Georgia Beekeepers Meeting in Athens,
October 12-13, 2001 Inaugurates New Building:
Three Decades of Honey Bee Research and Extension in Georgia
Highlighted
By
Dr. Malcolm T. Sanford
http://apis.shorturl.com
New University of Georgia
Facility Blessed:
In an era where reports of
funding reductions and shrinking programs related to honey bees are common,
it’s nice to see an exception. This is
true in Georgia,
where what some have described as a “miracle” has occurred. Under the guidance of Dr. Keith Delaplane, the University has just completed a brand new
facility for beekeeping research and extension.
Several things had to happen to make this a reality. First, the program was awarded a full-time
technician. At the same time, funding
became available from several sources, including the legislature, the
Department of Entomology and the University’s physical plant services. In addition, an existing honey bee facility
was being used to capacity at the University’s Horticultural Unit and there was
more room on the site for expansion. So
much was provided serendipitously as needed, Dr. Delaplane
said, that it is impossible to arrive at a cost for the facility ($150,000 is a
low estimate).
The new building was informally
“blessed” as part of the annual meeting of the Georgia Beekeepers Association,
October 12 and 13, in Athens, GA. Mr. Carl Webb, President of the Georgia
Beekeepers Association opened the meeting with a welcome to the participants. Dr. Keith Delaplane
followed with a description of the things that had to fall into place
(“miracles”) in order for the building to be constructed. He gave credit to Dr. Alfred Dietz, also on
the program, who provided a great basis for a
continuing beekeeping program before his retirement in 1995. Without such continuity, Dr. Delaplane, concluded it would not have been possible to
sell an idea for a new facility to the powers that be. The building has two large offices, a
conference room, and a meeting room (laboratory).
On hand was the venerated
Commissioner of Agriculture himself, Mr. Tommy Irvin. Mr Irvin is the
certified “dean” of Georgia
constitutional offices, having been elected to his office continuously since
1969. He told the audience that he was
excited to be a part of the ceremony in the new honey bee facility. He said he has always been involved with
beekeepers during his tenure attending bee meetings around the state and
advocating for the industry in a number of ways. He said that honey bees are becoming a
greater part of the agricultural mix because their pollination services are
more and more in demand. This is because
the traditional agronomic crops of rural Georgia like cotton, peanuts and
tobacco are being replaced by fruits, vegetables and ornamentals as the state
becomes more urbanized. Fewer pesticides
are also being applied, Commissioner Irvin said, especially on cotton, which is
also helping the beekeeping industry. He
is proud to be a part of the boll weevil eradication program that not only
means less chemical control, but also provides beekeepers, something that could
not have been imagined just a few years ago, a cotton honey crop.
Mr. Irvin’s vision of Georgia’s
agricultural future also involves more foreign trade. He said he’s always been in favor of this
side of the agricultural coin, even advocating exchanges with the Soviet Union before the fall of the Iron Curtain. Currently, he is championing trade with Cuba by attending a meeting early next year in Cancun, Mexico. As part of this continuing effort, the
Georgia Department of Agriculture is instituting a $3.2 million dollar
specialty crop promotional effort that he said would include an effort to
promote Georgia
honey in the global marketplace.
Finally, Georgia
is a leader in publishing important agricultural information; the crown jewel
of this, according to Commissioner Ivin is the Georgia Market Bulletin
<http://www.agr.state.ga.us/mbsite/index.html>
History of Beekeeping
Extension and Research in Georgia
It was in 1969 that the
modern era of beekeeping extension and research began in Georgia. In that year, a young professor from the University of Maryland
took up residence at the University
of Georgia
<http://www.uga.edu/>. Dr. Alfred Dietz, coming off a successful stint as
coordinator of the 1967 Apimondia meeting, the last
time it met in the United
States, was hired to lead the fledgling beekeeping program. Dr. Dietz, now an emeritus professor, was
present at this year’s meeting. Dressed
in full Bavarian lederhosen <http://www.germanclothes.com/Onlineshop/KTOnlinebundhose6.htm>,
he provided a history of his efforts, beginning with being hired as a 9-month
professor, academe’s “only
bee man in Georgia”
at the time. His research budget was
$250 per year and he shared a half-time technician with a colleague in the
Department of Entomology.
Dr. Dietz said funding comes
only from what you have done in academia and this takes time and
commitment. With little support at the
beginning, he was forced to search for a way to become noticed. He was successful by exploiting in a
relatively new field at the time, electron microscopy. Of special significance were the first
pictures taken of honey bee sensory organs (antennae) and a little-known
critter he was familiar with in Maryland,
the bee louse (Braula coeca). With this modest start, Dr. Dietz expanded
into other areas, including his interest in bee nutrition. He was a student of the influential honey bee
nutritionist, Dr. M. Haydak, at the University of Minnesota. Dr. Dietz’s studies on storing pollen led to
others concerning queen storage; one of his projects was to promote queen
production through the use of emerged queens in mating nuclei, rather than
queen cells. He also was able to show
that purple brood in south Georgia
was caused by pollen of the summer titi (Cyrilla racemiflora). This he says is caused by an “accidental transfer” of pollen, which
contains an amine that appears to cause the disease. Generally summer titi
nectar has little pollen in it. During his
early years at Georgia,
Dr. Dietz also began a beekeeping course; the first class had only 6
students. He was able to lure them in by
posing as the nobel prize-winning bee scientist of
the time, Dr. Karl VonFrisch
<http://www.nobel.se/medicine/laureates/1973/>, and presenting a series
of lectures in traditional German academic garb about bees around the campus.
As he became noticed, Dr.
Dietz took advantage of several invitations during his career including
exchange professor (Ehrlangen, 1977) and guest
professor (U. of Tubingen, 1995). He was
also staff apiculturist for the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service
(APHIS) < http://www.aphis.usda.gov/> in 1990. This was an outgrowth of his numerous
experiences in Latin America working with
Africanized honey bees in the 1980s. All
of these activities
provided more visibility for the Georgia program.
Along the way he collected a
swarm of students, a group that he called at the meeting “Dietz’s drones.”
These included Steve Jenkins, who pioneered work on the pollination of sea
oats, a plant that stabilizes Georgia’s
beach dunes, and Dr. Rainer Krell, who worked on
nectar secretion in Gallberry on the coastal
plain. Dr. Krell
is now at the Food and Agricultural Organization of the UN (FAO) <http://www.fao.org/>
in Rome. Manuel Mejia, a student from Colombia, helped design and participated in Dr.
Dietz’s studies on the impact of Africanized honey bees in Argentina. They documented that gentleness could be
selected for, but this also correlated with a reduction of up to twenty percent
in honey production. Vivian maria Butz
(not a drone?) looked at interactions among queen honey bees. Using the two-queen system she showed that 65
percent of the time young queens survived older queens when the units were
combined. In addition, she was able to
find out that the queens eliminated each other, and that this was was not due to worker intervention as previously
thought. Another Dietz drone, Carlos Vergara, was able to show in Mexico that there was significant
invasion of Africanized honey bee queens into European colonies and that this
was most often the case in queenless colonies. He also showed that larger bait hives
provided more attractive nesting sites.
Dr. Adalberto A. Perez de Leon, now one of Mexico’s top
thirty young scientists, showed that color was relatively unimportant in
selection of bait hives by Africanized honey bees. Finally, perhaps the most well-known of Dr.
Dietz’s students are Dr. Jeff Pettis, now at the Beltsville Bee Laboratory, and
this author, now retired from The University of Florida.
Dr. Dietz’s tenure also
profited from other exchanges. He hosted
now retired Dr. Yaacov Lensky,
of Israel’s Triwaks Bee Institute at the University of Georgia
and worked with several post doctoral students, including Dr. Frank Eischen, now at the Weslaco Honey Bee Research facility.
All this effort indeed
provided visibility and funding. The Georgia bee
program was able to hire a student technician early on. This author filled that spot for several
years. In 1983, Dr. Dietz’s program was
the largest recipient of grant money in the Department of Entomology at the University of Georgia with a total of $2 million. In addition, a successful short course was
instituted and a small building constructed at the horticultural farm, which
became the basis for the exapanded facility now at
that site. A turning point was the 1980
American Beekeeping Federation convention that took place in Savannah, GA. A chunk of money made by the Georgia
Beekeepers Association was awarded to Dr. Dietz’s program.
Dr. Delaplane
came on the scene in 1990 <
http://www.ent.uga.edu/personnel/faculty/delaplane.htm>. He is a graduate of Louisiana State
University, and although
trained in beekeeping and mentored by Dr. John Harbo,
was coming off a four-year sabbatical in termite study. He started out as one-hundred percent
extension, but later was integrated into the entomology department as an
academic faculty member after Dr. Dietz’s retirement in 1995. Since coming to Georgia, Dr. Delaplane
has been remarkably productive. Of
special significance for his extension program is his Georgia Public Television
series “A Year in the Life of an Apiary.”
<http://www.gactr.uga.edu/tv/videocatalog/bees.html> He also implemented the Young Harris College
Beekeeping Institute, which how has a ten-year history of service to beekeepers
in the state.
Dr. Delaplane’s
research has been outstanding and varied
<http://www.ent.uga.edu/bees/Research/archives.htm>. He has a long list of publications, including
significant articles in Bee World,
authorship with Dan Mayer of a pollination book that is considered an important
update of McGregor’s classic book: Insect Pollination of Cultivated Crop Plants.
<http://bee.airoot.com/beeculture/book/index.html> Most recently, he was the editor of
the new book published by Dadant & Sons, Inc. Mites of the Honey Bee. He has collaborated with Dr. Mike Hood of South Carolina in
determining treatment thresholds for Varroa mites,
and showed that vegetable oil extender patties helped control tracheal mites
and that feeding Terramycin® prevented weight loss in
Varroa parasitized bees. Other efforts include showing that bottom supering did not significantly improve honey yield and
brood production is reduced in old comb.
A large part of Dr. Delaplane’s program will be the full-time technician
position provided by the Department of Entomology, he concluded, a spot now
filled by Ms. Jennifer Berry. Ms. Berry provided an
overview of her current research, various studies concerning the comb’s effects
on the queen. Ms. Berry carried out studies in small cages,
where bees were given choices between old brood comb and that just drawn from
foundation. She found that newly-drawn
comb is preferred by queens and they lay more eggs in it as well. The comb also produces more bees. Workers from new comb weigh more (fewer cast
skins?) and on the average a greater number of workers are produced per area
than in older comb. There are more eggs
in new comb and bees store more honey in old comb. Thus, there is often less room to lay eggs in
older comb (a reason for
honey bound queens?). Ms. Berry’s studies provide
solid reasons for every beekeeping operation instituting some kind of comb
renovation program.
A final part of Dr. Delaplane’s research program is extensive study of bumble
bees (Bombus sp.).
He has published a series of much sought-after articles on rearing of
these bees, which are used extensively in greenhouse pollination. Dr. Delaplane
hosted a Fulbright Scholar from South
Africa, Selim Dedej, who is now a Ph.D. student. He first researched chalkbrood
control and showed that hygienic queens are responsible for a decrease in mummy
numbers in affected colonies. Mr. Dedej is currently studying the pollination of southern rabbiteye blueberries.
He showed the audience data that honey bees do increase fruit set and
that the effects of carpenter bees (Xylocopa sp.) are also important and not necessarily deleterious to the
pollination process. Carpenter bees are
implicated in slitting open blooms, which then attract so-called “side-working”
honey bees that avoid the pollination mechanism of the flower <>. Mr. Dedej concluded
that there is always a “background pollination” effect in rabbiteye
blueberries of about fifty percent, mainly due to the great variety of insects
always present. However, this effect can
be doubled in most cases by adding honey bees to the pollinating mix.
Other Speakers:
Dr. Jim Tew
at The Ohio State University < http://www.oardc.ohio-state.edu/www/people/tew1.html>
was the featured out-of-town speaker at the meeting. He provided two provocative discussions, full
of common sense and humor that those who have listened to Dr. Tew over the years have come to expect. His hilarious stories of collecting swarms
punctuated more serious swarm control techniques described. These include providing more drawn comb,
cutting queen cells (only for the most committed), adding foundation, and
finally, when those fail, as they often do, his design of a unique bee vacuum
powered by a conventional bee blower.
Swarming continues to be a vexing problem in beekeeping, Dr. Tew concluded, and many continue to scratch their head or
tear their hair out at what can only be described as the quintessential quixotic
behavior of the honey bee. I am reminded
that even the most revered bee masters, like the experienced C.C. Miller,
author of Fifty Years Among
the Bees, have become despondent when failing to control swarming.
The “energy eaters” of
beekeeping have become mites, according to Dr. Tew,
who shared his dirty dozen challenges faced by modern beekeepers. Paradoxically, aside from mites, the issues challenging beekeepers
today are much the same as those recounted in old bee journals. These include: time shortage, maintaining
enthusiasm, other pest problems (small hive beetle), timely information, honey
usage (new products), apiary locations, differences among beekeepers
(personality, objective, goals, time), decreasing technical support, our
sometimes not so friendly friends (non-Apis people, university and research administrators),
pesticides, and finally getting (and keeping) people into beekeeping.
Both Barry Smith and John Rudeseal of the Georgia Department of Agriculture were
present at the meeting. Mr. Smith is in
charge of apiary inspection, but also has responsibility in other agricultural
inspection efforts. There are now four
full-time inspectors in Georgia. The state is considered fully infested with
small hive beetle (Aethina tumida) and
there appears to be evidence of misuse of the new coumaphos-based
CheckMite+ strips.
The latter is troubling, Mr. Smith said, as any documented cases make it
more likely the material will be pulled off the market by the Environmental
Protection Agency <http://www.epa.gov/>.
Mr. Rudeseal provided an explanation of how
honey house inspections are carried out in Georgia at a workshop presented at
the meeting.
Other workshops included how
to get entries ready for the 2002 American Honey Show at the American
Beekeeping Federation meeting in Savannah,
GA, January 16-19, 2002, and
examples of successful beekeeping promotional efforts around the country.
Other Events:
Like many bee meetings, the Georgia
beekeepers hosted a honey show. The
cadre of judges, however, was not run of the mill. Rather, they were “certified,” being trained
at last year’s Young Harris Beekeeping Institute by Mr. Michael Young, chief
judge of the British National Honey Show and instructor at the
2001 Young
Harris Institute. Rumor has it he will be back for the 2002
event and all prospective judges are invited to attend. There was a silent auction and a catered
banquet. Fred Rossman,
the Master of Ceremonies, shared his knowledge of Georgia Beekeeping history
and various awards presented for service the beekeeping industry. The meeting was topped off with an ad hoc
shrimp boil and local bluegrass band.
The continuing success of the
University of Georgia beekeeping extension and
research program is a tribute to the efforts and commitment of a lot of folks,
both past and present. The new facility should
help coalesce all parts of the state’s large
beekeeping industry from equipment manufacturers to the traditional queen and
package bee operators to hobbyists into a unified effort to push forward the
boundaries of education and research.
Other states may wish to look at this program for guidance as one of the
crown jewels of beekeeping study and education in the United States.