. Founded in 1966, the AAVMC represents more than 40,000 faculty, staff and students across the global academic veterinary medical community. Our member institutions include Council on Education (COE) accredited veterinary medical colleges and schools in the United States, Canada, Mexico, the Caribbean, the United Kingdom, Europe, Asia, Australia and New Zealand, as well as departments of veterinary science and departments of comparative medicine in the U.S.

Contact: Michelle Olgers, 804.304.4200, molgers@foundationfar.org

Eric Hedin

A week ago, my wife came in and announced, “There’s a scary-looking bees’ nest in the lilac bush!” Wasps routinely try to build nests around our house, so I was prepared for the worst when I went out to investigate. What I found was a basketball-sized cluster of honey bees — a “swarm.” There was no nest, only a living ball of thousands of bees hanging from a branch.

I’ve never done any beekeeping, but fortunately, we have some friends who do. We had no idea, but apparently a swarm of bees in May on an easily accessible branch is something to get excited about! Soon, our beekeeper friends rolled up in their pickup truck. One pulled on jacket and bee-proof bonnet, set a large container (a portable hive box) on top of a stepladder underneath the swarm, took hold of the branch, and shook it. The swarm of bees, all festooned together, fell in a clump into the box. Or, rather, most of them did. Hundreds of them draped over the sides, which our undaunted friend scooped into the box (with gloved hands), while hundreds more buzzed around. The couple who came kept reassuring us, “They’re not going to sting because they’re focused on staying with the queen.” I learned that the queen bee’s presence is of utmost importance for the thousands of others.

Thanks for the Bees

Our friends extended thanks for the bees, then went home, while we went inside for a belated supper. The next day, I saw a smaller swarm around a branch in the same lilac bush. Here’s the interesting thing. Our friends said that they didn’t think they had captured the queen since the bees were acting agitated, so they came right back over to recover the remaining small swarm. When they added it to the hive with the bulk of the bees, all of them settled down right away. The queen had come home.

Here was a fascinating example of a finely tuned aspect of living organisms that was surely worth further investigation. A trip to the university library and online research quickly yielded multiple sources of information about honey bees from specialists of all types. As I’ve read up on bee behavior and their life cycles, a striking picture appears of ingenious design in living systems.

Natural Engineering

A recent research article reported on the use of x-ray microscopy to provide three-dimensional, time-resolved details on how bees manufacture their iconic honeycomb structure. Several observations from the authors are worth mentioning:¹

Honeycomb is one of nature’s best engineered structures.

Engineers recognize design, and never has good human-level engineering come about by anything other than intelligent design.

Honeycomb is a structure that has both fascinated and inspired humans for millennia, including serving as inspiration for many engineering structures. It is a multifunctional structure that acts as a store for food, a nursery for developing honey bee brood, and a physical structure upon which honey bees live. It is constructed of wax produced by bees in specialized glands in their abdomen. Wax is an expensive commodity and so comb construction can be quite costly for a honey bee colony. Honeycomb is constructed in such a way to minimize wax consumption.

Honeycomb construction is optimized to serve multiple purposes for the bee colony, subject to the constraint of material and labor costs. Sounds like the bees are a responsible engineering firm.

The ability of bees to “know” how to manufacture the structurally optimal hexagonal-packed honeycomb is even more amazing when one considers that the worker bees constructing it hatched less than three weeks earlier.

While not a perfect analogy, a colony of bees may be compared to a multicellular living organism. Each member of the colony seems to know what to do at each stage of its life for the good of the whole “organism.” An isolated bee will soon die, even if supplied with nutrients, suggesting that it is designed to function as part of the whole.

Arranged by a Designer

We could say that the whole honey bee colony is greater than just the sum of its individual members. This state of affairs usually arises when the individual components of a complex system are specifically arranged by a designer to accomplish a predetermined purpose. Consider any complex electrical or mechanical device. All of the components of my laptop would make a fascinating pile if laid out on a table; but they’re even more fascinating when assembled and functioning together as a whole, according to their designed purpose.

A professor of entomology at Iowa State University, studying the behavior of honey bee colonies, writes:

Each bee appears to specialize, for a time at least, on a particular job. Thinking about this, you may decide that a single bee is somewhat like a single cell of your own body. The work force in charge of a particular job, such as feeding larvae, would then correspond to one of your tissues. And if you follow this analogy further, you may conclude that a colony of honey bees is like an organism — a superorganism.²

Aspects of an organism that manifest in a honey bee colony include caring for developing larvae, securing and processing nutrients (similar to metabolism), tending the queen (whose presence coordinates the behavior of the entire colony), guarding the hive and patrolling for intruders (similar to an immune system), temperature regulation (fanning their wings to cool the hive, clustering and vibrating their wings to heat the cluster of bees), growth of the whole colony in terms of the number of individual bees, reproduction of the “organism” (resulting in the phenomenon of the honey bee swarm), coordination of activities mediated by a variety of communication channels, and a sense of purpose.

Observers of complex, functional systems, whether nonliving or alive, rationally conclude that, “If something works, it’s not happening by accident.”³

Beyond Mere Survival

The honey bee colony “works” and accomplishes a purpose beyond mere survival. It diligently stockpiles nectar which its workers convert to honey in amounts exceeding its needs.⁴ Honey’s unique ingredients give it value as a food source for humans that has been recognized for millennia.

The high total sugar concentration [primarily fructose and glucose, with a smaller amount of sucrose] in honey is beneficial in that most yeasts cannot ferment in it. Also, together with one other constituent (glucose oxidase), it gives the honey antimicrobial properties, and it can be stored safe from spoilage…⁵

Beyond the direct production of honey for our use, the role of honeybees as pollinators is of critical importance in agriculture:

Bees and other pollinators play a critical role in our food production system. More than 100 U.S. grown crops rely on pollinators. The added revenue to crop production from pollinators is valued at $18 billion.⁶

Continuing to ponder bee behavior, comments made by Professor Richard Trump of Iowa State University are instructive:

If a honey bee, with her microbrain, knows what she is doing, this is cause for wonder. If she does not know — if she is fully programmed by those sub-microchips of DNA that come to her as a legacy from her ancestors — this is even greater cause for wonder. It is incredible.⁷

Here are a couple of examples that may cause us to wonder how bees know how to do what they do. Researchers have found that bees possess an internal organic timer, which in conjunction with an awareness of the rotation of the Earth, allows them to efficiently time their foraging activities to arrive at flowers when pollen sources are at their peak.

The famous “waggle dance” that a scout bee performs back at the hive after discovering a food source communicates to other bees (by touching, since the inside of the hive is dark) both the distance and the direction of the food in relation to the current position of the sun. Bee keepers have found that if they reorient the honeycomb on which the bee is dancing, the undaunted bee will adapt its dance so that it still correctly communicates the proper direction to the food source.⁸ Sometimes the dancing scout bee will continue its dance for more than an hour, and over this time, the position of the sun has changed. In response, the bee will compensate for the sun’s movement across the sky by gradually adjusting the angle of its dance.

How Many Lines of Code?

If humans tried to duplicate the capabilities of honey bees by building and programming mini-robots that could fly, how many lines of code would have to be written and executed to make an artificial bee? We can also ask what the likelihood is of all this coded information arising from unguided natural processes. Someone committed to the evolutionary paradigm might answer that any genomic changes that offered a survival advantage would’ve been locked in by the ratchet-like mechanism of natural selection until primitive bee ancestors evolved into the complex, coordinated colonies of honey bees seen today.

Systems engineer Steve Laufmann, co-author of the recent book Your Designed Body, addresses the engineering hurdles facing any proposed evolutionary explanation:

…when evolutionary biologists hypothesize about small and apparently straightforward changes to a species during its evolutionary history, the biologists tend to skip both the thorny engineering details of what’s necessary to make the system work, and the bigger picture of how any system change has to be integrated with all the other systems it interacts with. The result is that biologists tend to massively underestimate the complexities involved.

And here’s the rub: if they’ve massively underestimated those complexities, then they’ve massively underestimated the challenge for any gradual, materialistic evolutionary process to build up these systems a little bit at a time while maintaining coherence and function. 

1. 324-325

The difficulties outlined by Laufmann are in the context of the human body, but they apply equally well to the complexities of a colony of honey bees. Bee keepers are all too aware of the precarious balance between life and death throughout a single year for a colony of bees. Engineers know that making changes to a delicately balanced complex functional system, even small ones, have a way of upsetting the balance — not towards better function but towards failure and collapse.

Honey bees offer us a glimpse of a remarkable living system involving interdependent, communally cooperative behavior. In some ways, they outshine the best in conscious human attempts to build a thriving society.  Perhaps we can learn a thing or two from the humble bee.

Notes

1. Rahul Franklin, Sridhar Niverty, Brock A. Harpur, Nikhilesh Chawla, “Unraveling the Mechanisms of the Apis mellifera Honeycomb Construction by 4D X-ray Microscopy,” Advanced Materials, Vol. 34, Issue 42, Oct. 20, 2022.
2. Richard F. Trump, Bees and Their Keepers, (Iowa State University Press, Ames, IA, 1987).
3. https://evolutionnews.org/2021/12/caltech-finds-amazing-role-for-noncoding-dna/
4. How do bees make honey? From the hive to the pot | Live Science(accessed 5/28/2023).
5. Diana Sammataro and Alphonse Avitabile, Beekeeper’s Handbook, (New York: Cornell University Press, 1998).
6. 25.2020 (usda.gov).
7. Trump, Bees and Their Keepers, p. 78.
8. Trump, Bees and Their Keepers, pp. 80-1.

ERIC HEDIN

Eric R. Hedin earned his doctorate in experimental plasma physics from the University of Washington, and conducted post-doctoral research at the Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm, Sweden. He has taught physics and astronomy at Taylor University and Ball State University in Indiana, and at Biola University in Southern California. At Ball State, his research interests focused on computational nano-electronics and higher-dimensional physics. His BSU course, The Boundaries of Science, attracted national media attention. Dr. Hedin’s recent book, Canceled Science: What Some Atheists Don’t Want You to See, highlights scientific evidence pointing to design.

We are here to share current happenings in the bee industry. Bee Culture gathers and shares articles published by outside sources. For more information about this specific article, please visit the original publish source: Natural Engineering in Honey Bee Lifestyle | Evolution News

• By SIMON GONZALEZ N.C. COOPERATIVE EXTENSION SERVICE

N.C. State apiculture specialists educate beekeepers about better management techniques and best management practices. Photo courtesy of N.C. State University

In the winter of 2006, a distressing phenomenon began to make headlines.

Beekeepers across the country were reporting troubling losses of their honey bee hives, at a scale and for causes not seen before.

The majority of worker bees in a colony would disappear, leaving behind the queen, plenty of honey, and a few nurse and immature bees. Colonies cannot survive without worker bees, and as many as 90% of beekeepers’ hives were being lost.

Stories about Colony Collapse Disorder (CCD) were amplified with the vital role that honey bees play in pollination and their critical link in agriculture production. There were dire warnings that the collapse of the honey bee population would lead to the collapse of the national and global food supply.

Soon after CCD stories became widespread, David Tarpy, N.C. State University Extension specialist in apiculture and beekeeping, noticed a phenomenon of his own.

“When I started in 2003 it was before CCD hit all the headlines,” he said.

“There were just under 1,200 members of the state association. Today there are nearly 5,000. They had 44 county chapters that met once a month. Now there’s something like 89 chapters, and half of them meet in their local Extension office. We have the most beekeepers in the nation, probably outright but definitely per capita.”

Motivations can vary.

Some North Carolina beekeepers do it for business opportunities, to harvest the honey to sell at farmers markets or to friends, family and neighbors. A few beekeepers have expanded their hives and are providing commercial pollination services.

But just about all of them have something in common.

“Most of them are getting into it because they hear that bees are in trouble,” Tarpy said.

“It’s something they’ve always been curious about, and always wanted to do. It was enough of a curiosity and impulse to get started and keep bees as a hobby.”

Seth Nagy, extension director in Caldwell County, observed something similar in his area.

“When Colony Collapse Disorder showed up and it was in the news cycle, locally we went from beekeepers calling us occasionally to a massive increase in awareness about bees,” he said. “We might be talking to somebody and suggest a crop protectant or a pesticide, and they might say something like, ‘Well, I don’t want to do anything that harms the bees. I know we need them.’ ”

May 20 is World Bee Day, first proclaimed by the United Nations General Assembly in 2018. It was chosen in honor of Anton Janša, a pioneer of modern apiculture who was born on the date in Slovenia in 1734.

The purpose of the day is not to celebrate Janša, but rather to raise awareness of the ecological importance of bees and their general health.

In 2022, the good news is there are plenty of honey bees. But there are significant challenges.

“A lot of people equate all bees as being the same,” Tarpy said. “Solitary native bees that are not under the purview of humans are in decline because of habitat loss. Since honey bees are managed they aren’t going extinct. We just have difficulty in keeping them healthy.”

“We are doing research on different stressors of honey bees to try to find ways to mitigate them,” Tarpy said. “That leads directly into our extension work, which is to educate beekeepers about better management techniques and best management practices. That’s where we have our most effective impact, trying to make existing beekeepers better.”

Among the major stressors affecting the health of honey bees are parasites and pathogens, disease agents that make bees sick. The worst of them is a parasitic mite called varroa.

“That’s what a lot of our training is focused on,” Tarpy said. “There are many different options, but there’s no silver bullet. You can do the same thing to two different colonies and they’ll respond differently. It’s about trying to get beekeepers to understand the complexity of the entire issue.”

Other stressors are pesticides and environmental contaminants, things that bees can encounter in their environment that are toxic to them; and nutritional stress, including habitat loss that reduces the amount of pollen and nectar-bearing flowers.

“It used to be possible to be a bee haver; you could have a hive of honey bees and let them do their thing. You’d go in there once a year and take excess honey, and that was about it,” Tarpy said.

“Now you have to be an active beekeeper, because there have been these introduced disease agents that our bees don’t have a natural defense against. As a result. they succumb to them if left on their own. So honey bees really do need a lot more hand-holding these days than before.”

Much of the education component takes place through the Beekeeper Education & Engagement System (BEES), an online resource that offers courses for beginning and advanced beekeepers.

“We built the BEES network to empower the Extension agents so that they didn’t have to be experts in beekeeping,” Tarpy said. “They could rely on my expertise and these online lecture materials to educate their local beekeepers.”

Before the pandemic, Extension apiculture added an in-person element with the introduction of three regional BEES Academies, held in Caldwell, Chatham and Brunswick counties. The academies took elements from the online course and added live training sessions conducted by Tarpy.

“The idea was we would take newer or even seasoned beekeepers and help add to their knowledge, dive into some of these topics like disease management and hive management,” said Nagy, whose Extension center hosted one of the events. “The second day we had some hands-on components where we did mite checks, as well as some things with the industry like hive products and how to expand offerings that could generate revenue. It was just a fascinating program.”

COVID-19 restrictions put the academies on hold, but there are plans to resume in the fall.

Another development on the horizon that will empower Extension to help North Carolina beekeepers is construction of a new field research facility in Raleigh, replacing the dilapidated building that was condemned.

“The state beekeepers, on hearing the news that our field research facility was condemned in late 2020, went to the state legislature and got funding for a new field lab,” Tarpy said. “That is in the works to be built in the next few years. It will include an Extension center so we can start having Extension activities at our field lab again.”

While there are challenges, Tarpy encourages anyone who has thought about becoming a beekeeper to take the plunge.

“Anything to promote bees is helpful,” he said. “It’s a great gateway into agriculture, a great way into farming and local produce.”

We are here to share current happenings in the bee industry. Bee Culture gathers and shares articles published by outside sources. For more information about this specific article, please visit the original publish source: N.C. State aids beekeepers with hive health | | journalpatriot.com

$15K grant supports local efforts in eastern Kansas

Kansas teens are learning how to plan, plant and maintain habitats that attract butterflies, bees and other pollinators. (Photo courtesy of Cheri Nelsen, Wildcat Extension District)

MANHATTAN, Kan. – An ambitious group of teenagers have set out on a path to improve pollinator habitat in their communities, while giving a nod to the important role that bees and butterflies play in food production.

Cheri Nelsen, a 4-H youth development agent in K-State Research and Extension’s Wildcat District, said the teens are learning how to plan, plant and maintain habitats that attract pollinators.

“Many youth know about pollinators like bees and butterflies, but they don’t always know what is needed for attracting and keeping pollinators,” Nelsen said.

Earlier this year, Nelsen and Leavenworth County extension agent Sonya Murphy were awarded a $15,000 grant from the National 4-H Council and Corteva Agriscience to support community-based pollinator projects.

The group includes youth from the Wildcat District – which includes Crawford, Labette, Montgomery and Wilson counties in southeast Kansas – and Leavenworth County (northeast Kansas). Nelsen said 17 youth have received initial training for teaching others; each of those youth is charged with teaching an additional 250 youth about pollinator habitats.

National wildlife conservation officials have put recent emphasis on creating habitat that attracts pollinators. As an example, in mid-2022, the iconic monarch butterfly – known for its bright orange and black markings – was placed on the endangered list, a result of habitat destruction and climate change, among other reasons.

As they move about, pollinators often choose milkweed to lay eggs.

“Maintaining a healthy habitat is important for pollinators,” Nelsen said. In nature, bees, butterflies and other pollinators carry pollen from the male part of a flower (known as the stamen) to the female part of the same or another flower.

Nelsen adds: “We all need to eat, and pollinators also play a vital role in food production (by pollinating food crops). For myself, I enjoy watching kids learn new things and doing things to help the community.”

In Parsons, youth are planting a seven acre plot to native plants. Nelsen said part of the process is determining what type of pollinator plants need to be included.

In Leavenworth County, youth are planning a pollinator garden at the Veteran’s Administration hospital.

Nelsen said youth have also taught lessons at Earth Day and in local schools, and are planning events during the upcoming county fair season.

We are here to share current happenings in the bee industry. Bee Culture gathers and shares articles published by outside sources. For more information about this specific article, please visit the original publish source: 4-H Youth Launch Projects to Improve Pollinator Habitat | Morning Ag Clips

Lucile will be assembling and distributing 600 seed packets for free. She will also offer free seed packets to ship anywhere in the United States after you pay a $1 shipping fee. When you get the seeds, you will plant them to produce flowers for pollinators. This seed blend is made for North America. Once the flowers bloom, they will feed the pollinators a more diverse diet. By producing more flowers, this could help fight against starvation, disease, and loss of resources to our pollinators.

Lucile will be giving presentations in southeastern Oklahoma and distributing seed packets for free. To schedule a meeting at a school, business, 4-H or other club please call (580) 743-6992.

If you would like a seed packet, please email: Beeboxcustomercare@gmail.com.

Thank you to our sponsor Oklahoma 4-H Foundation for this grant opportunity. To ensure future years of this service project she will be accepting donations for next year. Questions about the project? Email: Beeboxcustomercare@gmail.com

Set to break ground this summer, the new Honey Bee Research Centre on Stone Road will be a state-of-the-art research and education/outreach destination

Barbara Latkowski

A new facility for honey bee research, education, advocacy and outreach is coming to the University of Guelph.

Set to break ground this summer, the new $16.1-million Honey Bee Research Centre (HBRC) will be a state-of-the-art research and education/outreach destination dedicated to all aspects of honey bee health and well-being.

The new HBRC will be located on a former U of G physical resources tree nursery, east of the main campus near the corner of Stone Road East and Victoria Road. Work is currently underway clearing the property.

The current version of the Honey Bee Research Centre is at Townsend House which is a 1960’s bungalow on Stone Road East.

“They’ve outgrown that facility a long time ago,” said John Cranfield, associate dean for external relations at the University of Guelph’s Agricultural College.

The completion of the new Honey Bee Research Centre is projected for fall 2024.

Cranfield said the aim is to have a ground-breaking celebration in June, to not only thank people who have shown their support, but to raise awareness and attention to the project.

“We are really excited about the project and what it can do to raise awareness for the role of pollinators as well as what we are doing at the University of Guelph to make sure that we are addressing pollinator health, wild and managed, because we do both here at our college,” Cranfield said.

With a significant increase in honey bee colony mortality over the last decade, research is becoming increasingly important.

Honey bees are necessary for 1/3 of the food that humans consume. HBRC’S mandate is to support the future of honey bees through research, teaching and outreach.

“There’s one thread that weaves all of humanity together throughout all of time, and that is ‘what we eat.’ We all have to eat, and we know that pollinators of all kinds play an important role in the production of food,” Cranfield said.

“We have a long history. We’ve had a honey bee research centre and apiary since 1894. So, we are well versed on it and that is why we are really excited about this amazing facility.

“Our Honey Bee Research Centre is recognized globally for the science that comes out of the centre and the outreach that happens. There’s the scientific discovery that is fundamental to improving bee health, but there’s also the outreach that makes that research tangible for bee keepers,” Cranfield said

“It’s about putting that knowledge into action and into the hands of bee keepers.”

In addition to a 100 hive apiary, the new HBRC will be a 15,000 sq.ft facility that includes space for research, production and outreach programs, a research laboratory, as well as office and classroom space.

It will also serve as a demonstration facility for best practices in commercial beekeeping and honey production, enable world class research on honey bee health, and act as a vehicle for increased community outreach and public education.

Cranfield said that a very large part of the building will be public-facing.

“We are calling that the discovery centre, and that is the outreach component,” Cranfield said.

“We’ve designed the facility so that we can host school groups and other social functions. There’s a range of different options that can be housed at that facility, and right now, we don’t have that at Townsend House, at least not on the scale that we need.”

The University of Guelph has the largest research apiary in North America, he noted.

“The new centre will offer a dedicated space for learning. It’s a great way to help young people put STEM into action, in helping them understand the important role of pollinators.”

In terms of accessibility, the centre will be near a bus and bike route, surrounded by pollinator gardens and walking trails.

“There are wetlands all around us. What is really key is that there are nearby sources of pollen throughout the year, so when trees are beginning to leaf in the spring, that is an important source for pollinators. Throughout the summer, natural and planted flower beds are important. So, when bees wake up from winter, will have access to pollen and access to the environment which is important for what they do,” Cranfield said.

Located adjacent to the arboretum, Cranfield said this will help create a flow of people between two functional areas of the university.

“Visitors from the arboretum can also discover what we do at the Honey Bee Research Centre,” Cranfield said.

“This is great in making sure that we are all working together to activate that part of the campus and further enhance how we can engage with the public around nature, around pollinators, and around what we are doing at the university to help support both.”

So far, the project has raised $13.38 million towards a $16.1-million goal.

We are here to share current happenings in the bee industry. Bee Culture gathers and shares articles published by outside sources. For more information about this specific article, please visit the original publish source: New Honey Bee Research Centre creating a buzz at U of G – Guelph News (guelphtoday.com)

Each year, the North American Pollinator Protection Campaign (NAPPC), in conjunction with several partners, solicits nominations for eight prestigious awards: the Pollinator Advocate Award (3 countries), the Farmer-Rancher Pollinator Conservation Award (3 countries), the Pollinator Roadside Management Award, and the Pollinator Electric Power Award.

Nominees in all categories understand just how important pollinators are to food, culture, and life. They have taken that extra step to help out the birds, bees, butterflies, moths, and bats that support agriculture and ecosystems everywhere. NAPPC, through its recognition and appreciation of all awardees, encourages their activities and hopes to catalyze future actions on behalf of pollinators. Each year, awards are given in Canada, the United States, and Mexico supporting all of the work that goes into protecting North American pollinator populations. Winners of these awards are recognized at the North American Pollinator Protection Campaign Conference hosted annually in October.

2022 POLLINATOR AWARD WINNERS

OHIO DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION

2022 POLLINATOR ROADSIDE AWARD

The Ohio Department of Transportation, (ODOT) planted wildflower sites across the state purely for aesthetics in the 1990s. The Department realized the practice was not sustainable in its current form and discontinued the practice. In 2011, ODOT was approached by the Ohio Department of Natural Resource’s Division of Wildlife and Pheasants Forever to install a sustainable prairie on the western edge of the state in Darke County. The planting was successful and with a subsequent test site focusing on plants that benefit pollinators and wildlife began ODOT’s pollinator habitat effort. With minor adjustments to its seed mixture, the Department determined a prairie could be created that would meet the needs of both initiatives, which greatly increased the number of public-private partners. In 2016, ODOT created a fully funded standalone Highway Beautification and Pollinator Habitat Program to capture the numerous opportunities available to enhance and establish pollinator habitat along the state’s 19,000 miles of roadside. The coordinator works with local, state and federal agencies, non- profit organizations and other partner organizations to plan and implement new roadside pollinator habitats.

DISNEY SOLAR POLLINATOR PROJECT

2022 POLLINATOR ELECTRIC POWER AWAR

Disney set ambitious goals to drastically improve the sustainability and carbon footprint of company operations by 2020 including a 50% reduction of net emissions by 2020 from 2012 levels. To help achieve this goal, Disney worked with ORIGIS Energy USA, Duke Energy, Reedy Creek Improvement District, and Reedy Creek Energy Services to bring two solar facilities online, which offsets enough electricity to operate two out of the four Disney theme parks in Orlando. However, the story does not stop at clean energy. In continued commitment to wildlife and conservation, teams from Disney Conservation, Origis Energy USA, Duke Energy, Reedy Creek Improvement District, Disney Horticulture, other contractors, and individual experts worked together to create pollinator-friendly habitat at the solar facilities. The project goal is to not only add conservation value for native pollinators and wildlife, but also to provide valuable research meadow. Disney’s current research aims are to continue to develop best management practices for long term habitat maintenance, to study solar habitat impacts on native bees, and to study how under-panel microclimate affects flowering phenology and abundance. This project allows us to lead and support other businesses in setting a new bar for industry standards and corporate conservation.

To see ALL the Award Winners go to; Awards | Pollinator.org

We are here to share current happenings in the bee industry. Bee Culture gathers and shares articles published by outside sources. For more information about this specific article, please visit the original publish source: Awards | Pollinator.org

Auburn University professors, from left to right, Roberto Molinari, Geoffrey Williams and Stephanie Rogers were part of an international research team that studied the national and global decline of the Apis mellifera honey bee colonies.

Apis Mellifera honey bees are important insect pollinators whose impact has environmental, ecological and economical ramifications across the world. Recent research shows that U.S. beekeepers experienced a 43% colony loss for the crucial winged insect between April 2019 and April 2020.

Auburn University faculty members Roberto Molinari from the Department of Mathematics and Statistics, Geoffrey Williams from the Department of Entomology & Plant Pathology and Stephanie Rogers from the Department of Geosciences were part of an international team of scholars who researched the phenomenon of honey bee colony loss occurring in the U.S. The group recently published findings from its study in “Scientific Reports” as part of a collection dedicated to insect decline and extinction. Here they discuss what elevated colony losses mean for the future, as well as discuss how their study can help beekeepers better manage their colonies moving forward.

What are the main drivers of honey bee decline?

Molinari: Honey bee colony loss is widespread across the U.S., although it varies considerably across geographical areas and seasons. It is never simple to determine what the drivers of a phenomenon are when you don’t have control over the way the data are collected. Nevertheless, we have the tools to study potential links between stressors and honey bee colony loss over a period spanning from 2015-21. In this perspective, several stressors, on their own and also considered jointly with other drivers, appear to contribute to losses. Among them, Varroa destructor parasitic mites, pesticide exposure and extreme weather events (such as extreme temperature and precipitation events) appear to be the main drivers.

What do scientists know about the varroa mite, and what can be done to combat them?

Williams: The Varroa destructor mite parasitizes western honey bees in nearly every corner of the globe. Both beekeepers and scientists state that it represents a serious challenge for honey bees because it feeds on individual bees; this can result in a compromised immune system and the transfer of virsuses. Although much effort has been placed on better understanding and managing varroa, beekeepers still lack sustainable tools to reduce its effects. By taking a national approach, our study confirmed that varroa mites are a major driver of honey bee colony loss in the U.S., but also highlighted regional differences in varroa populations that may help beekeepers better prepare for the mite moving forward.

What role does environment and climate change play in this troubling trend?

Rogers: We found strong evidence across the U.S. that overwintering is the most crucial period of the year for colony loss, but some areas are more strongly affected than others. This finding actually confirms and supports evidence from another recently published paper that we developed in parallel to this work and that was specifically focused on environmental drivers. These results can be used to develop regional best-management practices to assist at-risk beekeepers in being better prepared for winter. While longitudinal data at much finer spatio-temporal resolution will be needed to fully understand the role of extreme weather events linked to climate change on honey bee colony loss, our results do provide some important preliminary insights, including the increased risk of loss linked to extreme events.

Which methods were used to collect data for this study, and what were your goals for teaming together for this research project?

Molinari: The challenge of this study was aggregating data from different open data sources which were collected at different spatio-temporal resolutions from different institutions. Adopting statistical techniques that enabled us to limit the loss of information, we aggregated these data together to obtain a good picture on the status of managed honey bee colonies, the stressors affecting them and the weather and land use conditions across the United States—over a period spanning from 2015-21.

Once the data processing was finalized, we adopted some state-of-the-art statistical modelling tools to determine the strongest statistical predictors removing the effects of different outlliers and forms of data contamination. This is the first study that has sought to understand honey bee colony loss across the U.S. using open-source data and controlling for different potential predictors. With this interdisciplinary approach, we hope our study will motivate efforts to collaborate across disciplines to tackle this multifaceted problem from many angles. Additionally, we hope these results highlight the need to increase both data collection efforts and data availability to researchers in the U.S., as well as other regions of the world.

Why is this study and this work so crucial to the understanding trends regarding the country’s honey bee population, and how widespread was your collaboration?

Williams: Understanding honey bee colony loss is so important because these bees are crucial pollinators of many agricultural crops, especially here in the U.S. Crops like almonds, blueberries, apples and even carrot seed all rely on honey bees for pollination. What’s novel about our study on honey bee colony health in the United States is its scope—we included data collected over several years and from most parts of the contiguous United States. By collaborating with researchers here at Auburn, the United States and Europe, we were able to shed light on the role of both biotic and abiotic threats.

It also was really encouraging to see such exciting science produced by outstanding young researchers collaborating across the Atlantic and connecting Auburn University and Pennsylvania State University to the University of Geneva (Luca Insolia), the Sant’Anna School of Advanced Studies (and its EMbeDS Department of Excellence) in Italy (Francesca Chiaromonte, also professor at the Pennsylvania State University) and the Norwegian University of Science and Technology (Martina Calovi).

The Expert Answers Q&As and columns reflect the expertise and opinions of individual faculty members and do not necessarily represent an official policy or position of the university.

To arrange an interview with our experts, contact Preston Sparks, director of university communications services, at preston.sparks@auburn.edu.

We are here to share current happenings in the bee industry. Bee Culture gathers and shares articles published by outside sources. For more information about this specific article, please visit the original publish source: Auburn professors discuss causes of national decline in Apis mellifera honey bee colonies

‘It will be an apiary program for students, built by students!’

BY MARIANNE HUTCHINSON RUMFORD FALLS TIMES

Maggie Corlett and Lacey Todd stand behind an observation hive full of honeybees donated by Al Borzelli of Happy Hive Farm in Sumner. This is the same hive and bees that the Western Maine Beekeeper’s Association had on display at the Farmington Fair. Submitted photo

Teachers Maggie Corlett and Lacey Todd are spearheading beekeeping classes for students at Meroby Elementary School and Mountain Valley Middle School, both in Mexico, and planning for an apiary to be built on school grounds this spring. The schools received a $100,000 grant for the bee project from the Maine Department of Education and the plan is to eventually include all schools in the RSU 10 district from the Mountain Valley region in the beekeeping project.

How will beekeeping and taking care of an apiary be helpful to students? What will beekeeping teach students?

Our student population struggles with a high incidence of trauma and ACEs (Adverse Childhood Experiences). We see students struggle with chronic absenteeism, negative behaviors, and poor mental health. Beekeeping has been shown to improve well-being after traumatic events. We have observed that outdoor learning has greatly improved our students’ engagement in learning and we believe that beekeeping will directly benefit our students by giving them an authentic and engaging learning opportunity at school, a hands-on element of their instruction, and a connection to the community where they can (as kids) be a legitimate partner. Our program, called The MVBees, will teach the students about self-regulation, responsibility, empathy, economics, and other life skills such as beekeeping.

We chose MVBees as our name because MV is an abbreviation for Mountain Valley, but it’s also a play on MVP . . . Instead of “Most Valuable Player” it’s “Most Valuable Bees” and also “Mountain Valley Bees,” since this project incorporates the whole Mountain Valley region and not just one school.

What will your program entail?

The MVBees will start with the 4th- and 5th-graders at Meroby Elementary and Mountain Valley Middle School. They will learn all about bees, pollination, ecology, small business creation, and beekeeping. From there, they will prepare presentations and teach the other grade levels in their schools. They will install the bees into the hives and get our apiary growing. Students in both schools will have the opportunity to make art and other items to sell on a student-created website, working together toward a common mission.

In the summertime, we will offer a youth MVBee Academy for students to learn about beekeeping while caring for the summer needs of the hive. Soon we will begin incorporating Rumford Elementary School students into the MVBees program. When the new school is built, with all K-8 students combined, we will have a common project that we are working on together.

How will the community be involved in the apiary and beekeeping process? How will Region 9 School of Applied Technology in Mexico be involved in your schools’ apiary project?

We are looking forward to providing a way for the community to purchase honey, student-made items, and queen bees to help financially sustain our program. At this point, we expect that as ideas come about, more opportunities for community involvement will reveal themselves and we look forward to growing this involvement.

Region 9 School of Applied Technology in Mexico will be a key player in helping us get our apiary built. We are still in the design and planning stages, but it is looking like the Region 9 students will be building several sheds for us, clearing and leveling the land, and helping us make connections with others who can help where they aren’t able. We are excited that RSU 10 students will have such a huge role in this program. It will be an apiary program for students, built by students!

To read the complete article go to; Face Time: Teachers Maggie Corlett and Lacey Todd — buzzing with excitement about beekeeping – Lewiston Sun Journal

We are here to share current happenings in the bee industry. Bee Culture gathers and shares articles published by outside sources. For more information about this specific article, please visit the original publish source: Face Time: Teachers Maggie Corlett and Lacey Todd — buzzing with excitement about beekeeping – Lewiston Sun Journal

Wood says preventing and treating disease in Prairie honey bee colonies is vital to ensure pollination of crops like canola and blueberries.

Angela Hill  •  The Star Phoenix

Sarah Wood was named Chair in Pollinator Health at the U of S Western College of Veterinary Medicine in June. PHOTO BY ANGELA HILL /Saskatoon StarPhoenix

A typical summer day has Sarah Wood outside with bees and probably getting stung.

“It’s just a continuous thing. I don’t really swell up or react to it anymore,” said the recently named chair in pollinator health at the University of Saskatchewan’s Western College of Veterinary Medicine.

The stings don’t slow her down. Wood has been interested in working with and studying bees as a veterinarian since 2014, when she left her veterinary practice in Alberta to return to her home province, Saskatchewan.

“I was a small animal vet, dealing with dogs and cats and snakes, and I decided to return to Saskatoon to specialize and study pathology or diseases of animals,” she said.

“I am interested in the health of many species, but in particular, I’m interested in the health of honey bees and wild bee species in the Prairies.”

 Not only do 70 per cent of Canada’s honey bee colonies live on the Prairies, according to a 2020 report by Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada, but about 80 per cent of Canada’s honey comes from here. These bees are also responsible for billions of dollars in agriculture by pollinating crops like blueberries and canola.

This is why funding for Wood’s work comes from Saskatchewan Beekeepers Development Commission; BASF, a chemical company; SaskCanola; British Columbia Blueberry Council; and Manitoba Canola Growers.

“We work closely with the Manitoba Beekeepers Association, and this investment expands our commitment to a healthy bee population,” Delaney Ross Burtnack, executive director of Manitoba Canola Growers, said in a release about Wood’s new research position announced in June.

 “Bees love canola, and canola loves bees. Both our industries grow when we work together.”

It’s a natural fit for Wood, who has a veterinary degree from U of S, a Bachelor of Science in Biology from Acadia University and a Masters in Environmental Biology from Guelph.

Like pets, honey bee colonies need care and management.

“In order to keep them healthy, it’s just like any other animal, they need to treat them with medications, and they have a variety of diseases,” Wood said.

“People really love their pets, but beekeepers also really love their bees and take this same level of care towards their animals like a pet owner would. It’s rewarding to work with people who care so much about the animals they work with.”

Wood started her research with a PhD project looking at how a specific pesticide treatment on canola seeds impacted honey bees. She learned that there are safe thresholds that won’t affect the bee colony’s ability to make honey or survive winter. During the research in 2015, Wood, her supervisor Elemir Simko, and another student started what has become the honey bee lab today.

 “We were really the first veterinary school to have a honey bee research program in North America,” she said.

In 2018, regulations changed, and beekeepers could no longer access antibiotics without a prescription, so there was an increased need for a relationship with a vet.

“It was just sort of fortuitous that we had this lab up and running when that change occurred and it just kind of grew from there.”

Now Wood runs the lab with 15 members during the summer, as postgraduate, graduate and undergraduate students come together to research and care for their bees.

‘Finding balance’

On a typical summer morning, Wood starts in the lab, first meeting with her students and checking in on their projects. One August day, she found Marina Becerra da Silva, a Brazilian master’s student peering through a microscope at a slide. The setup allows more than one person to look at the same time. Wood sat down and listened as Becerra da Silva updated her on the research.

 Becerra da Silva was first an intern in 2019 in the lab. She chose to come back to the U of S for her graduate work because of Wood.

“It’s amazing working with (Wood) because she is so patient and every day she is happy and gives advice … it’s good vibes, so it’s amazing. She is so smart.”

The bee lab has also attracted researchers from Germany, India, Ukraine, and Canada. The international lab team works on many different projects, including looking at types of bacterial infections in bees, their impacts and if bees can survive them; antibiotic resistance of these bacteria; how to reduce antibiotic usage; and more.

All the students work together to maintain the health of their bee colonies, which are in four locations around Saskatoon. One of these is at the university’s horticulture site. In the afternoon, after she checks in with the students, Wood heads out to the field.

 “One of the huge advantages to our research is we get to be outside quite a bit during the summer, so there is a lot of outdoor activity in addition to lab work,” she said.

Some of the honey produced by the Lab’s hives goes to the people in the lab, which they are all excited to receive. They also sell honey at the vet school to raise funds and awareness of their work. A majority of the honey is sold on the bulk honey market through a commercial bee-keeper, and the money goes to funding students to attend conferences or buy lab equipment.

For the past several years Wood managed her own bee colony in the backyard of her Saskatoon home, but she lost them last winter.

“I can tell you firsthand that it really hurts to lose your colonies,” she said.

 Bee health is measured by the ability to survive the winter. Last winter Canadian beekeepers lost 45.5 per cent of their colonies, with beekeepers in Saskatchewan losing 35 per cent, Wood said. The leading cause was the varroa destructor mite, but access to diverse nutrition and pesticides can all impact a colony’s ability to survive.

With her new research role, Wood said she hopes that by the end of the five-year term there will be a better understanding of how to manage honey bee health while dealing with “climate change and economic uncertainty.”

She wants to pull expertise from veterinary medicine, entomology and agriculture to learn how to better manage stressors on honey bee populations.

“It’s about finding a balance and allowing nature and agriculture to co-exist and be mutually beneficial.”

We are here to share current happenings in the bee industry. Bee Culture gathers and shares articles published by outside sources. For more information about this specific article, please visit the original publish source: https://thestarphoenix.com/life/bridges/healthy-honey-bees-a-priority-for-sarah-wood-at-sask-vet-college

Master Beekeeper program adds groundbreaking Spanish-language track as it celebrates 10th year

Elva Webster draws honey from a hive during a Spanish-language Master Beekeeping class. Credit Carolyn Breece

CORVALLIS, Ore. – Two years ago, Elva Webster knew nothing about bees. Now she’s on her way to tending her own hives as she progresses through a groundbreaking Spanish-language version of a Master Beekeepers program.

The Oregon State University Extension Service’s Master Beekeeper Program, which celebrates its 10^th anniversary this year, added the Spanish track in 2020. It offers the same classes, which teach science-based beekeeping techniques to participants who start out at the apprentice level with a mentor, work through a journey level and progress to the prestigious level of Master Beekeeper.

Carolyn Breece, faculty research assistant and coordinator of the Spanish-language version of Master Beekeepers, said it’s the first program of its kind in the United States. The need for such a program became clear during an OSU beekeeping workshop for commercial beekeepers and crews. As the day went on, she noticed Latino crew members bunched together talking in their first language.

“When trying to translate information in your head to a different language it’s a lot more work,” Breece said. “The benefit of having the class in their native language is that they can relax and talk to each other. It’s a much better experience and the response has been really positive. Participants are engaged. They are very happy to be there learning about bees.”

Participants join for multiple reasons – to join a crew, make their own honey or just for the fascination of bees. But there was no formal training for Spanish-speakers interested in beekeeping. That’s why Breece stepped in, aided by a team of colleagues and supported by Jen Larsen, who coordinates Oregon’s Master Beekeepers.

“One of the areas in which the Master Beekeeper program shines is our mission to provide an in-depth, beginner-level educational experience to beekeepers all around our region,” Larsen said. “Now, with our ability to transmit this information to Spanish-speaking beekeepers, we have filled a gap in our reach that was badly needed. I am so excited to see where this goes, and how we can grow the number of offerings we can provide in Spanish.”

Hives in mind

Webster, who has worked through the first level, is the garden and community engagement coordinator at Huerto de la Familia. The Family Garden, a Lane County nonprofit that provides opportunities and training in organic agriculture and business creation to Spanish-speaking families.

She helps manage the organization’s six community gardens and looks forward to the time she will be managing the volunteer-tended hives. Webster will be passing on the knowledge she learns to gardeners who long for space and gardening education so they can grow the food they ate in their home countries.

“A lot of our Spanish-speaking people are from different countries,” said Webster, who is from Morelia, Michoacan, Mexico. “Some are from Guatemala, El Salvador or Mexico, from small communities and love to grow their own vegetables. They eat different foods and need information in the language they are most familiar with.”

Webster and 13 others took part in three hands-on workshops in the apiary at the OSU Honey Bee Lab. The first of three workshops needed to complete the course was held on a gorgeous day in May, Breece said. Participants suited up to learn the basics of spring beekeeping – how to spot a queen, how to handle a frame and how to inspect for health and well-being.

To read the complete article go to; https://extension.oregonstate.edu/news/master-beekeeper-program-adds-groundbreaking-spanish-language-track-it-celebrates-10th-year

If you are interested in signing up, contact: carolyn.breece@oregonstate.edu

We are here to share current happenings in the bee industry. Bee Culture gathers and shares articles published by outside sources. For more information about this specific article, please visit the original publish source: https://extension.oregonstate.edu/news/master-beekeeper-program-adds-groundbreaking-spanish-language-track-it-celebrates-10th-year

By Caitlin Clark and Emily Sartin, Texas A&M University Division of Marketing & Communications

Juliana Rangel checks hives at the Janice and John G. Thomas ’59 Honey Bee Facility in Bryan, Texas. Laura McKenzie/Texas A&M Marketing & Communications

During the first lecture Juliana Rangel gives in her honey bee biology class, she asks Texas A&M University undergraduates if they enjoy eating fruits, vegetables and nuts. After they answer “yes,” Rangel then asks students if they know where their food comes from.

Honey bees are responsible for pollinating approximately one third of the food we eat – particularly the fruits and vegetables that make up a balanced diet. “That catches their attention, because typically they don’t know that honey bees are really important for the food they eat on a daily basis,” Rangel said. “And then we start thinking about pollination at a greater scale.”

Rangel is an associate professor of apiculture in the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences’ Department of Entomology. In addition to teaching students about honey bees and beekeeping, she runs Texas A&M’s Honey Bee Lab.

There, researchers like Rangel are studying the factors that affect honey bee health. And there are many – pesticides, landscape changes, poor nutrition and sick queens, to start. They’re also looking into a mite that weakens the bees and transmits associated viruses. Varroa mites are the number one problem faced by honey bees today, Rangel said.

Rangel and her students investigate these issues at the laboratory located at Texas A&M’s RELLIS Campus. In addition to the research projects run by graduate students, the Janice and John G. Thomas Honey Bee Facility is also the site of honey harvesting and extraction each year.

Depending on the time of year and the projects being conducted, the apiary is home to 30 to 80 different colonies.

Caleb Rodriguez and Sarah Jendresky harvest honey at the Janice and John G. Thomas ’59 Honey Bee Facility. Laura McKenzie/Texas A&M Marketing & Communications

In years when there’s ample floral nectar supply, honey from a few of those colonies is harvested and bottled for sale at the Rosenthal Meat Center on campus. All proceeds go toward funding the lab’s research.

“It’s also a good talking point to engage people and tell them about our research program and the importance of honey bees and honey,” Rangel said. “It comes from the wild plants and wildflowers surrounding the RELLIS Campus, and it’s all harvested, extracted, bottled and labeled by undergraduate and graduate students in our program.”

This year, about 50 gallons of honey were harvested from the lab’s colonies.

Students in her Introduction to Beekeeping class also get to work with bees hands-on. Rangel said they learn how to build their own hives and frames, and start their own colonies with about three pounds of worker bees and one queen. For the rest of the semester, students monitor the growth of their colonies.

“It’s really gratifying to see students grow from knowing nothing about beekeeping to building their own hive and seeing the colony grow until they have a new brood,” she said. “There are new adults, new drones and new workers coming up, so it’s quite fun to see them grow that way.”

It’s all part of the lab’s mission to both educate students about beekeeping and learn more about bee biology.

“It’s incredibly important, not just for saving their populations, but also to understand the intricate networks that occur between pollinators and the plants they feed on,” Rangel said.

We are here to share current happenings in the bee industry. Bee Culture gathers and shares articles published by outside sources. For more information about this specific article, please visit the original publish source: Aggies Working To Protect One Of Nature’s Most Critical Species, The Honey Bee – Texas A&M Today (tamu.edu)

Through Houston-based nonprofit Hives for Heroes, veterans trade their uniforms for bee suits, work to save pollinators, and learn mindfulness.

By Robyn Ross

Mentor Tim Schmitz (right) teaches “newbee” James Burns about beekeeping. Tim Schmitz/Courtesy Hives for Heroes

On a warm summer morning, Michael Moore and Charlie McMaster don their protective suits and veils to inspect the health of Moore’s four new beehives. The white boxes sit near the fence line of Moore’s fifteen acres outside Evant, a tiny hamlet northwest of Fort Hood. Here, on this undeveloped land, Moore plans to launch a second career in agriculture after his imminent retirement from the Army. A steady breeze sweeps across the treeless slope until it reaches a cluster of pecan trees near the hives. Overhead, flat-bottomed clouds stand motionless in the sky.

The pair approaches one hive, and McMaster, a retired Army colonel and a director for the Texas Beekeepers Association, removes its cover. With a gloved hand, he gently sets aside a Swiffer pad—a DIY defense against destructive hive beetles—and lifts one of the frames to reveal a bulge of golden comb. The bees have begun “drawing out,” depositing wax on the frame’s foundation and building it into cells. In the center of the frame, those hexagonal cells are a rich cinnamon color; they’re what beekeepers call capped brood, cells holding eggs laid by the queen and sealed with a top layer of wax. Nearby, golden cells hold capped honey. At the bottom, a clutch of cells are filled with fat white larvae.

Moore, a trim man with a narrow, tanned face, peers into the box. Behind his veil, his gaze is intense, an affect magnified by horn-rimmed spectacles. A novice beekeeper, he knows enough to interpret the capped brood and larvae as good signs. “So the queen is in there somewhere.”

McMaster nods, his veil bobbing up and down. “This is primo. You’ve got capped honey, you’ve got capped brood, you know the queen is in there and she’s laying.”

A hum thickens the air. Alert to the intruders, bees begin to emerge, darting and whirring as McMaster and Moore work. A few curious explorers land on their suits and veils, but the men ignore them. They move slowly and methodically from hive to hive, assessing each for evidence that the queen is still laying and that pests haven’t invaded. The two have been paired together through Hives for Heroes, a Houston-based nonprofit that helps veterans take up beekeeping by matching them with experienced mentors. The project tackles two disparate problems: the mental health risks that veterans face when they separate from service and the declining population of honeybees. Launched in 2018 by Marine Corps veteran Steve Jimenez, a Houstonian whose rough transition back to civilian life was transformed by beekeeping, the project has expanded to every state and matched more than 1,200 veterans—“newbees,” in the group’s parlance—with beekeeping mentors. About a quarter are in Texas, tending hives in cities, including San Antonio and Houston, and in smaller towns, such as Stephenville and Blue, near Elgin. Another 276 newbee veterans have signed up and await mentors in their areas.

To read the complete article go to; These Veterans Have Found a Post-Service Mission: Beekeeping (texasmonthly.com)

We are here to share current happenings in the bee industry. Bee Culture gathers and shares articles published by outside sources. For more information about this specific article, please visit the original publish source: These Veterans Have Found a Post-Service Mission: Beekeeping (texasmonthly.com)

Pollinator Grants Offered to High Schools

Sand County Foundation is now accepting applications from high school teachers for pollinator habitat grants.

This competitive grant program gives Illinois, Iowa, Michigan, Minnesota and Wisconsin high school students hands-on experience growing native wildflowers and establishing habitat for imperiled insect pollinators and monarch butterflies.

Successful applications will receive prairie seeds and seedlings, a consultation, and $1,000 to support project expenses. The deadline to apply is November 18, 2022. To apply, visit www.sandcountyfoundation.org/SchoolGrants.

Insect pollinators are essential for crop pollination and ecological diversity. In recent years their numbers are low partly due to loss of native wildflower habitat, especially in the agricultural landscape.

“Students will germinate and grow native plants over the winter, and plant them outside in the spring as an experiential learning opportunity,” said Haley Diem, Sand County Foundation school grant program coordinator. “We encourage applicants to partner with landowners to establish pollinator habitat on agricultural and other working lands.”

Pollinator habitat grant program sponsors include: Syngenta, Enel Green Power North America Inc., Monarch Joint Venture, U.S. Forest Service International Programs, Wisconsin Public Service Foundation, and We Energies Foundation.

In addition to the grant program, teachers can access a Pollinator Habitat Curriculum Guide. Aligned with state and national education standards, the guide’s activities engage students in planning, establishing, managing and monitoring prairie habitat. The guide is available for free download at https://bit.ly/2JHdq1u.

Sand County Foundation is a national non-profit that champions voluntary conservation practices by farmers and ranchers to improve soil, water and wildlife habitat.

Casey Langan, Sand County Foundation

608.295.6001, clangan@sandcountyfoundation.org

Online Beekeeping Courses & Webinars with Rutgers University

Make a beeline to Rutgers University for online beekeeping courses and webinars this spring and summer! From disease and mite prevention to honey production and harvesting, Bee-ginner Beekeeping will cover everything you need to know to further your hobby or get your business off the ground! Topics include:

• Bee Biology
• Queen Bee Purchasing
• Disease and Mite Prevention
• Hive Assembly and Management
• Honey Extraction
• Rules and Regulations
• And Much More!

Our instructors are Mike Haberland, an Associate Professor and County Environmental Agent with Rutgers Cooperative Extension, and Debbie Haberland, a teacher, marine biologist, and owner of Working Girls Meadows apiary. They will be on hand every step of the way to answer your questions and guide your learning. Complete the 15 – 17 hours of online course work at your own pace and attend a live review and Q&A session with our instructors. Certificates will be issued for successful completion of this course.

Bee-ginner’s Beekeeping: The Basics of Apiculture

Online Class – Opens October 3^rd & Closes October 23^rd, 2022

Participants can complete the course content (which will take approximately 16-17 hours) at their own pace anytime during the period the course is open. There is an optional live Q & A session with the instructors during which you can ask questions about the course content.

https://cpe.rutgers.edu/beekeeping/beginners-beekeeping

For more information and/or to register, visit:

https://cpe.rutgers.edu/beekeeping/beginners-beekeeping

We are here to share current happenings in the bee industry. Bee Culture gathers and shares articles published by outside sources. For more information about this specific article, please visit the original publish source: https://cpe.rutgers.edu/beekeeping/beginners-beekeeping