It is beneficial to beekeepers who enjoy collecting
feral honeybees to develop relationships with local 
pest control companies so that they will be more 
willing to refer honeybee calls to beekeepers.

It is also beneficial to beekeeper to teach pest 
control companies some of the habits of bees
and advise them on methods they can employ
in their pest procedures which will lessen 
the chances for cross contamination of 
pesticides into the honeybee population.

I want to encourage pest control companies
to implement pest control procedures in a
in a responsible manner. One way to do this 
might be to give responsible pest control
companies some type of recognition. 

To qualify, they might need to agree to a
few things such as what my pest control
company has done for many years.. 

1. Maintain a beekeeper referral list. 
2. Refer all honeybee swarm calls to beekeepers.
3. Refer all honeybee colony calls to beekeepers.

Now there are instances in which it is not practical
for a beekeeper to remove a honeybee colony.
Unfortunately, there are few options left, one of
them being to have them exterminated.  Most 
pest control companies use dust for honeybees, 
the most popular is probably Delta.

I’ve had occasion to inspect work from other pest 
control companies and am alarmed that they do
not plug holes after injecting the dust, -they
‘dust and go’,,, and I hear reports of them killing
honeybee colonies in the same location year after
year. This needs to stop! So I am adding as a 3rd 
criteria that pest control companies must
plug entrance points with screen and or caulking
after dusting. 

My question is, if they must use pesticide, which
pesticide would you recommend that would pose 
the least risk to honeybees?  And do you have any
other criteria responsible pest control companies
should follow to protect honeybees?  

You are welcome to reply on or off list if you wish.

Best Wishes
Joe Waggle

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