Bee Losses Too Much for Beekeeper

Jun 17, 2013 12:16 pm | Michele Colopy

            Beekeeper, Jim Doan got his first hive of bees at age five from his father. He has 112 acres in New York State, a quiet place for him to work his bees, prepare them for crop pollination services, and to harvest honey.  After forty-five years he is calling it quits. 

            He had really good bees to start the year.   When he wintered some of his bees in Florida’s citrus orchards, he suffered a loss of 320 hives.  As he still had pollination contracts for the spring, he moved some of his other bees that had wintered in the woods in central Florida, into the apple orchards in New York.  His bees in the orchards did not want to work the apple blossoms or the dandelions blooming below the trees.  Bees were not making any honey in the orchards for two weeks.  Other beekeepers in the orchards were experiencing the same issue with their bees declining the beckoning apple blossoms on a 70 degree day.   Mr. Doan talked with other beekeepers out of state, and consulted with a university entomologist.  All suggestions were to try another group of hives.   Those also refused to pollinate the trees.  Then, the bees started dying.  Mr. Doan found dead bees in front of the hives.  No other bees were moving in to steal the honey in the nearly empty hives.

            Mr. Doan moved the remainder of his central Florida bees back to New York, where he prepares the hives on his land.  Corn was planted on Thursday near his property a few days before the bees were delivered.  Within four days his bees started dying.  Eight frames of brood are now down to 4 frames per hive, and the Queen bees are laying at the entrance to the hive: dead.  He has never seen that before, a Queen bee lying dead at the entrance to her hive.

            Jim called the County Bee Inspector, who told Jim he was not the first area beekeeper to call and report a bee kill: there had been complaints from across the State.  The bee inspector collected samples of dead bees and pollen, and sent them to Penn State University for analysis.  The report is not in yet, but based on his experience he knows what killed the bees.  He knows even the remaining bees will slowly die.  The bee kills are not unique anymore.  Now another 300 of his hives have died or will slowly die.  While the lifespan of bees is just a few months, and new brood hatches in 21-23 days, you have to have a strong Queen, nurse bees, and worker bees to ensure the brood hatches, has food to eat, and the entire colony can collect enough food to store for the winter.  Recovery does not happen in 21-23 days.  If a hive can recover it can take two months to the rest of the year, depending on the food source, and if the Queen is still alive. 

            "I physically and emotionally cannot do this anymore.  I make no money when I lose hives.  It will take my remaining hives two months to rebuild so they can make any money."  

            Last year Jim lost 148 hives in the spring from corn planting, and he got no help for his losses then.   All he got was people questioning the cause of his bee kill.  The Dept. of Environmental Conservation in NY said they could not come out to inspect for dead bees as they had no money in the budget.  Mr. Doan offered the ironic comparison,   "If I shot a bear I would have a dozen officers after me.  But no money to inspect for dead bees."   Last year the bees in the apple orchards were surrounded by corn fields, and within 3 days of corn planting no bees were left in the hives in the apple orchards.  Bee samples were pulled and analyzed though from this bee kill.  While his pesticide level was not at the kill level of clothianidin his bees still died.  "The levels of pesticides are supposed to be safe, yet bees are still dying.  My thiamethoxam levels in my bees were the highest in the nation—and yet in New York thiamethoxam can only be used for rosy aphids in apples and on treated  corn seed.  Yet, these bees got corn dust as these had not been in apples long enough to experience any pesticides there.  Thiamethoxam had not even broken down a month after corn planting.  Thiamethoxam is supposed to break down in clothianidin."

            Jim Doan, a beekeeper with forty-five years of experience and knowledge has decided to sell his farm and bee equipment, and get out of the business.  He is done, and in one sense relieved he will not have the stress due to continual bee kills. 

            "I just cannot do this anymore.  Where is the help that I need?   If I did not have bee kills I might stay in the business, but the pesticide kills have doomed my business.  When I had a mite or tracheal mite infestation, it was cleared up in 2-3 years through "survival of the fittest," through the bees adapting—and now the bees have no chance to build up a tolerance so now new bees can’t evolve and be stronger.  It is rare anything ecologically happens at the same time especially when the pollinator health decline occurred from the east to west coast.  This should tell you something else is going on.  Beekeepers have a joke, that, ‘Only when planting happens do the mites come out,’ as that is the easy excuse for pollinator health decline.  Yet, beekeepers know what the problem is, our experience, my forty-five years of raising bee, tells me what the problem is with the decline of bee health."

            The beekeepers have no control, and yet are the ones who are most affected.  Beekeepers are not allowed to talk at meetings and conferences with farmers, land managers, crop and chemical scientists, and government officials. "I can speak for myself, I have the knowledge and experience.  They have no right to speak for the beekeepers. We need to listen to beekeepers," Jim exclaimed.

            "Where can beekeepers go for a safe place for bees.  Move into the mountains with bees where there is no farming?"  However, he does not want the stress of moving his bees to the mountains as "you still have to feed them.  They are safe from agriculture, but there is not enough diverse forage for them to eat."   Mr. Doan could continue to winter his bees in Florida, "if you stay away from the orange groves."  Mr. Doan thought owning 112 acres would be a saferespite for his bee colonies.  He has lived on his land for 26 years, and his parents live just a mile away from him and his wife.  "I no longer can do the work I have done for most of my life, due to the actions of others.  My business of raising bees, of providing pollination services I can no longer do because of the business practices of others."

            When asked what he thinks the future holds Jim sees only "loss and suffering."  And, looking at 2014 he sees major problems ahead for pollinating the large mono-crops.  This is not the bee industry "we used to have and I do not see how it will survive," Jim stated.   "At what point does this blow up in our face?  When we will have scorched the earth and cannot grow anything?   The world is stuck on corn and soybean, and tearing up golf courses to plant more corn and soybeans." 

            He expressed a concern that the growers are "listening to the spray man," and letting the salesman of pesticides determine when, how much, and how often to apply chemicals to the land.  "Integrated pest management seems to have been forgotten, which was supposed to cut back on pesticide use.  Now we promote systemics to blanket everything.  And yet no one knows the results of blanket covering.  If pollinators refuse to go to a blossom full of nectar and pollen because the bee can tell it is poisonous, what has happened to that crop?"  What will happen to crops if they do not get pollinated; and what will happen to the food supply if crops do not get pollinated, and nuts do not form, seeds do not develop, fruits do not grow?

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