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Subject:
From:
Bob Harrison <[log in to unmask]>
Reply To:
Informed Discussion of Beekeeping Issues and Bee Biology <[log in to unmask]>
Date:
Wed, 27 Sep 2006 23:09:35 -0400
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Hello All,
Thanks for your response  Medhat!
 
To the list:

For those seeing the small hive beetle ( SHB) for the first time. 

The alive  SHB beetle is easily spotted by the two parts seen on the head.

The parts stick out and then turn at a 45 degree angle outward by my 
observation.

 Many pictures in bee magazines show SHB without the parts on the head (not 
sure of proper name for the parts in beetles)because the  SHB when dead 
does not easily display the head parts. 

All SHB I have seen have been a quarter inch long.

The pollen beetle is very similar but longer ( and somewhat slimmer) and 
without the head parts.

I have seen both the SHB and the pollen beetle in the same hive. Coloration 
is similar. Black to dark brown. 

The bee labs have told me many of the beetle samples sent in have been the 
pollen beetle.

Two of the  truck drivers I interveiwed for the border article said they 
had seen no small hive beetles and when they turned away at the I40 
entrance into California a single dead beetle turned up. Both drivers asked 
me how  a dead beetle could have crawled out of the load.

The simple answer is they could not have. Hmmm.

In the case of the Tom Kennedy Honey Farm Homerville, Georgia turned around 
load  two supposedly small hive beetle were sent to Sacramento for testing.

When Tom Kennedy went to Sacremento to question the State of California 
about the findings he was told one was a SHb and the other was a small 
piece of rubber.

The turned around load cost the beekeepers around $20,000 in trucking and 
labor costs with figuring the lost pollination fees. The load (as per my 
ABJ article) was turned around for one dead SHB which crawled from the load 
and a black piece of rubber!

The  same rules are in place for this year! I have been told even higher 
pressure is being placed by California beekeepers to enforce SHb regs at 
the border. I have went higher than the State of California (Wayne Wehling 
in DC)to try and pressure California to make changes but so far no change.

Plenty of SHB in California in thousands of hives ( I gave Mr. Wehling the 
name of commercial beekeepers with SHB in California). 

Also plenty of africanized bees in California. In the October issue of ABJ 
on page 834 you will see  a picture of commercial beekeeper Rex Christensen 
which has had AHB in his apiaries for over 10 years in San Diego County, 
California.

Come clean California like Florida did! Why make hard working out of state 
beekeepers pay for you trying to hide the truth? 

Turning loads of hives bound for almonds over a single SHB is stupid and 
was done last season at the I 40 entrance to California. Tom Kennedy was 
told his load was turned because of a SHB *infestation*. Is a single SHB an 
infestation? A single cockroach or spider in your house? Each hive was 
moved onto a new four way pallet when loaded for shipment to California by 
the Kennedys. The main reason was for fire ants but also such a procedure 
will clear SHB from hives.

Letting off steam!

Sincerely,
Bob Harrison

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