in a world brimming with complexity few creatures
embody harmony like the honeybee with tireless
precision she dances from bloom to bloom each
motion guided by millennia upon millennia of
instinct each act in service to the whole and
then There are the beekeepers, watchful stewards
of this ancient symbiosis. Part agriscientist,
part poet, they move along their hives with the
efficiency of mow, levy and curly, tending to
the bees' needs as best they can comprehend,
and with the infrequency of a waterfall in the
Sahara, sometimes running off flapping and flailing
like a penguin on a hot sidewalk. This is their
journey. Partners in Beekeeping, Man Lake. Today
we'll be talking with Jerry Hayes, editor of
Bee Culture magazine, to discuss the status of
the beekeeping industry, yeah and a whole lot
more. First a few quick headlines from the world
of beekeeping. From Crystal City, Minnesota,
the City Council has officially adopted a revised
animal control ordinance that significantly expands
what residents may keep in their backyards. Residents
can now have ducks in their backyards and beekeeping
is now officially legal. Under the newly adopted
rules, residents may keep up to four hives, even
on lots under three quarters of an acre. Way
to go Crystal City! And out of Canada, beekeepers
ask government to ban overseas bee imports to
protect local hives. What's it all about? Of
course, they're alarmed by the spread of the
tropal alaps mite, and they're calling on government
to do something about it. Now this one out of
California, the headline reads, Almond milk kills
bees. Five shocking California impacts. This
one, I'm not... Gonna touch with a 10 foot pole,
but it's actually kind of an interesting read.
We'll put a link to the article down in the show
notes. I'll leave that completely up to you.
Lastly, while Texas beekeepers lost approximately
61 % of their colonies this year, there is some
good news out of the Lone Star State. Thanks
to much needed rainfall, honey yield is way up.
with production surging to its strongest level
in years at over four million pounds. Way to
go. I'd like to welcome to the show, I should
say back to the show, Jerry Hayes from Beat Culture
magazine, the editor, the big cheese there. Hi
Jerry, how are you? Good, how are you doing Eric?
I sure appreciate you giving me a few minutes
to just unwind here. I'm doing great getting
my feet back on the ground as the listeners know
I was on the Big Island for a few weeks and actually
did podcasts from there which was good fun but
I'm back in the mountains trying to deal with
having no humidity again but other than that
feeling great and and I wanted to get back with
you just kind of get a pulse on what's going
on with beekeeping right now and I'm just going
to throw out some stuff and and let you start
talking and then ask you questions if that's
okay but for example as we all know this last
winter of 24 -25 there was a huge bee die -off
here in North America and commercial beekeepers
that I've talked to most of them have recovered
pretty well But I'm curious what your pulse is
from talking to them and if they're doing things
differently since we're nearly into winter again
here. And let's take it from there. So give us
the 30 ,000 foot view. Dolly, and that's an easy
question. Oh my gosh. Yes, we had, you know,
the numbers show about 1 .6 million colonies.
parish and golly, tens of thousands in the commercial
industry, some commercial beekeepers, one commercial
beekeeper that I know lost all 16 ,000 of his
colonies. And yes, in that particular case, you
know, if you have a thousand colonies and you
lose 500, you can take the other 500 and split
them and make them up. When you lose everything,
you can't do that. And so his return on investment,
this is a business. And so a lot of beekeepers
who have lost a lot of colonies and are aging,
and their family doesn't want to take them over,
they're selling. And there are some groups that
are taking all these and have maybe 100 ,000
colonies now. I have no idea how you manage that.
I just don't know. And that's one of the problems
with thousands of colonies is how do you manage
that? How do you get enough people that know
what they're doing? And then of course, you know,
we have indoor wintering a lot now, trying to
maintain temperature and humidity so that the
bees are under a little bit less stress because
of everything that's there. Exposed to those
bees. I wouldn't be keeper. I talked to he said
the bees look great Coming out of the storage
and then two weeks later. They were all dead
So yes, we've had USDA tell us that it could
be a virus mutation that's impacting the bees
and we have no of course control over viruses
and then those viruses are in the bees because
of Roa many cases and Roa causes decrease in
in the bees ability to fight off bacteria and
diseases and what have you, their immune system
is compromised and we are not controlling grow
up very well and we're not feeding very well
and climate change is happening and think about
thousands of colonies and then to think about
loading this insect in their nest on a semi and
driving it across the United States to California
for almonds, let's say, or someplace else. It's
incredible. And the industry on a commercial
level is suffering. And then we have, of course,
you know, our hobby backyard beekeepers as well
that are struggling. And most of this is management.
And how much time do you put into managing your
colonies? And what do you do to control pest
predators and diseases? I have not had a chance
to speak with some of the people that lost everything
like you have, but some of the commercial beekeepers
that did okay and were able to bounce back well
tell me they were really on top of Varroa and
they were really on top of feeding. So anything
that we can do for hobbyists, for sideliners,
for commercial, anything we can do to keep our
bees stronger And to keep the viral levels down
because they're spreading the viruses, we just
have to do it. That's just the way it is. Beekeeping
is not easy. No, it's not easy. And to think,
you know, and there again, who's managing who?
Are they managing us or are we managing them?
They're trying to stay alive. And unfortunately,
on all levels of beekeeping, we have beekeepers
who aren't doing as you said, they're not. For
instance, Varroa control. Sample for Varroa at
an appropriate time, say during the season or
getting ready for winter. What have you, sample
for Varroa, pick a Varroa control, and then after
it, sample again to see if it actually worked.
And nobody's doing that. And then commercial
beekeepers, when you have thousands of colonies,
yeah, how do you do this with the expense of
labor and the Varroa controls and what you get
them? I know all these things there's not a whole
lot of return on investment considering what
they're getting paid for him. Pollination contracts
for and we're getting beat up by imported honey
coming in and real cost and all these things
that causes a struggle and the thing that. Turn
it makes my blood pressure go up is that we've
done a horrible job of advertising and marketing
ourselves of the value. of not only beekeepers,
but honeybees, pollinated dependent agriculture,
the food supply chain, and then nobody's ever
showed me a number for the environment. You know,
honeybees are going out and foraging in a two,
two and a half mile radius. Well, that's, you
know, like 8 ,000 acres or something like that
in the environment and pollinating plants that
produce seeds so they can reproduce or fruits
or nuts or what have you for squirrels and turkeys.
And then you got the plants growing in carbon
sequestration and water retention. And nobody
knows this error. And so we're thought of as
the only stepsister of agriculture. Well, and
until we can. get some of those chemicals under
control and I'm not going to name any by names
today but we all know what they are until we
can get some of that stuff under control. A lot
of that's out of our hands and we can't control
it but there are things that we can control and
so let's control those things as well as we can.
There are new treatments for varroa that we can
try. There are new things out there every year.
I've tried some of the ones that were new this
year and had good success with them but it takes
work. And let me just throw out one thing that's
a reminder for all of us and you mentioned testing
before and after treatment. What we used for
Varroa last year and the year before and the
year before that may not work for us anymore.
there is a tolerance that can be built up and
that's why we have to test after because that
may not be working anymore and we may have to
move on to something else for a while. And in
three years we may be able to go back to that
treatment that we loved but it may not work for
a couple of years. So be willing to be open -minded,
do your research. Sorry we're getting kind of
preachy here now but it's a big deal. No, it's
a good thing because in my world and it's been
in my world for decades, I'm here because honey
bees are important to agriculture and to the
environment and beekeepers are incredibly important
because they're managing this insect. It may
seem early, but right now is a great time to
order your live bees for 2026 because they do
sell out and because Man Lake is offering a discount
for beloved podcast listeners. Wait, what? I
know, you're saying live bees, they never go
on sale. Well, they are now. Click on over to
Man Lake, order your bees any variety, nukes
or packages, and anything in the beginner essentials
category. And when you check out, use the code
getstartedinbees, it's down in the show notes
so you don't have to remember, for a discount
on everything. So get your orders in early and
save. How many insects do we manage as humans,
you know, that can be moved and transported and
what have you? And then as you were saying, for
a Varroa resistance, let's say to certain Varroa
sides, Varroa is trying to survive. And so if
you only kill 90 % of the Varroa in your colony,
that might be good for a little while, but then
you got 10 % of the Varroa that is laughing at
that Varroa side and they're going to mate. and
reproduce and have babies that are resistant
to that boroside. So as you say, we have to rotate
these out and then we have to really try to manage
by sample, treat and sample again. Yeah. And
hopefully that's going to work. It should at
least, it's something you can do to increase
your odds, right? Absolutely. But like I'm headed
into a very cold, wintry environment here in
the next few days. And I need to go out tomorrow
and I need to test again to see how my most recent
treatment worked. Now here's the problem. If
it didn't work very well, I don't have very much
time left to fix things. So I'm going to do what
I can. And that's just the kind of world that
we live in now. All right. No, it's true. It's
true. And then we have to Not only about treating
and when but what have you and what you pick
and this is where the tools for management guide
for honeybee. Console is so good because it doesn't
tell you what to do it gives you options. Because
there is collateral damage when you're trying
here this is over all night and i'm a honeybee
how do you kill a bug on a bug. without hurting
the big bug and so i can spray rainier face every
day eric it's not gonna kill you what's gonna
happen to you in ten or fifteen years something
is going to happen and when we're doing this
to honey bees trying to kill an insect on an
insect wrong terminology but you know i'm talking
about a bug yeah again a bug how do you do that
safely and this is where some of these biologicals
that are coming out now by a rational. Products
i think we need to yeah migrate to some of those
and in this process of using different products
we rotate some of these things in and out so
that we get some more use out of them and control
for all better alright. Let's let's quick kick
in this horse. Let's move on to some other things
that can be concerning. What do you know about
yellow legged hornets? Yeah, you know, certainly,
you know, I'm in northern Ohio now, so kind of
on the eastern part of the country. So. I keep
in contact with Georgia and South Carolina and
what have you, and Alabama, where some of these
things have been found. They're doing their best
to limit the spread of them, but that's incredibly
hard to do by looking for nests and putting out
things that will attract them to that. Yes, they
can help, but is it going to be 100 %? I doubt
it. Yeah, well, that Asian giant hornet, supposedly
the couple that were up in the Northwest, those
were taken care of. They'll be back someday.
So the yellow -legged one in the meantime, and
I've talked to a lot of people over in Europe
that have been dealing with it for a while, and
they're, you know, they're dealing with it. It's
not easy, but they're dealing with it. It's kind
of like us dealing with Varroa. Yeah, no, it's
true. And you can deal... There again, that just
adds another level of management and management
skill to this. And we're talking about, I think
the Natural Honey Board says there's like 125
,000 or 135 ,000 of us beekeepers. About 1 ,000
or so are commercial beekeepers out of the millions
of colonies that we have. What does that do to
the other 124 ,000 that are hobby and backyard
beekeepers who are struggling now as it is and
then you add another level of this on it and
That's where so many of them drop out after three
years and become stamp collectors or less than
three years Yeah, no, absolutely. It's just honey
bees are amazing. What they do is amazing. How
they live is amazing. And that passion for most
of us grows as we look in a hive and separate
ourselves from the crazy world out there looking
a hive. But yeah, how many people want to do
that all the time because they're not all doing
it now? Well, part of what I love about beekeeping
is there's always something to learn. You never
know it all. The bees are smarter than we are.
And nature's smarter than we are because there's
a lot of other things going on and I just had
to throw this out there on that topic because
we also have chickens that we've had for the
last, I don't know, since we moved out here into
the country for the last 10 years or whatever.
And I like the chickens but they're easy. and
maybe I'm just naive, but they're really easy
compared to bees. And I tell my neighbors that
have horses, they think bees are really easy.
I'm like, you need to know as much or more about
bees as if you're taking care of a horse. I mean
this is not an easy thing, but it's very rewarding
also. So one last pest that I wanted to talk
about is, and this is nothing new, but this is
the Africanized bees. because they are spreading.
I read an article just yesterday of somebody
in Las Vegas that was attacked and got 400 stings.
Luckily he survived, but he's in the hospital.
I don't even have a question for you, Jerry,
but talk about Africanized bees for a minute.
Yeah. And so a long time ago on a planet far,
far away, I was the chief of the ape area section
for the Florida Department of Agriculture. And
when I was there, That's when Africanized bees
made their way to Florida mostly as swarms on
shipping traffic coming from Mexico and the first
real incident that I was involved in was and
this never happened before was You know an 800
pound horse was killed. It was in a stable and
these bees attacked the horse and the horse didn't
die of envenomation. I was there during the autopsy
and the vet pulled out, I'm guessing two or three
pounds of bees from the horse's lungs and stomach
because the bees are attracted to CO2 and they
went up the horse's nose and down and stung in
the meantime, which caused the trachea to expand
and the horse suffocated from that. But yes,
not only to livestock but to to people because
we had a problem in florida where these things
were in the news media and the citizens of florida
were afraid of having beekeepers around them
because people most people are afraid of insects
anyway and now you've got an insect that's gonna
kill your horse or your dog or sting the kids
at the school bus stop or what have you. And
so we really had to work hard on building the
value of honeybees and our inspection service
that would intercede and help both communities
out. A couple of people that we had on the show
earlier this year that I want to mention. One
was a beekeeper in southern Arizona. She catches
a lot of swarms and she does what she calls rescuing
those swarms, which is catches a swarm. It's
easy to tell if they're Africanized. Not a swarm.
It's not. No way, Jose. No, all swarms are basically
gentle because they don't have anything to protect.
Well, within days of hiving that swarm, she can
tell. I'll put it that way. There you go. She
then dispatches the queen, requeens with some
kind of gentle breed of queen, and things go
along pretty well. I had another beekeeper on
from Southern California that also does a lot
of swarm removal. In his opinion, and he hasn't
had all the lab tests done, but in his opinion,
there have been so many crosses now between European
honeybees and Africanized bees in Southern California
that he feels like all of the bees that he sees
and that he works with have some Africanized
genetics in them. They're not as hot as a fully
Africanized strain. It's been diluted with generations.
That's his theory and he's used to them. They're
not as aggressive as fully genetic, sorry I don't
know the right term there, Africanized bees.
They're good honey producers, they're pretty
good at taking care of Varroa because they're
kind of hot, and so he doesn't mind it so much.
So I don't know, what are your thoughts on those
things? Well there again from past experience,
yeah the drone carries a grumpy gene. And so,
when queens are out mating in the DCA, I don't
know how many bees are around there, but the,
you know, the DCA could have drones from a huge
amount of different colonies out there, and as
a virgin queen goes in there and those drones
compete and mate with her, you can have, and
we found this again in Florida, you can have
a colony, and depending on what sperm... the
queen is accessing to fertilize those bees those
bees could be just kind and gentle and nice and
then when she runs out of that sperm she may
get into sperm from a drone that has that grumpy
gene and those bees will chase you into the kitchen
but then when that's used up I mean so this is
all over the place so yes this is a little bit
awkward because you can say oh gee whiz to your
neighbor my bees are calm and nice. I raise my
own queens and I pick out the the gentle ones
and then the next day something ugly happens
and so this is where you have to be really careful
and maybe access queens from other areas that
may not have those particular drones. Okay sounds
simple. The fact is the African eyes genetics
are spreading As far as I know they can't handle
real cold climate yet the part of my state that
I'm in We don't have any but the southern part
of the state. It's a lot warmer and we do well
and and there again And I hate to say this but
there are queen producers You know in Arizona
and Texas and New Mexico and what have you? that
are queen producers and then beekeepers here
in my state of Ohio now buy queens from them
and they bring them up and they're grumpy. So
we have spread these genetics all around because
we're not thinking ahead appropriately. That's
a very good point. What do we do different? How
do we think ahead better? I think it goes back
to what you said earlier about our connection
to honeybees, our passion for honeybees. and
wanting to be good managers, because if you want
to be a good manager, you're out looking for
appropriate information, data. You know, I think
the worst thing, and I hate to say this, in many
cases for beekeeping, that it's easier to go
to a podcast someplace where somebody's telling
them to control Varroa with green jello because
nobody knows the right if I was if I would want
to learn about physics and I went to a physics
podcast and they said some how would I know if
it was right or wrong if I don't know anyway
so this is where you know yours and and others
are so good but there's others out there that
are saying goofy things And people don't want
to read anymore. They don't want to access books.
They don't want to get newsletters. Some of them
don't even want to belong to local regional associations.
So our educational outreach needs to be better.
We also on this show try not to tell people what
to do for their Varroa. We'll talk about, yeah,
test, treat, or if you don't treat. That's a
whole other path that you can study and go down.
But here's options. Here's this option, A, B,
C, D, E, F. You do your research, you figure
out what's best for your bees. We're not going
to tell you because it's different for everybody.
It is different from everybody. And there again,
we have no genetic consistency in honey. This
isn't like black angus cattle or the chickens
in your backyard. that have bred and bred for
certain traits, certain colors, what have you.
The bees are out mating in these drone congregation
areas and the drones are, you know, whatever
drones show up is the ones that have the opportunity.
And so that's one of the reasons bees can survive
from pole to pole, basically, is because genetic
diversity. But by the same token, we don't have
that consistency and pest predator and disease
issues that would help the industry out a little
bit better. All right. I don't want to make this
whole show a downer on these tough things. Let's
get some good news out there. I don't know about
where you are, but we had a really good big honey
crop where I am this year. How about you, Jerry?
Boy, you said you wanted a happy, a happy one.
No, we. See, so I've lived all over the country
and the nation. Some parts of it had a wonderful
honey crop. We here in Ohio didn't. And this
is one of those strange things that I've learned
since I've been here for the last five, six years.
If it doesn't rain, and we had this drought issue,
if it doesn't rain in July, then that impacts,
strangely enough, Goldenrod and Astors when they
come up. a couple months later, and so we had
beautiful golden brown, beautiful asters with
not a bee or a honeybee or a native bee or anything
on them, because for some reason, if they are
not rained on in July, it doesn't happen. And
so, yes, my colonies, instead of getting, you
know, 50 or so pounds of honey, I might have
had 15 or 20. And so... It's different everywhere,
and some beekeepers did great, and bless her
heart. Boy, down her Debbie today. No. Jerry,
give me some good news from somewhere. No, but
the good, I think the good news is that we have
Apia Inspectors of America who are hanging in
there and are great mentors for beekeepers. And
for the most part, they're not the bee police.
They're Extension. because extension doesn't
exist anymore. And then we have the Association
of Professional Appicultures, all these people
that have labs at universities that are still
working so hard on our behalf. And we have USDA
with all this crazy USDA stuff, but they're hanging
in there for a grave. So we have this whole...
contributor connection partnerships with really
smart people with great equipment and labs that
still want to help and are connected to us. And
I think that is a true blessing for all of us.
And we need to engage them more and show them
that we appreciate them and what they do so that,
you know, they can still get funding and carrying
on because that's what's going to make us successful
or not. What are other good sources for information?
You mentioned Honey Bee Health Coalition. Right.
What else? Well, you've got Honey Bee Health
Coalition, which is great. And then you have
PAM, Project Apis Malifera, which is great. And
then you have, as you were talking about, you
have, you know, Apimondia. That was before we
were recording. But yeah, I went to Apimondia
this year. It's amazing how much scientific information
is out there at places like Appamondia. Well,
and then I just got an email this morning, COLOS,
which is a European organization that has researchers
from all over the world and dealing with honeybee
management issues and success. They're going
to be meeting in Washington, up at the University
of Washington, coming up in June of this year.
So we have an international organization coming
here. And then, of course, you have your state
and local associations who are, I'm assuming,
will be connected to, you know, HBHC and PAM
and AIA and APA and all these other things. And
we have ABF and, you know, HPA and everything
else. All these organizations are working on
together on our behalf. And I think whoever is
listening now, you know, Google all these up
and take a look at their websites and what they
do and support them. Because, you know, without
our support, they don't exist. And your advice
about podcasts? And I'm going to lean towards,
well, I'm going to just stretch that a little
bit and mention YouTube because there's a thousand
times more beekeepers that claim to be experts
on YouTube than there are on podcasts. And some
of them have good information and some don't.
And the hard thing is you don't know which is
which. No, Beth, how do you discern that if you're
trying to learn? I don't know how you do that.
This is why these These fundamental organizations
and, you know, and podcasts like yours are so
important for people to identify as places to
go. I didn't warn you of this, but the last time
you were on the show, I asked you to come and
share some kind of fun, wild and crazy beekeeping
story. Do you have any others in mind for us
this time? We'll give you a minute to think about
it. The fun know that I think some of the fun
thing is all this new equipment that's coming
out and new hives and different things that will
allow us or will theoretically allow us to manage
bees so that they can maintain, you know, what
they do. You have to think of honeybees. You
know, they're looking for a cavity certain size.
to live in, and we give them these wooden boxes,
and we call that their home, but is it insulated
enough? Is the entrance in the right spot? Is
it in the right dimensions? Is it longitudinal?
Is it horizontal? All these things as we experiment
with bees because bees are very patient and you
know I've seen bees living in a mailbox and I've
seen them living in a you know a hollow tree
and I saw one at one time living in a junkyard
in the trunk of an old Buick. So bees can live
in a lot of different places but how do we beekeepers
help them live successfully? What's your favorite
kind of hive? Just standard Langstroth now, but
and then here in Ohio, I've gone to some type
of insulation around them because you know, it
gets kind of chilly here and the temperature
goes up and down and You know that one inch wall
on that wooden Langstroth box probably isn't
Insulated enough as it would be say in a hollow
tree that's got six inches of wood around the
cavity and so these are all things that We're
still trying to learn about there again. We have
no consistency. If you were asking a black thing
is cow producer, what he or she does to raise
them. They could, they could give you the checklist.
We'd we have a checklist, but it's four times
longer because you never know which part you
got to check. Well, now I don't know about you,
but I like to experiment. Yeah. I've picked up
some of the new things that are out there these
solar heater things and these different blanket
things and different kinds of insulation and
different kinds of hives that are This thick
and having our value through the roof and and
I'm trying all this stuff to see what works for
me in my area Yeah, no and that that's true and
that's a good thing for you to do and for me
to do and for people out here to do but there
again if you have If you're a commercial beekeeper
and you got five thousand colonies, you can't
do that. No, no, that's not realistic at all.
No, it's not realistic at all. And so how do
we how do we support that? Because when you walk
into the grocery store. You don't walk into the
aisle with the cleaning supplies in the toilet
paper, you walk into the produce section that
most of the time is there because of honeybees
pollinating for a fruit, not a vegetable. But
then you also have some that are pollinating
for seeds. So you like lettuce or something that's
the seeds that, that are there. So, you know,
if, if that all disappeared, do we want to buy
all our food from Guatemala? I prefer Peru. I'm
sorry, I can't be that serious this morning.
Jerry, I appreciate your time so much. I know
you're busy. I appreciate you putting out the
Quality magazine, B Culture magazine, and the
good information that's in it. Do you have any
last thoughts you want to leave us with? No,
but I want to, you know, if you were closer,
I'd take you to lunch because I really appreciate
what you do, how you're doing it, and how you're
being connecting to the beekeeping industry to
give them a foundation of validity. So pat yourself
on the back. Thanks for joining us on Be Love
Beekeeping presented by Man Lake. If you like
this content I hope you'll share it with a friend,
follow and subscribe to this podcast, and even
sign up for our newsletter at BeLoveBeekeeping
.com Also, just a shout out to Vita B Health
for their support, we appreciate them. Vita's
Varroa Control range of products includes Epistan,
Epigard, and now Veroxan, 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.