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. We are so fortunate to have today's
guest, Debbie Saib, president of the American
Beekeeping Federation. We'll be discussing everything
from adulterated and fraudulent honey to varroa
and tropimites, basically anything and everything
that's important to today's beekeeping. Also,
hey, I just wanted to mention that last night
I saw the first episode of National Geographic's
new Secrets of the Bees documentary series. And
I must say the videography is beautiful and amazing,
especially being able to see many things from
the perspective of actually being inside the
hive. Highly recommended. Give it a look and
let me know what you think. And speaking of inside
the hive, great segue, huh? Let's take a minute
for our very own inside the hive feature, which
is brought to us every week by Primal Bee. Here
is something amazing about honey bees. The temperature
inside the brood nest has to be exactly 95 degrees
Fahrenheit, that's 35 degrees Celsius. Not about
or close to 95, not maybe in the area, but exactly
95 degrees. Baby bees developing inside their
cells are incredibly sensitive. Drop the temperature
just a few degrees and you start seeing problems.
Wings don't form right, shorter lifespans, bees
that can't learn navigation as well, which means
they get lost on foraging flights and never come
home. Drop at a few more degrees and a lot of
them don't even make it out of the cell at all.
So the colony pays whatever cost it takes to
keep that temperature in the right range. In
cold weather, nurse bees press their bodies against
cat brood cells and vibrate their flight muscles
to generate heat. They are living space heaters.
In hot weather, they fan and spread water to
bring the temperatures back down. This effort
runs around the clock and it's one of the biggest
energy drains or as we like to say energy bills
in the whole hive. In the wild bees choose nesting
spots with thick walls that hold temperature
naturally. The less work they have to do to hit
95 degrees, the more energy they have for everything
else. Making honey, raising brood, fighting off
problems and beekeeping, thermodynamics really
do matter. I'd like to welcome our very special
guest today, Debbie Seib. How are you, Debbie?
Great. Nice to see you. Coming to us from the
very, very cold Indiana right now. Yes. I know
you've had some crazy storms out there this winter.
We're going to be talking about everything from
ABF because you're the new president. Congratulations
to your own beekeeping business and your own
love of bees and a little bit of everything in
between. Where do you want to start? Well, I
could start with introduction. I would love that.
Tell us a little bit about you. Yeah, my name
is Debbie Seib. I am co -owner of Seib's Fisher
Honey and I am currently the new president for
the American Beekeeping Federation. I got started
in bees about 37 years ago, about 39, oops, when
I met my husband and he was a beekeeper. So on
one of our dates, he said, let's go get into
some beehives. And I turned it in and said, are
you crazy? But I did fall in love with them.
They're very cool. I like the little creatures.
I have went through a transition of where when
I first started, I wore a full suit, gloves,
hat, veil. And it was the old hot cotton ones
to graduating to a ventilated. suit and then
graduating to a ventilated jacket. And that was
a big thrill for me many years ago. Yeah. So
that's, that's pretty much how I got into beekeeping.
How are you with gloves? I use gloves all the
time. I always use gloves. We've talked about
this, it seems like a lot recently. PPE. I don't
want anybody to feel like they are not the coolest
beekeeper around if they're decked out from head
to toe. I think everybody should be comfortable
and if that means just a jacket or if that means
just a veil or if it means head to toe and thick
leather gloves, good for you. There's no shame
and there's also no prizes for some of the people
on YouTube that are trying to look like they
can wrangle any kind of bees they want with perfect
hair and makeup and everything else. Yeah, I
do not look like this when I'm in the beehives,
I will tell you that. But I will also tell you,
this is the fun fact that you will know and a
lot of people are shocked at. I've never been
stung by a honeybee. And after doing it for 39
years, I get the eyebrow raise just like what
you did. Basically is because I love my bees.
I'm very comfortable with them. I can go out
there and I have no problem getting into the
hives. I can pop them open. I can get, I can
help my husband do splits. I cannot raise queens.
I'm not very good at that because I don't have
the eyesight for it. I wear a jacket with hat
that has the veil on it, the fencing veil, and
I wear gloves. They're not heavy, but they're
heavy enough to where I'm comfortable to not
get stung. I don't have heart palpitations when
I go out there because I'm suited. I wear jeans,
of course, and when it's really hot, I wear a
short sleeve t -shirt underneath my jacket. That
is why I do that because I've tried once before.
not doing it and I got about halfway down to
the apiary and I could hardly breathe and I'm
like, why am I doing this to impress somebody
else who's not even here? So yeah, I'm very comfortable.
I love my bees. Good for you. Sounds like they
love you too. If you ever get down to Texas or
Southern California or Arizona where they have
Africanized bees, hopefully you still won't ever
have a sting. We'll see. Well, I have some friends
that were around Africanized bees and they suited
up and they had two layer of gloves on and said
they still got stung. So I'm not sure if I want
to try it, but someday I may. Well, I want to
hear a little bit about your beekeeping business
first. So I will tell you that we grew from having
just 10 hives to around 150 to 200. Depending
on the time of year, sometimes we get up to 250
or three because we split our hives and sell
off nukes. We have eight different apiaries.
We do pollination, but we keep all our pollination
in the state of Indiana. We have never taken
our bees outside. So some of them, when my husband
lived in Kentucky, originated down there. Of
course, those bees... are gone now but they did
come up into Indiana they were inspected and
then they were came up to Indiana but we don't
take them outside for pollination or anything
like that we sell honey we sell high products
we have people that stop by the our home to get
our high products and our honey so we're pretty
just all around beekeeping we are a man -like
dealer so we sell equipment so once a year we
would do what was called the newbie day we would
bring new beekeepers to our home, and we would
do about two hours of education session, and
then we would take them out, we would do a ram
-robin. So we would teach them about different
types of equipment, show them how to put it together,
do some hands -on, and then the third part was
we take them out and do a hive inspection. Basically
what we're looking for is a couple things. First
of all, are they really interested, and they
so scared that this is really just not a hobby
for them to get into because I hate getting somebody
started into it and then a couple years later
you see all their equipment on Facebook marketplace
or you know being sold somewhere and I'd really
like not to do that but so far we've had really
good luck because all of the people when going
through our school are still beekeepers That's
really good that education really makes a difference
I have a friend who got started in beekeeping
and I had no idea that he was doing it and After
his second season I ran into him at another place
doesn't matter And he said oh, yeah, I tried
that beekeeping didn't work for me All we did
is we got one jar of honey and all the bees died
and I'm like I didn't even know where to start
because You know the education is just such an
important part to being not only successful But
dealing with loss when loss happens So you're
not just giving up and I like to ask people.
What is your why? Why are you getting into it?
If it's only for the honey and that's all you
care about I Tell people to go to the store and
buy some Yeah, interestingly, one of the slides
that we have in our education class was talking
about why are you getting into beekeeping? Is
it because love of the bees? Do you want to see
in help with pollination? Is it to make money?
And if it's to make money, you're probably in
the wrong business, unless you want to go really
big. So those are things that you need to know
before you get started. Most beekeepers that
start out, if you don't get them past their third
year, they will stop being beekeeping. And so
a couple pieces of advice we always tell them
is find a local club. That is key. Get around
other people that are excited about beekeeping.
Find a mentor. Some people say that they will
educate, but they will not mentor. And that's
great. Other people are great mentors. The biggest
thing is just have somebody that works with you,
that works your same schedule. So if you're an
on 12 hours and off 12 hours, you need somebody
else that can do that. well. And then somebody
that's like you. So for instance, if you're someone
who wants to get the bees, but you want to kind
of joke around a little bit, you need a mentor
that's going to do that. Because if you've got
a mentor that's just, you know, let's just do
this and this and this, that's not going to be
as much fun for you or them. So you can make
it work. You can always make beekeeping work.
And I challenge everybody out there. You can
do it. What's the fun part for you? Oh, wow.
Spring. Spring when you start seeing these hives
start busting out and the queens are laying again
and the bees are out. Today you cannot see it,
but it is snowing here. Yesterday we had 70 degree
weather. So I always say our bees are so confused
right now, but yesterday as I was standing out
in the yard and I could see the bees going in
and out, it was really cool. That's the fun part
for me. It's making sure that the fun part is
to see hives that made it through the winter.
All the things that you do, no matter what, that
they made it through the winter. That's the fun
part. Let's talk about spring for a minute. We
all know that is a time that if we're not careful
those bees are actually going to starve and it
is heartbreaking if they make it through winter
and then come March they starve out. So would
you just tell me some of the things that you
and your husband do this time of year and and
this is being recorded in the second half of
March 2026. What kinds of things do you do as
far as Varroa and food and I don't know when
it's time for splits in your area, but kind of
run us through some of that Gosh, let me start
with the things that you ask and hope I don't
forget any actually our spring starts in the
fall Because if you don't have enough food on
the bees in the fall They're not gonna make it
to winter and if they make it through winter
They may not make it through the springtime when
you have cold and hot days You have to make sure
that the food source is close enough to them
because bees will move up in a ball as you know.
So if you have a small frame, if you have a 10
deep, 10 wide, and you've got two deep boxes
on it, they'll go up. So once they go up, if
it's not warm enough to them go to the side,
they keep going up and at some point if you don't
have food on the top, that's when they start
starving. And that can happen anywhere in March
when it starts warming up and they start getting
more active and they need food and yet nothing's
out there. So that's one thing that we want to
make sure of is that we have enough food on it
in the fall. But we do on a warm day, we'll go
out and pop the top or we will, if it's too cold,
we'll lift the back just to see if we feel like
there's enough weight on there that they've still
got food in there. We don't use candy boards,
but we do something that's more like an igloo.
We'll make an igloo of sugar and we'll put that
in there. So it does a couple things. First of
all, the bees will go up into the sugar. and
they'll eat from the inside, that sugar will
absorb moisture, so it does the second thing,
but it gives them food if they get a warm day,
but they can't, it's not warm enough for them
to go outside of the hive, they can actually
have some food source. We put in things like
additives, Honey Bee Healthy, we use some supplements
from Micro - Hive Alive. Yes, thank you. Yeah,
so we put that in there as well to make sure
that they're healthy because healthy bees make
good bees. Basically, if they're not healthy,
it doesn't matter. So that's a couple things
that we do. And then the other thing you ask
is, what do we do for treatments? This past summer,
we, you know, you hear all these new treatments
that are coming out and are they good or are
they bad or are they working or are they not?
So we wanted to do some tests. So with eight
different apiaries, we can do tests on different
ones and see which ones works, which ones didn't
work. And the ones that worked, we didn't have
any that didn't work. If you follow the directions,
I just can't say that enough. Follow the directions.
We use oxalic acid, we rotate. So sometimes we
use oxalic acid and sometimes we use other, but
we check. And that's the key. If you're going
to treat, you have to check. Was it effective?
Because it wasn't effective, then you need to
treat again. And so that's something too, is
make sure your mic counts are low. or as low
as you can possibly get them. You certainly do
not want, you know, 10. You don't want to do
a mite count of 10. And then looking at other
pests and diseases, it's not just the Varroa.
You need to look, have they already spread some
of the diseases? Do you have other pests in there
you need to keep down? A lot of that is just
keeping a healthy hive. So we had one hive this
year. Actually, there was three of them in a
row. They were just overridden by yellow jackets.
So what, and yellow jackets and a healthy hive
usually do not kill the hive, but the inside,
the inner cover, inside the frames was just full
of yellow jackets and it was a dead out. So when
we got to looking around, we're like, oh, something's
going on here. There was a yellow jacket nest
right next to the hive in the ground and it was
huge. So those are things other pests can also
bother them. Scratching on the side says you've
either got you know raccoons or something like
that trying to get in the hives So in the spring
we want to make sure we've got healthy hives
We've got a healthy environment for them on warm
days. We do go check them As much as we can if
it's gonna be cold, we don't want to break the
cluster But those are things we do to try to
keep them alive in the March time frame because
it is devastating We don't count our losses.
We personally don't count our losses till the
beginning of April, but it's devastating to go
out Let's say you go out in February and you've
got 90 % of your hives have made it and you're
like woohoo. I only have a 10 % loss This is
great. And then you go out in April and you see
now you're at 50 % it it is It's sad and it is
devastating to see that. You know, people come
to me and say, hey, Debbie, what'd you think
about this treatment or what would you recommend?
I like to, I don't recommend a brand either.
I don't think that's right and I don't think
it's fair. I will tell them my experience with
each one and I can't give them an experience
if I haven't tried it. So. Well, and one thing
that we learned especially last year is that
we need to rotate treatments. Right. Something
that worked three years ago may not work this
year. There may be a resistance built up, or
there may be something else going on. If we were
naming brands, we would never say there's one
and I'll be all for everything Virola. Because
there isn't. Just doesn't work that way. Right.
I wish it were that simple. Yeah, if something
worked that well. I've had people tell me they've
never lost their hives for Virola, they don't
have mites. If that were really true, then that
person would be a multi -billionaire because
everybody would be doing what they're doing.
And that's right. When something that works really
well this year, you need to rotate so they don't
get resistant. When do you do splits in your
area? And I know it's weather dependent. This
year with all the snow, it may be later than
usual, but give me an idea of average. Ours is
usually in May. We wait until we know that we
have purple -eyed drones. Purple -eyed drones
are drones that when you you know, open up the
cell that got pupilized so far. Because that
means they'll be sexually mature when your splits
are occurring and you're having to graft for
queens. You're grafting for queens, you have
to get them mated. And if you don't have good
drones, then you can't make them. So that's when
we do splits. And again, everything is weather
dependent. We've done them as early as April
before because the weather was just great. But
I don't know, this weather this year, we're gonna
hold off. Yeah. You should come out here to the
Rocky Mountains because I live in a high mountain
valley, 5 ,700 feet elevation and we've had hardly
any snow at all this year and it is supposed
to get into the upper 70s this week. Wow. It's
crazy. But there's nothing in bloom yet. So I
have to make sure those foragers that are going
out and burning up all those calories that they
have something to eat when they get back home.
Right. Yeah, we're a little concerned about that.
It's such a different year. Well, that is one
of the things that hurt some of the hives that
were in sheds this year, is it just didn't get
cold like it was supposed to. Let's talk about
ABF. When did you get started with ABF and why?
15 years ago, I went to my first ABF. Was encouraged
to go by someone who is in our state association
and said, oh you got to go You're just gonna
love this and I'm like, okay, we'll go. I'm not
real big on all those Sessions and going to session
after session with something You know, I got
to have something fun in between. Because you
have to remember, I was not the original beekeeper.
I was the married into beekeeper. So I went,
my husband wanted to go. He's pretty excited
about it. And that's how I got into it. I got
into it more on the more level when I was walking
by. and Michael North was standing outside of
a door, and Michael North is, you know, part
of ABF, and he said, are you from Indiana? And
I said, well, I am, because I had a little name
tag on it, and he said, oh, you have to come
in here to the State Delegates Assembly. And
I said, I have no idea what that is, and he said,
well, let you know, so come on in. I admit a
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and use code be love at checkout. That's that
kind of hooked me unfortunately that kind of
hooked me and then I went back every year I went
back to see friends I would never get to see
if I didn't go there and I went back to see the
the first time I went I did the kids and bees
thing and I got all these ideals that he took
back to Indiana and I said oh you guys you got
it we got to do this for the kids and the auctions
oh my gosh you know they always say women get
crazy at auctions let me tell you those men those
men get like that too but yes so I I that That's
how I got in it and I absorbed everything. So,
of course, once you go and you do that and you
experience all the things about ABF at their
conference, you're going to go again. And then
you get more hooked into ABF and you want to
get involved and you want to help out on committees
and you just realize all the stuff that we do
and you want to be a part of that. So I'm sure
most commercial beekeepers know who and what
ABF is. If somebody is a hobbyist out there,
is this something they should get involved with?
What can it do for them? So absolutely, ABF represents
all levels. We represent a small scale, which
would be hobbyist. We represent sideliners, which
are the people that are hopefully growing into
commercial beekeepers. And we represent our commercial
beekeepers as well at all levels. So a lot of
people think that we only do things for commercials,
but about 10 years ago, I want to say, there
was a bill going through Congress and one of
the bills said that they wanted us to put added
sugar onto our labels for honey. That meant everybody
that meant everybody who was selling anything
in a farmers market had to put added sugar Well,
of course if you add sugar onto your label No
one's gonna want to buy that because they think
it's adulterated honey and you've done something
to it. Why would I buy that? So we thought that
I'm sorry to interrupt but it's also not true.
It's true It's not true. You're not adding sugar
Sorry, keep going. No, you're absolutely right.
So those are some of the things. That's a small
piece of what we do. The other thing that we
do is we are constantly trying to get bills and
research money passed when we go to Congress,
when we go to Washington every year, and that
helps small and small -scale beekeepers as well.
You have some beekeepers that say, I don't want
to treat. I want to be treatment -free. I want
to be all -natural. And that's great. I am no
problem against that. But I will tell you that
if every hive was able to sustain by doing that,
then we wouldn't have the problems that we have.
And so what ABF does for the small beekeepers
is we help with some of the research. And if
you think about it, this is how this trickles
down. What we do for commercial beekeepers helps
commercial beekeepers stay in business and commercial
beekeepers are where you get your hives from
if you're a small scale or if you're a sideliner
in small scale. Small scale can grow their own,
but they normally, especially when they get started,
will get them from either a sideline or a commercial.
So all of that works to where we need all levels.
And as a small scale beekeeper, the other things
we do for small scale beekeepers is we put out
a quarterly magazine. That quarterly magazine
tells you a lot of different things that are
in your area, things that are estate delegates,
things are about a conference that are specifically
for small scale beekeepers. We have workshops
at our conference and these workshops are things
that commercial beekeepers probably won't do
anymore, like make lip balms and things like
that, but render wax. Small -scale does and they
need to know how to do that. Someone needs to
teach them. So that's what we do for them as
well. And we do a state delegates assembly which
takes information back of what's going on in
the industry and they take that back to all their
states. We have 87 of them. So each of the states
are mainly a small -scale and that's how they
get the information back from ABF as well. So
we do absolutely a lot. We have a monthly eBuzz
that goes out. We have a lot of people that small
-scale beekeepers can contact us. They can say,
hey, we need a speaker. Can you help us out here?
Myself and some of my other people on the board
have went to talk to a lot of the state associations
at small scale. So there's just a lot of things
we do. What are some of the really pressing issues
right now that you're lobbying for or either
laws that you're seeing that may be a problem
or laws that we need? Well, there are a lot of
things that are hurting our industry right now.
The first thing is that we are losing way too
many bees. We cannot sustain the loss last year
that we had. Over 70 % of our bees were lost
last year. There's disputing whether it was 70
% or 60%, even if it dropped to 50%. It's way
too many. And if you took any other industry
that lost that much in production, they'd be
screaming all over the place and you'd have lots
of money thrown at them. And yet beekeeping,
we just can't get that. We need research on some
of the pests and diseases that we have, and we
need to put more research out there. The second
big thing that's just really hurting a lot of
our commercial beekeepers is fraudulent honey.
We've got honey dumping going on from out of
country. We've got fraudulent honey. We've got
what we call fake honey is actually lots of different
things number one It could be blended where if
it's blended it says it's a hundred percent when
it's really not the other is mislabeling Right
now a big thing for Consumers is to say something
organic if I say it's organic. You'll pay double
price for it because you think it's better So
when you see in a store anywhere where it says
organic honey and you read the label and it says
USDA grade a Organic honey you automatically
know one thing that's imported It's imported
because we do not have a standard in the United
States for organic honey And we're not allowed
to label our honey like that. So we're not allowed
to partake in the additional price increase that
we could get for organic honey. And in addition
to that, it's false advertising because as a
consumer, if I'm not a beekeeper and I don't
know that, I think I'm getting a very good local
product from the US that's really healthy for
me. And that may not be the case. So that's one
thing that's hurting our industry a lot. Fake
honey, the anti -dumping, the dumping that's
going on right now with things that are not really
honey. Other countries have that issue as well.
It's not just the U .S. So they're trying to
clean up their act as we're trying to clean up
ours. So we've got a lot of collaboration going
on between us and Europe right now, which I'm
very excited to see. The other thing that we
have is a lot of our research funds are drawing
up. As you know right now, they've got lots of
tightening of belts, and I understand that, but
why are we not tightening the belt somewhere
else and still helping? food source that is going
to be a food security issue if we don't keep
our bees alive. And that's basically the thing.
If we can't keep our bees alive, we can't make
honey. If we can't make honey, then the beekeepers
can't stay in business. It's just a very, it
seems like it's so simple, but yet people really
make it complicated. The other thing that we
have a huge issue on is we don't have a standard
of identity of honey. And I'm shocked about that.
I'm a farm girl that's very black and white.
And it says, If it's not from honeybee, it's
not honey. And if you put something else in it,
it's not honey. So stop calling it that. And
yet we don't have that standard of identity.
So we have worked with some of our senators,
some of our congressmen. We've got a couple bills
out there and we're trying to get them passed,
but we're not making a whole lot of head headway
right now. We keep pushing for it and we're going
to keep pushing for it. But just so you know,
that's a huge issue for us. That's some of the
big ones. biggest one I guess I would say. Two,
number one is we need to raise the awareness.
We need to raise the awareness of the issues
that the beekeepers are having about the honeybees
that are dying every year and about adulterated
honey. That's a huge thing. Just get that awareness
out there. But I will tell you one of the, in
my mind, again, my opinion is the biggest issue
we have is ourselves as beekeepers. That seems
kind of funny. But basically what happens is
We can't work together. We just can't seem to
play in the same sandbox without throwing sand
in somebody's eyes. And until we learn to do
that much better than what we are now, we are
only hurting ourselves. We can't continue to
divide. And one of the things that we need to
do is we need to learn that when we go to Congress,
we need to go to Congress as one entity and one
voice and one industry. We are so small footprint.
They just gnat us off like flies and we need
to be able to grow together and we just don't
seem to be able to do that yet. If you go out
to Facebook, what I noticed, because I see some
of the small scale or the newbies, the new beginner
ones, they're so nice. They ask a question. You
got like 20 people helping them out and giving
them ideas. And you know, well, this is how I
do it. May not be the only way. The higher up
you go, it is vicious. Someone asked a question
and you've got 20 people just knocking them down
and I'm like, yeah That's not really helping
us any so I will tell you in my opinion. That's
one of our big issues is ourselves People don't
like to hear that No, I appreciate you bringing
all that up. I mean, that's a lot a lot to deal
with and We appreciate you and the whole group
doing something about it the whole organic thing.
I think some beekeepers just don't know because
I've seen at local farmers markets honey with
an organic label on it. And I don't think they're
trying to be deceptive. I think they go, well,
I'm treatment free, therefore it's organic. Well,
half a mile from you is a field being bombed
with whatever kind of chemicals. That's a big
deal. And I think probably some people, when
you were talking about organic, were saying,
well, wait a minute, I go to Costco and there's
honey with an organic label on it. And that's
because it's not from here, right? It'll say
USDA grade A organic honey and you flip it over.
One of the things I will tell you a mantra is
know where your honey comes from and know what's
in it. You flip it over and it'll say from Argentina,
China, Brazil. I'm not knocking those countries,
but if you think you're getting US organic honey,
you're not. Think about even In order for you
to have organic bees fly anywhere from debatable
two to four miles in any direction. So in order
for you to guarantee that that bee didn't get
anything that had not been sprayed or treated,
you would have to be a beehive in the middle
of like thousands and thousands of acres. One
beehive. So you can't be producing all this honey
if that's the case. And you couldn't have a stream
running through all those acres that came from
somewhere else That may have gotten a little
chemicals in it or something else He found an
orchard and the orchard blooms were about done
And so now they've been sprayed for because orchards
do have to spray It's not a bad thing that they
don't have to spray to keep the worms out because
you won't buy an apple with a worm in it You
know, so it's kind of a catch -22 that your bee
went over and flew on and then came back so That's
that's why people when they say organic I try
not to say much, but my husband says, Debra,
your face says it all because I kind of chuckle
and walk on by. The thing that I tell everybody
if they're going out to buy honey, so non beekeepers,
is get to know the beekeeper. Farmers markets
are great because you can talk to them and you
can say, gee, where do you keep your bees? What
kind of treatment do you use? Now, non beekeepers
probably won't even understand that answer. But
if the answer is well we use this and this and
this then you know they're using chemicals if
it is we don't use anything you know they're
not etc etc. Anyway the more questions you ask
the better decisions that you can make so be
careful and look at labels carefully and yes
USDA doesn't mean it was grown in the US. Correct.
I noticed that you missed some other things that
I assumed you were going to talk about like tropimites
and yellow -legged hornets. Yeah, we do have
a lot of invasive, we have a lot of pests that
are here already that are invasive like Varroa.
Varroa has been here for many years and we don't
seem to have enough research to get rid of it.
We can knock it down, we knock the levels down,
but remember it's usually not the Varroa mites
that kill the bees, it's the viruses that they
vector. So when you're looking at your hive,
that's why I said you need to look in the fall,
you need to look in before the mites got in there
and multiplied and passed all those viruses in
there. The other thing was the yellow -legged
hornet, Florida, Georgia, North Carolina now.
It just seems to be spreading further and further.
And I've heard people say, well, I think we've
eradicated it here. It's not eradicated till
it's all gone everywhere because it just, it's
like, oh, it just moves. It started out in Florida,
moved up to Minnesota, and then it just went
from there. They've tried in the past things
like burning hives, isolating hives for treatment,
and that just doesn't work. We have to go after
something that's going to kill the mites. And
like I said, what the treatments are that we
have right now, knock them down, but they don't
really kill them. So that's another thing that
we'd like is speedier ways to get any kind of
mite treatment through the process. yellow -legged
hornets the same way. You can put out century
hives. Those are things that are being done right
now. Interestingly enough, APHIS is one of the
groups that monitors invasive species, but APHIS
cannot really do anything until after the species
is in the United States. So one of the projects
that I was on, I know it seems kind of silly,
One of the projects I was on, I went to Thailand
with Jeff Williams and his group and 10 apiary
inspectors. Eye -opening when I saw choppy mites
over there. It was more than eye -opening. It
was shocking and gravely concerning. Number one,
they're very, very fast and they multiply every
24 hours. So Veroa takes, gosh, I'm going to
go back and say 16 days, 18 days. Oh, well, they
go inside the drones for 18 days, but... Trophy
mites will go every 24 hours. They'll reproduce.
So, interestingly enough, if they ever got here,
if we don't have some kind of plan, we will be
in really bad, bad trouble. Now, again, aphids
can't get involved until they're here. Well,
that's kind of a catch -22. So I will tell you
that APHIS has actually worked on having a plan
in place. So it's not like they're just sitting
back and going, okay, we're gonna wait and see
when they get here and then we'll come up with
something. They have a plan in place. A lot of
the states have a plan in place. Most of the
states cannot or will not share that plan with
you. I will tell you for a fact that if you come
up with something that is going to detrimentally
destroy a commercial beekeeper's business, then
you're going to have less involvement for them.
They're not going to be as willing to help you
out. That's just a livelihood. So when they decided
with Roa, they were down in Texas and they decided
they were going to isolate, and this again was
many years ago, there were hundreds of thousands
of colonies that were lost down there because
they would not let them move out of Texas and
there was no forage for them so they starved
and So a lot of commercial beekeepers will now
say I'll be honest with you. I'll tell you I'll
tell you but okay I have a mortgage a car payment.
I have food to buy I have kids to feed You know,
you have to kind of look at that way. So we need
something in place before they get here and my
whole point was We need to do research and we
need to do something that will stop them. Not
just wait until they get here and our plan is
going to be do this or do that. I couldn't agree
more. And we don't want to be reactive like how
Australia was with Varroa. And no offense, we
have a lot of listeners in Australia and love
Australia. But the way that whole thing went
down where all they did was they freaked out
and burned hundreds of thousands of hives. and
then kept sending hives out all over the country
for pollination. It just didn't work. We just
need a better plan so that we don't get in that
kind of situation. We are just about out of time
and I told you I wouldn't take too much time
today. So I want to end with something fun. I
want to hear your wild and crazy beekeeping story.
Oh, wow. I will tell you and I still see it today
in my mind. We were in the hives and I had my
jacket zipped up thought I had my helmet zipped
on to my jacket and it was not and I'm down in
this hive and it's in the spring and so there's
a lot of bees in there and they're coming out
and I look and there's a bee inside my veil so
I do talks with people who are linemen, like
who climb poles and things like that, and I teach
them what not to do if you come across a hive.
Bee hive, wasp nest, doesn't matter. And I tell
them the worst thing you can do is panic and
you jump in your truck and there's three or four
bees flying around and then you jump out of your
truck and there's hundreds because you panicked.
Don't do that. Just, you know, calmly get in
your truck. If there's three or four, you know,
take the hit or try to get them down, but don't
go swatting. So what did I do? Human nature took
over. I ran around the truck screaming, there's
a bee, there's a bee in my suit. And my husband
kept, and I flew, I threw off my veil and my
husband kept saying, stop running, stop running.
So I have to tell you, in my mind, it happened
yesterday. It was many years ago, but it happened
yesterday. I'll never forget that. You know,
sometimes it's a little bit hard to tell whether
the bee is outside the veil or inside the veil.
And the secret is, and you don't want to have
to learn this, if you can see the underside of
the bee, like the legs, you know it's outside.
If you're seeing the back of the bee and its
wings, Time to panic. The other thing is if you
just tilt your head up, it'll go toward the sun
or to the light and then you can lift it up and
it'll go away. I knew how I got down there. I'd
pulled my jacket down too far, but boy, I laugh
about it today, but I still remember it like
it was yesterday. If you don't mind I know you're
about out of time but I would like to we didn't
really talk about ABF that much and I would like
to share that ABF does some other things for
not only beekeepers but researchers. We have
scholarships, four scholarships that we give
out. We are involved with 4 -HSA Contest right
now. Deadline is May 1st. So I would love for
people to go out to our website and take a look
at all the things that we do out there. We have
research, the latest research we put out there
every month. It's just a great way for you to
know everything we do. And if you have any questions,
certainly feel free to contact us. Fantastic.
And what link should they go to to find your
website? It's abfnet .org. That'll be in the
show notes too, in case you forget. Debbie Seib,
thank you so much for being with me today. Well,
thank you Eric for having me. I really appreciate
it. Thanks again for joining us on Be Love, Be
Keeping presented by Man Lake. Another big thank
you goes to Vita B Health for their support.
Vita's Varroa Control Ranger products includes
Epistan, Epigard, and now Varroxan Extended Release
Oxalic Acids Trips. Hey thanks a lot guys. And
if you haven't yet, please subscribe to and follow
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for the honey or the money, you're in it for
the love. See you next week.