Bee Feedback

A couple of weeks ago, after I published my Empty Hive post, I posted links to it in a couple of different places in the hope that I would get some feedback and gain some insight from others experiences.  It worked!  I had several comments on my NM Beekeepers Association post on Facebook.  Here's a little of what I learned:

Commenter #1 - It has been a tough winter for the bees. Most of my bees survived the winter but not the spring.

Commenter #2 - I lost 1 out of 3 hives. Happened in April. There was no honey in the hive so I suspect they starved. Other 2 are taking 1:1 sugar water like crazy. Its a very bad drought here; very little blooming yet.

Commenter #3 - lost 2 of my hives this Spring here in Sfe with exactly the same conditions. Lots of honey and lots of bees dead in a cluster partially in the cells. I had this exact type of loss about 5 years ago. I figure they froze due to drastic temperature drop after they had started to forage and uncluster.....?

Commenter #4 - I had two hives going into winter completely packed with honey. One hive was very strong going into spring, the other quite weak so I combined them and pulled off about 30 pounds of honey.

Commenter #5 - All 3 of my hives are right next to each other and it was the middle hive that died off. I don't think it was a temperature drop that did that hive in but I suppose its a possibility.

Commenter #6 - All four of mine, going 'great-guns' strong in late June, had rapidly succumbed to an indeterminate brood disease by late July. (Even Joe Wesbrook couldn't definitively identify it.) At the April 2013 meeting of ABQ Beeks, one speaker (Kate) labeled the symptoms & outcome as a "parasitic mite syndrome." I surmise that my colonies were weakened by the hot, dry weather.

Commenter #7 - 4 out of my 10 hives in Taos had the exact same conditions that you describe. My hypothesis is that due to the extreme prolonged cold the bees clustered together and weren't able to break cluster to get honey. I only insulated the top of my hives. Next winter I will insulate the sides and will put an insulated false back in the hive to reduce the amount of space they have to heat.

Commenter #8 - I had one hive abscond because the queen froze, mostly because I removed their Winter packing too early. 1 out of 16 - not a bad ratio. Still have Winter sugar in some of them because it is so dry.

And then a conversation broke out between two commenters (with a response by a third) that broke my heart:

Commenter #1 - While out in California for Pollinating almonds a few months ago, most of the comercial beekeepers I talked to, claimed super high losses. One I know, he had 1500 on the summer but could only take 220 to pollination, most of them died or where weak and dieing. Another of the big ones I talk to, said he brought back from making Ohio honey, 1200 dead hives that were full of honey and dead animals at the end of summer. He used to have 12000 hives and now, he only has over 3000. It was the same Sad story and hard times for commercial and sideline beekeepers. I just do not know if beekeeping has a future the way it is now. If laws do not change in regards of pesticides and agricultural practices, there is no future for commercial or sideline beekeepers.

Commenter #2 - My mentor of 35 years ago sold his 5000 hives and became a Pastor. I fear for our commercial folks, this may be a lifestyle that is going away without hardly a whimper. It is probably more tragic than we now realize, the repercussions have yet to be felt in our society.

Commenter #1 - Yes, people do not realize how extreme this problem is, or how it potentially can impact the survival of our human race. We run several orphanages in Mexico, and have tried to teach children who to be a beekeeper, but drought, pesticides, and God knows what, have taken a toll into our stock. Now, from 50+ colonies we had dedicated to teach children at the orphanages, we are down to 12 and 8 of them just surviving. It is terrible, but 42% of the agriculture land in Mexico is not being cultivated for lack of rain, and here, in Anthony New Mexico where I live, the situation is not better. There is no water in the river, there is no irrigation, no rain, no wild flowers to feed our colonies -just bad. I hope I am wrong, but it seems like there will be massive famine at the copper canyon of Chihuahua. Last year, several Tarahumara Indian families committed suicide rather than face starvation. Families were jumping from clifftops in desperation- sad.

Commenter #2 - May you and your missions be blessed.
Folks in Mexico live closer to the food supply than we do in el norte, we tend to say “ah the poor bees” and not realize the interconnection that our pollinators have with our ecosystem and our food supply. We may have some real issues if we can’t keep bugs alive on this planet, this is the canary in the coal mine.

Commenter #3 - I have heard something on the lines of greater than a 60% loss this year for commercial beeks. The rumor has it this may the the last economically viable bees season for them. The cause has roughly been attributed to neonics used on Sunflowers in their wintering grounds - and lack of forage. So sad about Copper Canyon. That is a unique place in the world. I would like to go there someday.

While we are still not sure what happened to our hive specifically, I've been pouring through articles and reading everything I can to try to get a handle on what is happening to all of our bees (you can read a couple of the most recent articles here, here, here and a different perspective here).

What I'm learning is not anything new, and it is truly heartbreaking. Our way of living on this planet has to change.  Truly, our bees, our food and our lives depend on it.  We, as people on this planet, must find other ways of growing and producing food.  Not only is what we're doing now not producing enough food for the all of earth's people, but it is killing our environment.  Bees are the canary in the coal mine. If we don't listen and change our actions very quickly, we will be in a world of hurt before we know it.

xoxo,
M

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