As I’m sure everyone is aware, there’s a lot of buzz about global pollinator declines lately. But are declines restricted to pollinators, or are we actually experiencing global insect declines in general? This is the topic of our second “Notes from the Lab”, where we highlight “More than 75 percent decline over 27 years in …
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Alfred Hitchcock would have loved the small hive beetle, Aethina tumida. If he had only known, he might have scrapped his movie The Birds in favor of The Beetles. Small hive beetles lead a horror story life, fraught with mystery, intrigue, and destruction. The beetles, aided by their partner in crime—a symbiotic yeast—produce slime, mimic …
Read MoreEvery beekeeper has wrestled with the Varroa destructor mite. Every beekeeper also knows we’re running out of weapons. With abounding resistance to conventional miticides, researchers at Monsanto are instead trying to use biotechnology to fight the mite – it could work, but is another mite-killing agent what the industry really needs? Recently, I had the …
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Colony usurpation is when a summer swarm takes over an established colony by quickly invading it in a matter of minutes. While some of the hive bees and the usurpation bees fight, the crucial action is with the queens. The usurpation queen becomes balled near the hive entrance, where she just entered with the invading …
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For the last two months, I’ve been talking about things that can go wrong in the honey bee colony. Threats to social cohesion. In November, I talked about so-called “royal” subfamilies whose female larvae coerce nurse bees into feeding them royal jelly and rearing them into queens. Last month I talked about “anarchistic” workers who …
Read MoreInternational Honey Market Ron Phipps – 23 The Slippery Life of the Small Hive Beetle Rusty Burlew – 39 Extended-Release Oxalic Acid Progress Report #3 Randy Oliver – 45 Five Women of Iowa Share a Passion for Bees Robert Weast – 60 Bee Vision is Totally Different Adrian Horridge – 65 Varroa Problem—Part 14—Virus Dynamics and Treatments Randy Oliver – 69 Cold Flying Foragers: Honey …
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In 2016 Maryland experienced a giant blizzard that dropped over three feet of snow in late January. The wind blew a lot of the snow off the roof, where it met the snow collecting on the deck. While shoveling the deck clear, my shovel hit something hard. I had completely forgotten about the two story …
Read MoreFirst Year Beekeepers Hello: My husband and I are first year beekeepers. We live in the Washington, DC area and have a weekend place in West Virginia. We set up two beehives in the spring of 2017 at our place in WV. There’s a small stream nearby and more wildflowers all spring, summer and fall …
Read MoreQ Ventilation I’ve made a Lang hive ventilator. I stapled a plastic queen excluder to prevent the hardware cloth from sagging. I then put a layer of thin burlap, then shavings. The frame has holes drilled with screen on them. I’m having a tough decision on one thing. Do I put my ventilator on top …
Read MoreTraps baited with synthetic pheromone could become solution to invasive Asian hornet Over the past decade, Asian hornets, predatory insects with a widespread and expanding population, have invaded parts of Europe and Korea. Vespa velutina has a growing reputation as a species that proliferates rapidly, preys on honey bees and poses risks to humans. Now …
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