Bees make a comeback

Courtney Spradlin

A United States Department of Agriculture report on honey shows production is up 19 percent year over year — a good sign after lengthy periods of decline in honeybee colonies.

The number of managed colonies has been slashed in half since a peak in the 1940s, according to the USDA, thanks to predatory pests and diseases that have ravaged the non-native insects.

Producing colonies have decreased about 4 percent in Louisiana, March data shows, but colonies were up in number about 22 percent from 2013.

The state of bees in Louisiana remains favorable, said Thomas Rinderer, head researcher at the USDA’s Baton Rouge Honey Bee Breeding, Genetics and Physiology Research.

Weather, good beekeeping practices and the state’s agricultural systems have helped, he said.

But an issue that continues to press beekeepers — from cottage to commercial operations — is the Verroa destructor, a parasitic mite that first devastated feral and managed bee colonies in the 1980s.

In recent decades several methods were developed to keep the bug in check, though no one can eliminate it altogether.

“It’s hard to kill a bug on a bug,” said David Matlock, a juvenile court judge in Shreveport who manages a small beekeeping business in his free time with Chuck Pourciau, the senior pastor of Broadmoor Baptist.

The two started CapLock Honey two years ago, selling “treatment-free” raw honey, hives and queens. The two also remove bee infestations humanely from houses, trees and other structures.

There is a division in the beekeeping world and differing schools of thought on how to keep bees safe from the seemingly unending threats to their survival, which is claimed to be intertwined with our own.

“A third of our diet is bee-related,” Matlock said, referring to the widely publicized statistic that claims one-third of the foods humans consume is dependent upon pollinators such as bees.

Matlock and Pourciau take a naturalistic approach to their hobby, which is not lucrative but has in two years begun to pay for itself. They are proponents of the treatment-free method of rearing bees, though the honey yield is lower and their practice is still in theory.

The method has sustained their growing colonies so far, which are 15 in number and with low mortality, Matlock said.

Treatment-free, Matlock explained, means they do not use chemicals to ward against pests such as Varroa mites or antibiotics to protect against associated diseases.

“The idea being ... the bees will develop resistance and traits that will help them reach equilibrium with parasites as they have with other diseases and parasites in the past. This is the exception, and the vast majority of large and medium-size honeybee operations use a number of treatments to reduce the impact — particularly the economic impact — of the Varroa mite,” he said.

Randy Fair, a commercial beekeeper whose livelihood is selling honey, treats his bees to protect them from predatory bugs and diseases. Without the treatments and antibiotics, Fair said his average losses are expected to be 30 to 50 percent rather than the current 10 to 15.

He has a large operation of about 400 colonies just outside of Mansfield at his farm, Clear Lake Apiary.

Half are in production, yielding an average of 150 pounds of honey per colony. He sells to commercial retailers and from his home.

“In my opinion, treatment is the way to go if you have a large operation. There are those that would argue otherwise,” Fair said.

The topic is controversial, he said. Other controversies include how honey is extracted, how it’s packaged and what classifies as natural honey, raw honey or even as honey at all.

“There are those that say you’re wrong to put chemicals in a bee. There’s concern that it could get in the honey, but the chemicals I use are not put on the hive during a honey flow. Whatever I sell commercially is tested to make sure there are no chemicals in it,” he said.

Fair’s honey is raw, not “super-filtered” and contains pollen. His product is a consecutive winner at the Louisiana State Fair.

People call him the “beevangelist” for his work in the world of beekeeping. He is the state’s delegate in the American Beekeeping Federation.

But just like any other beekeeper, Fair has mites.

He treats and still loses, but his and other operations fare better than in the past when bees were critically low.

“Through treatment with pesticides we were able to bring our bees back,” Fair said. Colonies in the wild still die due to Varroa mites, as he has seen firsthand.

“There is a thought that if I only use feral colonies that haven’t been treated, I’d never have to treat. That does work for some beekeepers, but as large an operation as I am, I do it,” Fair said.

With that theory in mind, Matlock and Pourciau, who learned the art of beekeeping from Fair, use a bulk of feral bees in their hives, bees that have been untreated and that have survived thus far in the wild. They presume the comeback of bees is a sign the insects are adapting and establishing equilibrium in their environment.

Matlock and Pourciau trap and introduce the feral bees into their operation, assuming they are more resistant, though they are less productive than the commercially popular Italian honeybee.

“It’s a choice we make — like with free-range chicken or natural foods — how natural do we want our food and what sacrifices are we willing to make,” he said.

Matlock said the treatment-free approach leaves the bees “to their own devices” and allows the strongest to adapt.

“It seems to be better today than it did 15 years ago when diseases swept through and knocked out feral and managed bee hives. It wreaked devastation, the Varroa mites. Others have over time to more or less degrees,” Matlock said.

Others are tracheal mites, small hive beetles and wax moths.

“It has been this way over the last 100 years with bees, and generally they have established equilibrium,” he said. “If you don’t take all their honey and leave them resources that don’t hurt them, they’ll handle (the pests).”

Matlock said he and Pourciau are “a little later in the curve.”

“We may be spoiled a little bit because we just haven’t suffered the losses that others have. Only time will tell,” he said.

Rinderer said beekeepers should be vigilant against threats such as the Varroa mite and make treatments if necessary, or perhaps keep resistant bees to aid their efforts.

The Baton Rouge lab started releasing a Russian breed of Varroa resistant bees 10 years ago to combat the severity of the Varroa mite’s impact.

Rinderer said the state’s success with bees also can be attributed to this resistant strain, which is commercially available for any beekeeping operation or hobbyist.

“We started the business of producing resistant bees. As such, we think that’s a good way to go. Using chemicals to control mites works — but how long will it work? We worry about resistance in the pests we’re trying to control. All of a sudden the chemical doesn’t work — that’s the history of the chemical control of insects and weeds,” Rinderer said. “It’s the direction I think we need to go. On the other hand, people using chemicals — if they do it right though it’s a difficult job — they can certainly get through year by year.

“That’s an important segment of people who are keeping bees successfully.”

Honey in Louisiana

2014

•48,000 honey

producing colonies

•84 pounds per colony

•40,032 pounds

produced

2013

•50,000 honey

producing colonies

•98 pounds per colony

•49,000 pounds

produced

2012

•41,000 honey

producing colonies

• 86 pounds per colony

•30,526 pounds

produced

Sources: USDA honey report,

Louisiana Bee and Honey Report