Tips for August

(Courtesy of Joli Winer, The Bee Buzzer of the Northeastern Kansas Beekeepers Association, August 2015) Use the weed eater and mow around your hives so that the bees can get in and out. After pulling off your supers check your hives to make sure they have laying queens. Provide water for your bees—this will keep your bees alive in this heat. Bees are hanging …

Bee Health App

Dear Apiculturists Alberta Agriculture has developed an app for “Bee Health”. Phase I of the “Bee Health” app is released. It focuses on bee diseases symptoms, diagnosis and treatment options. It is developed for iOS and Android platforms. It can be downloaded to iPhone, Samsung phone family and iPad. To download to iPad, you need to use the iPhone only option …

USDA Encourages Producers to Consider Risk Protection Coverage before Fall Crop Sales Deadlines

Disaster Assistance is Available for Crops that are Ineligible for Federal Insurance WASHINGTON, Aug. 20, 2015 – Farm Service Agency Administrator Val Dolcini today encouraged producers to examine the available U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) crop risk protection options, including federal crop insurance and Noninsured Crop Disaster Assistance Program (NAP) coverage, before the sales deadline for fall crops. “Deadlines are quickly approaching …

Apicultural Conference Tackles Neonic Issue

Italy Banned the Seed Treatments in 2008 by Jeffrey Carter When neonicotinoid seed treatment insecticides were effectively banned in Italy in 2008, corn growers in the northwestern part of the country grumbled. They feared yield losses to insect pests if the chemicals were to be taken away. Those fears never materialized, according to Franco Mutinelli who spoke at the Eastern Apicultural Society (EAS) conference …

IU Paleobotanist Identifies What Could Be the Mythical ‘First Flower’

New analysis represents major change in the presumed nature of the planet's earliest angiosperms Indiana University This is a large intact specimen of the fossil, Montsechia. Usually only small fragmentary pieces of the fossil are found. Credit Bernard Gomez   BLOOMINGTON, Ind. -- Indiana University paleobotanist David Dilcher and colleagues in Europe have identified a 125 million- to 130 million-year-old freshwater plant as one of …

Indiana University’s Efforts to Help Beekeeping

by Amy Renee Toler, Indiana University BLOOMINGTON, Ind. – For the past decade, beekeepers in the U.S. and Europe have been reporting annual bee and hive losses that are considerably higher than what would be considered normal or sustainable. U.S. beekeepers lost more than 40 percent of their colonies in 2014-15 -- the second-highest loss since the Bee Informed Partnership, a partnership …

Honey Bee Health Coalition Releases Guide to Help Beekeepers Detect, Control Varroa Mite Infestations

Guide Equips Beekeepers of All Types with Tools to Tackle Parasite, Strengthen Hive Health The Honey Bee Health Coalition, a diverse coalition dedicated to improving the health of honey bees and other pollinators, released a guide today aimed at helping beekeepers strengthen hive health by controlling the Varroa mite (Varroa destructor). This parasitic mite undermines honey bee health by literally draining …

Some Honey Bee Colonies Adapt in Wake of Deadly Mites

CORNELL CHRONICLE by Krishna Ramanujan A worker bee with two Varroa mites. (Tom Seeley photo) An exposed nest of a colony of honeybees living in a tree. (Tom Seeley photo) A new genetics study of wild honeybees offers clues to how a population has adapted to a mite that has devastated bee colonies worldwide. The findings may aid beekeepers and bee breeders to prevent …