Lloyd Spear said:

> Perhaps this selfish attitude on the part of some commercial beekeepers
> started back when there was a quarantine on movement due to varroa
> infestation and one commercial beekeeper said 'to hell with it', and moved
> his bees regardless.  There was not only no enforcement action, but the guy
> was subsequently elected President of ABF!  This same guy is now spreading
> SHB throughout the Northeast and is not particularly bashful about saying he
> knows his hives are infested, so nearby beekeepers should 'be prepared'.

Bob Harrison replied:

> In defense of the migratory beekeeper:
> When we look back at the efforts of the USDA to stop varroa, tracheal mite,
> AHB or the small hive beetle with quarantines. Has any of the quarantines
> worked?  NO!

Fair warning - I'll be providing covering fire for Bob in the event that this
turns into a knife fight.   :)

Lloyd's right.  What's one to do with a rouge beekeeper who clearly cannot
be bothered to take even minimal prudent steps to protect his own investment,
let alone the investments of others?  At what point does he become a public
nuisance?  Quarantines or not, the lack of a minimal set of standards and the
complete lack of a "code of ethics" endangers the future of the guild.  And yeah,
we are a guild, like it or not.  We just have not agreed to any groundrules, and
this is one major reason why our numbers keep shrinking.

But Bob's even MORE right.  The history of bee-related quarantines in the
US is a set of textbook examples of how NOT to implement quarantines.

Quarantines are very difficult to implement, moreso when the pest
(for example, SHB and AHB) is able to move considerable distances
on its own.  From my point of view, the only quarantine that might have
stopped SHB would have involved the use of defoliants in a 20-mile swath
along the edges of the infected areas, to eliminate habitat for SHB trying
to fly out of the infected zone.  No one would tolerate such draconian
practices "for the good of beekeeping", even if the alternative was the
complete elimination of beekeeping.

Bob's also right that the migratory beekeeper bears unacceptable costs
and risks to loads as a result of inspection and quarantine programs, like
California's attempt to control fire ants.  His only recourse in the event of
the loss of a load of bees is a lawsuit, since no government authority who
plans a quarantine program would ever admit that beekeepers losses are
to be expected when one stops a truck at a border point for "inspection".

But it should be clear that such losses are inevitable, unless inspections
are planned with intelligence, for example allowing bees to be moved to
an exsiting holding yard for inspection.

So, what to do?

1)  Don't expect beekeepers to beg to be inspected and quarantined.
     The larger beekeepers tend to be elected to offices in beekeeping
     organizations, since they are often the only ones willing to give the
     time and effort required to serve.  Non-migratory beekeepers could elect
     their own slate of candidates any time they wanted to join the
     various organizations (most don't), attend meetings (few do), and
     give of their time (fewer still).  Is it any wonder that the "voice" of
     beekeeping represents the view of the majority of hives, but the
     minority of beekeepers?  Recall that "democracy" includes the case
     of two wolves and a sheep deciding what's for dinner, and make your
     choice.  "Freedom" would require the sheep to pack some serious firepower.

2)  Large migratory beekeepers are somehow viewed as more knowledgeable
     and "better" beekeepers, even though their mass-production approaches
     and migratory models inherently imply that much of the actual hands-on
     beekeeping is done by hired hands, many of them part-time and temporary.
     But smaller beekeepers have found that diseases and pests are not
     something that can be completely prevented with mere better attention
     to a smaller number of hives.  There are no "solutions" known to the
     problems posed by exotic invasive pests and diseases that are merely
     too labor-intensive to be used by the largest beekeepers.

3)  "Enforcement" is clearly a touchy subject, given that an overly aggressive
     bee inspector would be subjected to pressure from beekeeping groups
     [see point (1)].  Fair enforcement would be even more difficult, since it
     would be easy to point out that many cases of "migratory distribution of
     pests and diseases" are known to have been due to the smaller beekeepers
     moving a "few" hives, for example in the classic chess move from "Gallberry to
     Sourwood" between the coastal plain of Georgia and the Blue Ridge Mountains.
     How can any US quarantine be truly enforced without 24-hour checkpoints on
     EVERY road, manned by the national guard?

The problem is that there appears to be no middle ground between "irradiation"
programs, like USDA APHIS' program (or should I say "progrom"?) to eliminate
"citrus canker" in Florida, and what we have, which is nothing more than counting
the casulties and tracking the results of our own lack of organization, focus, and willpower.

It is interesting to note that no one anywhere has ever really "won" a fight against
an invasive pest or disease, and that no model or approach has been shown to be
effective in even preventing the spread of these invasives.  Large bodies of water
and other natural barriers were effective, but the WTO is working hard to eliminate
even these barriers to the worldwide and universal introduction of every possible
pest and disease.

Living in an area not on the migratory routes, and sparsely populated by beekeepers,
I am "safer" than most, but even that is not an "answer".

Anyone have an actual solution to suggest?
I'm fresh out.

        jim