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Background |
| August 2008 |
| Our bees this year have been
very strong and we have had many New Jersey beekeepers
purchase our locally produced queens; the word has gotten
around about what we are trying to accomplish by not using
chemicals and using natural methods to manage our bees. In
this season, our seventh season with out using chemicals,
the bees have produced a bumper crop of honey and Mary has
been very busy pulling and processing the plentiful honey.
She has also continued to graft queens from three new
breeder queens which we received in early April from Glenn
Apiaries; (1) Russian and (2) Carniolan queens.
Glenn Apiaries
Web Site. |
| In June Mary traveled to the
University of California at Davis to attend an advanced
instrumental insemination course taught by Sue Cobey. She
has spent the summer, in her spare time, practicing in the
lab we have set up in our home. We hope to be able to
integrate this new technique into our operation in 2009 but
we must say it takes much practice to master.
UC Davis Class |
| We began using a new
integrated pest management technique for controlling the
African Hive beetle. It is called AJ’s Beetle eater and it
was introduced in Australia. It has been very effective and
very easy to use and of course there is no need to use
chemicals; we just add vegetable oil to it.
AJ’s Beetle
Eater site |
| Mary is very excited by the
strength of our bees and now as the last days of summer
approach we are starting our winter nucleus preparations. In
the past two years we have been very successful
overwintering nucleus hives and we have to thank Kirk
Webster, from Vermont, for spreading the word on this. We
have found that in the spring the nucleus hives are bursting
and ready to go. |
| January 2007 |
| We successfully grafted 100
queens from a instrumentally inseminated breeder Russian
queen that we purchased from Glenn Apiaries. We received the
queen, in great condition, on May 5th and she was
immediately accepted by the bees. She was a prolific layer
and her laying pattern was beautiful. We received a second
Russian breeder queen from Glenn Apiaries in August and she
will be our breeder queen for 2007.
Glenn Apiaries
Web Site. |
| In May, during a
raging rain storm we drove to Vermont and picked up (10)
Russian nuc’s from Kirk Webster. After picking up the bees
we promptly turned around and drove back to New Jersey. We
arrived home at 2:00 am and went to bed; then got up at 5:00
am to move the new bees into our yard. The bees are a
welcome addition to honey bee project.
Article on Kirk Webster in Orion Magazine |
| The weather this past Summer
and Fall made things more difficult for our bees to produce
extra honey with the monthly precipitation going above and
below the average norms throughout the honey season. Finally
the Fall started off with a very cold September which
greatly impacted our bees honey production. We are getting
many reports of New Jersey beekeepers who are feeding their
bees so they can make it through winter. Our Fall honey crop
was almost non existent this year; we normally get over
1,000 pounds of Red Bank Raw honey during the fall. |
| This past year was pivotal
for Mary and I. We were very successful in our 1st full
season of grafting honey bee queens and we continued our
program to develop a stronger honey bee without using
chemicals. But during the year we had many debates about the
propensity of the Russian Honeybee to swarm more then other
races of honeybees; something that we have observed and
lived through during the past four years of our program. We
compared this negative Russian Honeybee trait with its
positive trait of being able to handle mites without the use
of chemicals. |
| We finally came to a
decision that we would add New World Carniolan HoneyBee
stock (NWC
Breeding Program) to our program in order to modify this
Russian propensity to swarm and to also add additional
genetic diversity to our bees. So in 2007 we will be adding
NWC Nuc’s and NWC queens alongside our Russian Bees. |
| In addition we decided that
we would add an instrumental insemination (II) component to
our program. Our plan is to buy the II equipment, take a
basic II course in 2007 and start basic II in 2007. Our aim
is fully integrate instrumental insemination into our Honey
Bee Project by 2008.
The Development of Instrumental Insemination |
| Since we began migrating our
Honey Bee yards to Russian Honey Bees in 2003 we have not
used the following chemical medications: Apistan, CheckMite
and Terramyicin. |
| Our Honey Bees have been
getting stronger since 2003 and we hope during this year,
2007, our program will continue to make our bees even
stronger!! |
| February 2006 |
| Our way of looking at and
working with bees changed dramatically five years ago when
about 40 of our beehives collapsed a month after we had
harvested our early season honey; Mary and I were in a state
of shock! We spoke to all our Beekeeper friends and about
the best they could tell us was the mites (V. jacobsoni),
that we had been treating for, had become immune to the
treatments. The conventional thinking had been to treat the
mites with chemicals and when the chemicals didn’t work
anymore then we should switch to the newest chemical which
the mites still had not yet become immune to. Mary and I had
worried a lot about treating our bees with chemical
medications and this disaster was the last straw- the straw
that broke our camel’s back |
| We immediately began to look
around to see what other beekeepers were doing to fight the
mites that didn’t involve chemicals! Soon we discovered a
Honey Bee project that was being run at the USDA , ARS Honey
Bee Breeding, Genetic, Physiology Research Laboratory in
Baton Rouge, Louisiana that was actually working with
Russian Queen Honey Bees imported from Russia. The purpose
of the project was to determine if the Russian version of
the Honey Bee species (Apis mellifera) would be more
resistant to the mite since: |
| Apis mellifera is not
native to the Primorsky Territory on Russia's Pacific coast,
but was first moved there in the last century. At that time,
pioneers from western Russia took advantage of the
completion of the Trans-Siberian Railway and moved bees from
European western Russia to the Primorsky Territory in Asian
far-eastern Russia. This far-eastern area of Russia is
within the natural range of Apis cerana, the original
host of Varroa jacobsoni. Thus A. mellifera
was brought into the likely range of V. jacobsoni
even before the parasite was scientifically described in
1904. This probable long association of V. jacobsoni and
A. mellifera in the region has engendered one of the
best opportunities in the world for A. mellifera to develop
genetic resistance to V. jacobsoni.... (Source:
USDA Agriculture Research Service) |
| When Mary and I discovered
the American Honey Producers Association was meeting in
Baton Rouge, Louisiana for their 34th Annual Convention
(January, 2003) and that they were going to highlight the
Russian Honey Bee and also take a field trip to the USDA ,
ARS Honey Bee lab we made travel arrangements and booked our
flight.! |
| As expected the AHPA
convention was great and we got a chance to meet the
research personnel from the lab and even got a chance to
handle the Russian Honeybees while at the USDA , ARS Honey
Bee lab. In addition we met some of the beekeeping
cooperators, the commercial beekeepers from Iowa,
Mississippi, Louisiana who participated in the field trials
of the Russian Honey Bee, and we were able to have extended
discussions with them about their experiences with the
Russian Honey Bee. (see cooperators at:
Russian Honeybee Project Cooperators) |
| The following Spring we
began a program of moving our HoneyBee stock over to Russian
Honey Bees. Our first task was taking a trip to Virginia to
pick up Russian baby bee hives (also knows as Nuc’s ) from a
beekeeper name Bob Brockman who was recommended by the
people from the Baton Rouge bee lab. Bob had been using
Russian bees for a number of years and he over wintered his
bees from upstate New York in Virginia. Later in the Spring
we received in the mail Russian Queens from Bob Brockman and
Hubert Tubbs at Tubbs Apiaries in Mize, Mississippi and
introduced these queens into our bee yards. |
| In 2004 we continued our
introduction of Russian Queens from Bob Brockman and also
Ray Ravis from North Carolina. In addition Ed flew out to
Ohio to take a Queen rearing course at Ohio State University
with Sue Cobey. |
| In 2005 we began our third
year of introducing Russian Queens from Ray Ravis. In
addition we began our own Honey Bee Queen rearing program
and we successfully produced (20) Russian Queens. |
| In 2006 we will be
introducing Russian Queens from Bob Brockman and Ray Ravis.
In addition we will be bringing in a Russian Breeder queen
from Glenn’s Apiaries and intend to produce (100) Russian
Queens. |
| (please see:
Glenn Apiaries
) |
| Finally we are on a waiting
list for Russian Honey Bee Winter Nuc’s from Kirk Webster at
Champlain Valley Bees & Queens in Middlebury, Vermont;
hopefully we will be making the trip to Middlebury, Vermont.
We think Kirk’s bees will be a real positive influence for
our Honey Bees. |
| This year we will be testing
all of our Honey Bees for hygienic propensity and activity
so we will have a better idea on which hives can really take
care of themselves against diseases. |
| Since we began migrating our
Honey Bee yards to Russian Honey Bees in 2003 we have not
used the following chemical medications: Apistan, CheckMite
and Terramyicin. |
| Our Honey Bees have been
getting stronger since 2003 and we hope this year’s
activities will only make our bees stronger!! |
Mary & Ed Kosenski
E&M Gold Beekeepers, LLC
mailto:
emgold.beekeepers@verizon.net
113 Hope Road, Tinton Falls, NJ 07724
Tel: 732-542-6528 Fax:
732-460-0908
Check out our Jersey Fresh Honey & Beeswax candles @
http://www.emgoldbeekeepers.com |
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