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John Hodgkinson
My dear bees, I am sorry.
Seventy years of association with the European honeybee (Apis mellifera) for me came to a sad end this week when my last remnant-of-a-strong colony absconded. No doubt to cling as a small swarm to some Bellingen bush and make a futile attempt to find a new home, as swarm critical mass needs to be substantially greater for successful colonisation. And that’s without the new parasites.
Beautifully, and now achingly cached are my childhood memories of Arnie Weiss’s hives at the back of our 900 acre Matheson soldier settler farm near Glen Innes in the early 1950’s, his extracting van parked off the Kings Plains road, the smell of his smoker and the magical and unforgettable night-time hive aroma in the nectar flow season, then the luscious taste of yellow box honey from the 60lb tin he paid us in rent for the site each year.
These latest hives were the last of my six hyper-productive – and much loved- colonies to vote against Small Hive Beetle (SHB) and varroa mite with their weary and demoralised little bodies. The last few thousand l left quietly and unseen as I went about my Biodynamic Agriculture Aust daytime duties, leaving behind all their sealed brood, now-unattended larvae, accumulated pollen and ample winter honey stores.
How do I cope with the feeling of impotence and loss, tinged with a sense of failure?
What epitaph can I manifest to pay homage and express my gratitude to all those beings for which I was responsible? Maybe this love-lament will suffice.
By a rough estimate, my huge Langstroth colonies (I used no queen excluders, allowing the queens to lay eggs in all the four or five supers) would have numbered anything up to 60 000 bees each!
For months have I watched in dismay as each hive firstly chased many hive beetles into the trays of diatomaceous earth under each brood chamber and into the top bar traps. But still they kept coming – flying in by night from all the town beehive sites which have been providing ideal breeding conditions, especially originating from “slimed-out” colonies.
Then secondly – and suddenly – dealing with the varroa mite invasion! These tiny parasites arrived in force early in the year, and despite the DE traps, installation of Hive Gyms became present by the hundreds.
I watched as the bee populations rapidly dwindled. I bought some formic acid strips and fumigated half my colonies, but if anything, the dwindling accelerated.
My strongest colonies went first. These had produced around 60kg of gorgeous honey in the previous 12 months. Each. Now I am cleaning up all the empty hive gear and putting it into storage.
Not that I was always over the last 10 years waiting on their “production” with a hot uncapping knife and a nice warm extractor, ready to spin. My approach was to harvest their generous surplus regularly but not too frequently. Much of the honey became gifts; some stayed in bulk and sold for a bit of welcome pocket money. Thank you for all your dedicated work, my little female (and male) creatures, including all those queens in succession.
I have loved keeping bees, especially keeping only a small number of hives – up to only six in the last few years. Long ago I went “commercial” for a time, migrating up to 500 hives within a radius of 200km from the NSW Central Coast.
Epic as it was, I still loved rising to that challenge, and romanced the bees despite the ridiculous difficulties, hard work and tortuous trucking.
Now, I feel gutted, as the saying goes. The talk is that everyone’s colonies are dying out, but a few optimists are asserting that some colonies will adapt, and we can breed back from these.
Other optimists feel that miticides will work to maintain colony health, honey production and crop pollination. I doubt that even so-called “natural” ones offer a long-term solution.
What of hope? Well, in the offing is the chance to employ biodynamic peppers to even the playing field somewhat. We already have Rohanne Young’s small hive beetle homeopathic pepper (see the delectablegarden.com.au) and will soon have ditto for varroa.
However, given the possible future appearance of a varroa-resistant hive or bush colony, I may have a go at starting a nucleus colony or two, protected by the peppers.
Hope springs eternal…
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