May I have your attention, please? The following
is not the real Jeff Fox release. If you no longer
count how many times you get stung, you might
be a beekeeper. If when robbing is going on at
your house, but you don't call the police, Well,
you might be a beekeeper. If you refer to your
divorce as swarming behavior, you might be a
beekeeper. I'm going to give you a minute to
think about that one. Just in case you missed
last week's episode, I'd like to give you a quick
update on the research being done to solve the
mystery of the U .S.'s great bee die -off of
2025. The bottom line is all related to Varroa.
No big surprises there. Bees are dying from viruses
that are spread by Varroa, and Varroa is becoming
resistant to some treatments, specifically amitras.
So... Keep on top of your Varroa and alternate
between different treatment options. If you're
new to beekeeping, don't think that your beautiful
bees are exempt. They're not. You have Varroa
in your hive and you need an IPM to deal with
them. Even treatment -free beekeepers work a
plan to limit the mites. The days of lazy or
naive beekeeping are over. On another note, Have
you ever seen a news headline about a semi truckload
of bees crashing on the highway? It happens and
I've always been curious how the mess is cleaned
up and by who or is it whom. So today we're having
a discussion with a beekeeper in Washington state
who recently helped with one of those disasters.
First a quick favor if you haven't yet followed
or subscribed to the show please do so now. and
be sure to share it with a friend. Also, if you
want to be part of the show, reach out to me,
Eric, at Be Love Beekeeping dot com with your
ideas for guests, your wild and crazy beekeeping
stories and your suggestions for the not real
Jeff Foxworthy on why you might be a beekeeper.
Thank you. Thank you for all of that. Now, let's
find out what it's like rescuing a few million
bees from an overturned semi. I'd like to welcome
to the show today, and this is going to be so
fun, everybody. Derek Condit. How are you today,
Derek? Doing great, Eric. Thank you for having
me. And you're in Washington state someplace.
Where are you? I am. So I'm actually located
in Mount Vernon, Washington, which is a little
more than an hour from the border of Canada.
So up north. And I've invited Derek to be on
the show today because I don't know if you've
seen the news. But not long ago, there was a
big semi full of bees that tipped over somewhere
near him. And it seems like every year we hear
about one of these crashing someplace. A couple
of years ago, there was one only about 40 miles
from me. I didn't have the opportunity to go
help do the rescue efforts. They specifically,
the Highway Patrol specifically said, beekeepers,
please don't come help. So they must have had
help that was maybe from, I don't know, the insurance
company or the owner of the bees or something
they wanted to take care of it themselves. But
it closed down I -80 for quite some time. Derek,
please tell us what happened with the truck rollover.
First of all, let me get to the most important
thing. Is the driver OK? And then tell me about
the accident. Sure. Yeah. And my most recent
update on the driver is he's doing fine. It wasn't
an exceptional amount of stings to where, you
know, cause real problems, but he was stung like
many of the beekeepers were during the recovery
efforts. But he is doing fine. And I can. So
I'll give you the as much of the story of the
accident that I know, Eric. Yeah, do that. And
then tell me how you got involved. Okay, perfect,
and I'll actually kind of wind that into the
story because it kind of plays out that way It
was the morning of May 30th So just a few days
ago, and I found out later the accident actually
happened that evening before Because these released
beehives and of course, they're doing the moving
during that evening time putting them on the
truck and then as the truck was leaving with
this 300 or so beehives on the back Basically,
it just took the corner too sharp, and along
the road there, so you can maybe visualize a
country road, there's gullies that run along
them to catch excess water and rain and whatnot.
So the back axles of that truck are what fell
into that little gully as he was leaving. And
it caused the bed of the truck to slant just
enough to where all the hives broke the straps
and slid into the brush and trees right off to
the side of it. And that's where it sat when
I showed up. So now this is the morning of May
30th, which I think was a Friday. My wife actually
sent me a Facebook post talking about the accident
because I hadn't heard about it yet. It was still
pretty early in the morning. I realized that
it was about 45 minutes or so north of our location.
So I thought, well, you know, I mean, I got all
the gear and ready to go. So I contacted the
local sheriff's department in Whatcom County
and it didn't take many minutes starting from
that call. to where I was chatting with the person
on scene who was in charge of the accidents in
the cleanup, they asked me and said, go ahead
and grab your gear. We appreciate it and show
up when you can. So it was probably an hour later
and I was there on scene. So I'll give you kind
of a description of the scene I came up on. When
the beehive slid off, they didn't just fall onto
the ground. They kind of they fell into some
shrubs and brushes. So they were still many of
them. standing or stacked, but they were separated.
So they all kind of slid. I'm not sure how to
give you a visual kind of like dominoes or a
stack of books that aren't quite pushed all the
way over. So basically, all of the hives were
exposed. And you could see the frames and all
of that, which was why there were the millions
of bees that were flying all around us at the
time. So I arrive and I'm probably 300 or so
yards from the accident itself before I approached
the first barrier or stop where there's news
media there and then also sheriff's department.
I let them know who I am. And of course, they
brought their windows up because by that point,
the accident had been happened at night and they'd
all been stung already, of course, even from
that distance. So they let me through. I pull
up to the area where the truck is kind of off
still again country roads. So there's lots of
room to park out there right now. And of course,
not letting anybody by. So I see the accident
and I'm like, oh and I'm in a large white van
which is good for me because I can just crawl
right in the back before getting out because
once you're that close even say a hundred yards
away The vehicles people everything was just
bees everywhere Well, that was one of my first
questions is how far out did this cloud of bees
spread? Was there about a hundred yards or even
further than that? well I would say to where
I would call it a cloud, to where it's just so
dense of bees with bees, probably 50 yards. And
then, of course, it tapers off past that to maybe
100 yards. If you're anywhere within several
hundred yards, which is where the barrier was
in the sheriff's farm, they were getting stung
as well. They just didn't have 2000 bees on them
at a time. They had a typical few. So I show
up there and I see what's going on with the truck.
Luckily, I had the The wear was all quickly to
grab my cell phone. I turned off the Wi -Fi and
Bluetooth and all that and just took some footage.
That's when you get to see the actual and I'll
mention also, of course, the camera crews, the
news crews couldn't get anywhere near this scene.
Some of them had gone to I could tell local hardware
stores or something about bee hoods thinking
that was going to protect them from this type
of scenario. They learned real quickly that wasn't
that wasn't going to do it. So I would go back
and forth and talk with them a little bit and
go back to the scene. And then it was just really
all hands on deck. And when I showed up, there
were already two people there that had been there
from the evening before. And they were already
just beat tired, working so hard, trying to save
as many as they could. Because the bigger point
was to remove the hives that were leaning on
the truck so we could move the truck out of there
and get the hives that were not just leaning
on it and laying in the brush nearby, but under
it. So we were basically moving box by box and
they were not all complete boxes, of course,
from an accident like this, parts and pieces
everywhere. So you do the best you can and then
you stack them on the pallets and then, you know,
try and move them out of the way. And some of
that's shown in the video. But we get a forklift
under the back of the truck after so many hours
and move it out of the way and then we're able
to access the rest of the hives. There was massive
losses, of course, on something like this, as
far as the bees go. Give me an idea of how many
hours you were there. Oh, maybe three or four
hours total, because I didn't realize or even
know the accident had happened until maybe nine
or 10 that morning. And then it was, again, approximately
an hour later, I showed up. And that's when I
spoke to the beekeepers on scene. And he let
me know that he was there for, again, since that
evening when it happened. And then throughout
the day, Other beekeepers would show up I'm not
sure if all of them were beekeepers But people
in suits is a lot of them would most of them
would actually turn away when they saw how many
bees that were And I don't blame them. Yeah,
I mean it was and I don't blame anybody because
Regardless and people brought duct tape to tape
up there, you know their boots and hoods were
needed in gloves But regardless bees with that
many bees they found their way into all of our
suits and that was happening Well, yeah, this
is not regular beekeeping. No where you're just
interrupting their home and giving them a puff
of smoke. And for the most part, they're not
going to give you too hard of a time. These are
angry, angry bees. I mean, wouldn't you be if
that just happened to your house? And then 300
of them houses hide. Yeah, then everybody wants
an all exposed. And so, you know, you get the
scenario from there. So saying they were agitated
is an understatement. I would be the same way.
I was trying not to say pissed off but let's
face it yeah they were beyond so you had a van
so you were able to get in the back of the van
get all suited up before you got out smart guy
you know what we're just gonna have to post some
of the video so get on over to our youtube channel
Bela Beekeeping You'll find it on YouTube. And
I'm going to post these couple of videos, Derek,
that you sent over. I appreciate your permission
on that. And they're not edited fancy or anything
else, but it'll give you an idea. I mean, I saw
one of the people there. His back was completely
covered. You couldn't really tell that he had
a white bee suit on because it was just be back
as we call it. So and I can't imagine the guys
that were there all night. That's exhausting
because you're lifting heavy things, too. Would
think that just that many bees that upset I haven't
been in the middle of something like that It's
got to be as much as you try to be calm. Isn't
it a little bit? I don't know Exhausting and
anxious filled. Yeah, that's good points Eric.
It was there's a lot going on Personally, you
know, I try not to get in the heightened state
because as we know as beekeepers I can heighten
situations antagonize. So yeah, no I was I've
been through a lot of stuff in life. We can just
say so I think really for the most part the ones
that the beekeepers that actually stuck around
and were going hands on moving the boxes were
relatively calm. I mean, they weren't they weren't
getting heightened at all, just exhaustion. So
that was a thing. But there were other people
that showed up that would run around even in
suits, just swatting the bees on themselves and
having issues like that. I'm like, yeah, you
might just want to stand back a little bit. And
you guys do look calm. So I'll give you a whole
ton of credit for that, because I imagine that
wasn't easy. So I have a couple of other questions
for you. What happened to all the bees afterwards?
And who owns the bees? And how does the insurance
kick in? Sorry, I said a question. You just got
delusional three of them. I know that's OK, and
I'll do the best I can on this because that's
we had some issues the following days, but I
can kind of go in reverse. Somebody reported
to me yesterday a local resident in that area
where this accident happened. He drove by giving
update. He said the better part of the beehives
are now. gone. So they've been put back together
and or relocated to another and I don't know
where another location because they are least
bees. But there was an issue and you couldn't
help but have this issue because of the type
of the accident. There was a lot of damage. So
the migratory lids, the covers that would keep
the beehives separate from each other were damaged.
So in the recovery, there just wasn't enough
stuff or equipment there to keep them separate
to move them. So a lot of them ended up being
stacked where the plan was to move them just
around the corner onto the farmland will and
then bring in the parts and pieces to fix them.
So that was one of the things that needed to
be done. And we had several volunteers, including
business owners with all the equipment needed
to bring that in and make that final recovery
and you know, separate every beehive because
you don't want to leave them stacked, of course,
with no separators in there. But they were left
that way for a couple days. So there's a whole
story behind that. I'll get into as much as I
can, but I was in contact with the owners and
they're making the moves they could on their
part, as far as I could tell, and in touch with
insurance. But I can't really comment on the
insurance aspect because I don't know how that
all worked or worked out for them. So from our
on the ground perspective concerned citizens
and beekeepers and business owners, we were just
trying to get all hands on deck as soon as possible
because we knew the state of these hives and
there were of course, brood emerging during before
and after all of this as well into that chaos.
So that's, that's a part two that hasn't been
talked about because we usually just think about
the bees that are flying around. And these boxes
did have large amounts of brood and honey because
I was putting them back together, I got to see
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it's in the show notes, for $10 off your first
$100 purchase. I don't really know, to be honest,
the state of the hives now other than they've
been relocated because we did draw some attention
to try and get that done sooner. Well, you did
send me one video from a couple of days later.
Did it look like they had calmed down? Not so
much. I mean, to a percentage, yes, because...
On that second video is when I went back two
days later thinking that, oh, these hives should
have been all repaired and the migratory lids
put back on kind of thing. When I started watching
the video and looking a little bit closer, I
realized, oh, a lot of these are still missing
that, which explained why there was still so
many bees swarming around in a heightened state
because that was still happening. Well, and I'm
guessing just in all the confusion, there had
to have been some boxes where were they two deep
boxes, by the way, most of them. It varied because
by this time when I got there, of course, it
was all a mess. Some had deep brew boxes and
then with a honey on top of it, it just varied.
So there was a whole mix of them. Yeah. I mean,
chances are you ended up with a box that didn't
belong to a queen in this other box and some
that had... And that was our issue. Yeah. And
some that had no queen. And so, wow. I imagine
just putting them on pallets and stacking them
together. And the one video shows, I don't know,
50 hives or something on pallets. And you'd think
they would kind of sort it out after a little
while. But then again, hey, if I'm a bunch of
guys in there with no queen. You know, they're
not going to be very happy and there's all kinds
of things going on and there's Robbing and I
mean it just opens such a huge can of worms.
Yeah for those bees It was confusing to you.
I'll tell you Eric when I posted I think it was
yesterday Maybe that image which I extracted
from that last video you're talking about that
you'll be sharing it from the average person's
perspective It looked like a bunch of pretty
beehives stacked high in a field looking great
and they're all saved And that's not the case.
They were stacked there. But again That's why
I went to verify that and see and I noticed that
those the lids were missing and and that so many
bees were still out having a hard time. So that's
that's that's what I came up on. So now that
you've done it once, do you have any advice for
somebody else that may be in that situation sometime
in the future? Because like I said earlier. Every
year you see one or two of these someplace in
the country one of these trucks flips and local
beekeepers are coming to save the day I have
lots of tips and believe or not since this happened
a few days ago. I've already started drafting
a Nationwide response plan for bee emergencies
like this so that first responders know We need
this gear. Here's where we call people. And I've
already set up on another website I just developed,
a database where beekeepers nationwide can put
their name and phone number on there so they
can be notified if there is an accident anywhere
on these routes where they take the bees. But
believe it or not, the recommendations bring
extra tape with you, like duct tape, things like
that, especially on an accident because there's
parts and pieces of the truck that were there,
pallets, so you can get tears in your suit. and
of course for taping up your suits like like
we would do typically and you definitely want
to do that in this situation and of course I
can't blame anybody and I appreciate how we were
provided beverages and food but my tip here is
for the beekeepers or the responders eat before
you go things like that because we were brought
cases of lots of good stuff granola bars to eat
and things but you're not exactly gonna unzip
your hood to put some food in there not even
for a second So that was a thing. Nobody could
eat or drink. For example, the Gatorade, they
brought us up against your hood and drink through
it. Well, in this situation, you're trying to
boy thousands of these. So it's just not a thing.
So that was an issue. So I'm working that type
of stuff into this plan I'm putting together.
Yeah, I imagine to eat or drink or anything,
you'd have to get a couple of hundred yards away
even further and then think restroom as well.
Yeah, restrooms and where there are hours in
the heat. So most of us just opted not to eat
or drink. It wasn't really an option, to be honest.
It just was what it was. So yeah, that was a
problem. And if you were in a place where it
was 100 degrees out, you would have no choice.
You would have to be drinking. You would. It
was maybe 70 degrees for us. And we were burning
up in the suits, of course, lifting all those
hives. So imagine 90, 80, 100. Yeah, yeah, it
warms up. Well, tell me a little bit about you
and your beekeeping. Sure, I'm loosely what's
called a treatment free beekeeper So I try to
opt as much as possible for you know, no chemicals
or treatments where where you can Also, I have
what's called shungite beehives. Well, I'll kind
of you know, what in the world is that? I know
you're like what what is that? Long story short
as I like to say shungite is a black rock It's
a mineral that's carbon -based and it's found
in Russia But what scientists have found out
is that this mineral called shungite, S -H -U
-N -G -I -T -E, for those who want to look it
up, has an effect on frequencies within our environment.
So one way I use it is I use the shungite powder,
blend it with paint, paint the exterior of the
beehive. And when I was in the military, we would
call things like this Faraday cages. So what
shungite does, and this has been proven already
to have an effect. it'll stop much of those harmful
frequencies that are under power lines, you know,
Wi -Fi, cell phone, that stuff in our environment
that does affect the bees, and it's been proven
to have an effect on. So introducing shungite
to that environment, you can say energetically,
keep the bees calm. It keeps a lot of the harmful
frequencies away from them. So when the bees
are in their beehive recovering and sleeping
at night, you can say they're healing themselves.
So I don't have the colony collapse disorder
losses. I had pre years using shungite on my
hives. And I've got a lot of information on this
on our website and the documented studies verifying
shungite and its effects on energies and bees.
and we'll put your website in our show notes
so anybody that wants to go there mysticalwears
.com it'll all be in there but so this is a regular
langstroth hive and you call it shungite because
of the coating you put on is that correct yeah
we do and i actually put shungite nuggets so
again it's a black rock um if you look at it
at the entrance and what bees will do and i've
recorded video of this for the most part so a
highly percentage number of the bees that come
and go from the hive will opt to land on the
shungite, it energetically has an effect. And
again, it's all about, I need the science, I
won't get too much, but it's about the carbon
-60 molecule that's in there. It's called a fullerene
or a buckyball. Buckminster fuller, lots of scientists
know about it and work with this. So when you
use those aspects of it, and again, that buckyball
or a carbon -60 molecule is what's inside of
shungite that gives it these energetic aspects
to it. And we're just using those effects of
shungite in various ways on the beehives to help
them. So you take this, you grind it up into
a powder, and you mix it with paint. Is that
how you explained it to me? Yeah, you actually
do. So we actually have shungite powder you can
buy, and you blend it in the paint, and then
just paint the exterior of the beehive. We have
rooms, and these have been made in Europe, called
shungite rooms, where they'll line the walls
with shungite and or shungite paint. My own clay
is I brought it to the bees, but shungite's been
around for a long time. Huh. I think you're going
to be selling this stuff. I'll take some right
now. I'll tell you what, Eric, you should go
to our website because I've done this for seven
years now. We've gifted free shungite to any
beekeeper on the planet who's willing to try
it. If you go to MrGores .com, request the free
bee kit, you're just going to pay shipping. I'm
giving it to you for free. You're going to get
enough powder to make your own gallon of paint
to paint your beehives and free shungite nuggets.
And this whole explanation of how to use this
And a lot of this, like 90 studies, scientific
studies, not me doing them, I've republished
on our website showing the effects shungite has.
So for those that want to get into that part
of it, it's all available as well. But again,
we've been gifting this for many years now. Well,
I didn't mean for this to turn into an infomercial,
but if you're not making money on it, I guess
it's not technically so. It's free. Yeah. Hey,
that's pretty cool. All right. This is the time
in an interview that I normally ask people to
tell me their most wild and crazy beekeeping
story that they can think of. I think you've
accomplished that already. But can you think
of anything else, something unusual that happened
or something embarrassing or painful or give
us something unusual? One unusual thing from
my perspective was I found myself for various
reasons. in the middle. I live in the Cascade
Mountains here in Washington state, so a lot
of snow at times. I find myself in a situation
where I had to relocate three beehives in three
or four feet of snow. So, and that means full
beehives and they were probably stacked three
or four boxes high left over the winter for that
and there were somebody else's. So having to
move those was a feat in itself, trying to get
them up on there and through the snow and even
though we sealed the openings on it and secured
the boxes together. During the transport, some
of the openings or the entrance blockers were
damaged and were broken off and none of the bees
tried to come out. Of course, it was pretty cold
out, so that makes a lot of sense from that perspective,
but it was interesting that we were able to successfully
relocate the hives even during winter and we
had complete success rates in the spring when
they came out. Were those yours and did they
just get left up there or what happened? It was
a chain. I was consulting on these hives So they
were shungite beehives as we call them So it
was shungite introduced to them and then they
were just Basically that land was commercial
land and I don't know if it was moving hands
or what was happening exactly But the beehives
had to had to go off of there So I was the one
showing up to relocate them and literally lift
them up into the back of a truck I would didn't
think for a second. It was gonna work or we'd
be able to lift them that high in the middle
of winter in the snow. But, you know, thank goodness
that they lasted. They were covered. That's kind
of bizarre. Yeah, it was unusual. Yeah, it's
been pretty unusual with all my stories with
the bees, to be honest. Well, Derek, I appreciate
your time and I appreciate what you did for the
bees in that rollover and helping everybody out
there. So thanks for all you do. And hey, keep
in touch. I will. Thank you. I appreciate you
having me on the podcast. Thanks again for joining
us here on Be Love Beekeeping presented by Man
Lake. Remember right now to follow or subscribe
and share this podcast. Also a quick shout out
to Vita Bee Health for their support. Vita's
Varroa Control range of products includes Apistan,
Apigard, and now Varroxan Extended Release Oxalic
Acid Strips. Thanks guys. And remember, if you're
not just in it for the honey or the money, you're
in it for the love. See you next week.