12 CapitalPress.com
June 3, 2016
Bees
3,528,000
CONTINUED from Page 1
In the last year, more than
40 percent of honeybee colo-
nies in the U.S. perished, suc-
cumbing to several factors,
which in combination have
more than doubled the normal
losses seen in the past.
Environmental stressors,
sub-lethal levels of pesticides
and pests and disease have
been taking their toll on ag-
riculture’s most important
pollinators for the last decade,
claiming as much as 45 per-
cent and as little as 29 percent
of honeybee colonies per year.
The losses are a threat to
farmers and production agri-
culture, considering that hon-
eybee pollination is critical to
the success of a vast array of
crops — including fruits, veg-
etables and nuts, as well as the
alfalfa fed to cattle to produce
milk and beef.
All told, honeybees are
responsible for pollinating at
least 90 commercially grown
crops in North America, ac-
counting for more than $15
billion in crop revenue in the
U.S., according to USDA.
This past year, the com-
mercial beekeepers who keep
U.S. agriculture buzzing — as
well as part-time beekeepers
and backyard enthusiasts —
lost 44.1 percent of their col-
onies, according to the Bee
Informed Partnership, a na-
tional research collaboration
supported by USDA and the
National Institute of Food and
Agriculture.
“The problem it seems like
we’re having is it’s hard to
keep them healthy,” McGuire
said.
There are many stresses,
including a lack of forage,
lack of a diversifi ed diet, pes-
ticide exposure and varroa
mites, he said.
McGuire’s home base is
in dairy country, where alfal-
fa is now cut before bloom
for high-quality hay for milk
cows. Canal banks that used
to bloom with nourishing
fl owers are now mowed or
sprayed barren. And his bees’
“working vacation” in Cali-
fornia’s Central Valley offers
only thousands of acres of
almond trees that limit their
diet.
With the lack of forage
variety, “there are now areas
where beekeepers have to
feed their bees all year,” he
said.
McGuire feeds his bees
heavily in the spring and fall.
This year he bought about
150,000 pounds of corn syr-
up. At $32 per hundredweight,
that’s a $48,000 expense.
Despite his efforts, he’s
still experiencing annual loss-
es of 30 percent to 40 percent
— compared with 10 percent
in a bad year in his early days
in the family business.
McGuire’s 2,800 colonies
were down to 1,600, strong
enough to take to California in
U.S. honeybee
colonies, 1989-2015
4 million
(Honey producing colonies by market year)
2,660,000:
Down 24.6%
from 1989
3
Source: USDA NASS
2
1989 ’91
’93
’95
’97
’99
’01
’03
’05
’07
’09 ’11
’13 2015
Alan Kenaga/Capital Press
Carol Ryan Dumas/Capital Press
Commercial beekeeper Jed McGuire inspects a frame in one of his beehives while his nephew, Tyler
Magnelli, stands ready in a bee yard near Gooding, Idaho, on May 24.
December to get them out of
the cold and ready for almond
pollination. That left a lot of
empty hive boxes at his apiary
in Idaho — and more empty
boxes would be coming home
in April.
The number of bees in a
colony varies widely by sea-
son, with USDA estimating
most at 20,000 to 40,000.
Hives of 40,000 to 60,000 at
the peak are common but at
that population bees typically
swarm to split the hive.
These days, McGuire
plans on bringing 20 percent
of his hive boxes home emp-
ty — double what a bad year
used to be on the California
trek — but he has had losses
as high as 45 percent, he said.
Growing threat
Beekeepers have always
lost bees, but those losses
started accelerating in 2004
— two years before colony
collapse disorder captured
media attention, said Gene
Brandi, a Los Banos, Calif.,
commercial beekeeper and
president of the American
Beekeeping Federation.
Brandi started working in
the bee business in the early
1970s and opened his own
apiary in 1978. Back then,
he considered winter losses
of more than 5 percent of his
colonies to be a bad year.
Even with the arrival of
the varroa mite in the U.S.
in the late 1980s, beekeepers
weren’t experiencing the kind
of losses they’ve seen the past
12 years. The mite gradually
grabbed a foothold in the U.S.
but with proper controls, it
wasn’t a big deal, he said.
The mite feeds on both
adult bees and developing
brood and spreads rapid-
ly from one hive to anoth-
er, transmitting viruses that
cause deformities, paralysis
and death. Varroa control con-
sists of both mechanical and
chemical methods, as well as
the introduction of mite-toler-
ant stock.
“You’ll always have them;
you just try to keep them man-
ageable,” McGuire said.
But varroa mites have be-
come a major threat that is
growing, according to a re-
cent study of multi-year hon-
eybee disease surveys by the
University of Maryland and
USDA.
Released in April, that
study found the varroa mite is
far more abundant than previ-
ously estimated and is a par-
ticularly challenging problem
among backyard beekeepers.
“Many backyard beekeep-
ers don’t have any varroa
control strategies in place.
We think this results in colo-
nies collapsing and spreading
mites to neighboring colonies
that are otherwise well-man-
aged for mites,” reported Na-
thalie Steinhauer, a graduate
student in UMD’s Department
of Entomology who leads
data collection for the Nation-
al Honey Bee Disease Survey.
“We are seeing more evi-
dence to suggest beekeepers
who take the right steps to
control mites are losing col-
onies in this way, through no
fault of their own,” she said.
The varroa mite has be-
come one of the main issues in
colony loss, along with some
pesticides and insuffi cient nu-
trition that compromise bees’
immune systems, Brandi said.
But in his opinion, the in-
creasing use of neonicotinoids
— a systemic insecticide fi rst
registered in the mid-1990s
— was a major factor in the
accelerated loss of colonies.
Other pesticides, including
fungicides and insect growth
regulators, added to the down-
fall, he said.
Those other pesticides ar-
en’t toxic to adult bees, but
they impact the development
of brood, he said.
“Anything that disrupts the
normal development of brood
impacts the sustainability of
the colony,” he said.
Poor nutrition is anoth-
er factor, as malnourished
bees are more susceptible to
disease. The drought in Cali-
fornia has certainly impacted
nutrition, but the issue is more
widespread, he said.
The combination of fac-
tors has led to winter losses
in some years of more than 35
percent and total annual loss-
es of well over 40 percent, he
said.
“We never used to see
that,” he said.
Working overtime
The critical role of honey-
bees and their startling losses
have drawn more research.
But the culprits are varied and
their interaction complex.
“Beekeepers are struggling
to manage all the things af-
fecting their colonies. It’s a
whole laundry list,” said Jef-
fery Pettis, a USDA senior
entomologist and co-coordi-
nator of the Bee Informed col-
ony loss survey.
In addition to poor nutri-
tion from not getting mixed
pollen, a lot more chemicals
from pesticides are in the hive
than in the past. Pests and par-
asites are gaining ground, and
queens are failing at a high
rate, he said.
Historically, queens lived
two to three years, but now at
least half are failing and must
be replaced within six months.
It’s an issue he and other re-
searchers are exploring.
With queens only last-
ing a year, “you’ve lost two
years of pollination and hon-
ey production and the ability
to split the hive for a couple
of years,” compared with the
past, McGuire said.
Beekeepers are struggling
with both winter and summer
losses, with summer rates ri-
valing winter losses for the
second consecutive year in
the Bee Informed annual col-
ony loss survey. Both were at
28.1 percent last year.
While summer losses are
easier to replace, the increase
is concerning because that’s
when bees should be their
healthiest — and those losses
still cost beekeepers time and
money, USDA’s Pettis said.
Summer losses are being
replaced at the cost of weak-
ening the colony they’re be-
ing taken from and limiting
beekeepers’ supply of bees for
pollination, he said.
“The high rate of loss over
the entire year means that bee-
keepers are working overtime
to constantly replace their
losses,” he said.
A new survey on honeybee
colony health by USDA’s Na-
tional Agricultural Statistics
Service — which uses differ-
ent methodology than the Bee
Informed survey — shows
U.S. beekeepers with fi ve or
more colonies lost 1.65 mil-
lion colonies from April 1,
2015, through March 2016.
It also shows they renovat-
ed 1.33 million colonies and
added 1.31 million over the
same period.
“I have to replace colonies
every year. If I don’t, I’m out
of business,” Brandi said,
adding that he splits his strong
colonies after almond pollina-
tion.
He and his son Michael
operate 2,000 colonies, buy-
ing 1,500 to 1,600 queen bees
a year. Queens with desirable
traits cost $23 to $25 apiece,
he said.
McGuire bought 1,250
queens this year and devot-
ed a month of 10-hour days
rebuilding 300 dead boxes a
week.
Raising bees today takes a
lot more time and money than
it used to, but most beekeep-
ers have adapted, he said.
“It’s defi nitely harder to
keep bees alive, but we’ve
gotten pretty good at replac-
ing and rebuilding,” he said.
Growing demand
Honeybee demand for al-
mond pollination has grown
signifi cantly over the past 10
years, but the managed bee
population hasn’t, Brandi
said.
Pollinated in February,
more than 900,000 acres of
bearing almond trees in Cali-
fornia — at two colonies per
acre — demand 90 percent of
the nation’s available, viable
colonies, he said.
The high losses to bee-
keepers are certainly concern-
ing but more importantly, the
industry needs commercial
bees to meet the growing de-
mand for pollination services,
Pettis said.
“We urgently need solu-
tions to slow the rate of both
winter and summer losses,”
he said.
Researchers are focused
Dogs
Water
CONTINUED from Page 1
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three of them. He said they
had large amounts of green
dyed grain in their stomachs,
which is consistent with go-
pher bait that contains strych-
nine.
The gopher bait was mixed
with a signifi cant amount
of raw ground meat and the
amount of bait found in each
dog would have required mix-
ing it with food to encourage
the dogs to eat as much of it
as they did, he said.
Varriale said he examines
dogs that have consumed go-
pher bait and suffered strych-
nine poisoning about once ev-
ery few years and they never
have that much of the bait in
their stomachs.
The large number of Eche-
varria’s dogs that have suf-
fered strychnine poisoning this
spring, coupled with the large
amount of bait found in their
stomaches, “tells me it was
done intentionally,” Varriale
said.
Varriale saved and froze
stomach content samples from
each dog and contacted the
Canyon County Sheriff’s De-
partment, which investigated
the incidents but has not iden-
tifi ed any suspects.
Varriale said strychnine
poisoning is a bad way to die
because it causes paralysis so
the dogs can’t breathe and they
suffocate to death.
“They may not catch the
wetland allegedly had a “sig-
nifi cant nexus” with a river
120 miles away.
William Funk, a profes-
sor at Lewis & Clark Law
School, said he’s an en-
vironmentalist but agrees
with the Supreme Court that
it’s wrong to use jurisdic-
tional determinations for
the “power of extortion.”
While obtaining a Clean
Water Act permit is expen-
sive, “litigation isn’t cheap,
either,” he said.
Landowners aren’t like-
ly to file lawsuits over ju-
risdictional determinations
“willy-nilly,” but the pros-
pect of litigation will force
the government to be more
careful than it otherwise
would be, Funk said.
The Supreme Court’s rul-
ing was “pretty predictable”
in light of its 2012 decision
that EPA “compliance or-
ders” — which forced land-
owners to remediate alleged
Clean Water Act violations
— are reviewable in federal
court, he said.
In the most recent case,
the Supreme Court told the
government that its theories
of Clean Water Act jurisdic-
tion are subject to checks
and balances, said Danielle
Quist, senior counsel for
public policy at the Amer-
ican Farm Bureau Federa-
tion.
Sean Ellis/Capital Press
Coyote, an Anatolian shepherding dog, guard goats in southwestern Idaho May 16. Someone has
poisoned 14 stock and guard dogs with strychnine in this area since early April.
person that did it but I hope it
at least ... prevents it from con-
tinuing,” he said of the reason
he contacted law enforcement.
“It’s a terrible way to die.”
Echevarria said the dogs
cost him between $1,500 to
$2,500 each and although the
poisonings have cost his op-
eration a lot of money, he’s
more concerned about the
dogs’ suffering.
“This does piss me off,” he
said. “The way they’ve done
it is more cruel than shooting
them with a gun. I don’t want
publicity for me. It’s more
about getting the word out there
so it doesn’t happen to (any
more) dogs.”
The poisonings have drawn
the attention of Idaho’s Hu-
mane Society of the United
States branch.
“This should be publicized,”
said HSUS Idaho Director Lisa
Kauffman. “Strychnine poi-
soning is a really horrible way
to go. That is an excruciating
death for those dogs.”
Idaho’s animal abuse felony
law, which was strengthened
this year, does not apply to
these incidents, Kauffman said,
because production agriculture
animals, which include stock
and working dogs, are specifi -
cally exempt.
However, she said, another
state law that has been on the
books for years makes it a felo-
ny to intentionally poison a pro-
duction ag animal, including
stock dogs, that is worth more
than $1,000.
News of the poisonings an-
gered Tim Linquist, who uses
shepherding dogs to guard the
goats he rents out for weed
control.
“It’s a shame anybody
would do that to an animal,”
he said. “Fourteen dogs.
That’s crazy.”
on every aspect of failing col-
onies, he said.
McGuire said he’s glad for
third-party research, but it’s a
slow process and likely needs
more funding.
The pesticide factor of
the equation is the hardest to
handle, and it seems research
in that area is mostly coming
from the big chemical compa-
nies that have a vested interest
— and he’s not particularly
comfortable with that, he said.
Beekeepers tell farmers
that bees are bringing pollen
with fungicides back to the
hive, which is killing larvae.
But the chemical companies’
fi eld men tell them that’s not
the case, citing their research
on the amount that is lethal to
adult bees, he said.
Some farmers are starting
to listen to beekeepers — but
just like research, education
and changing farming practic-
es is a slow process, he said.
Profi t margins have also
become tight in the beekeep-
ing business, although pol-
lination fees have increased
as a function of supply and
demand, Pollination fees for
almonds range from $150 to
$200 per colony, depending
on the size of the colony.
Those fees carry Mc-
Guire’s operation, which gets
about half the honey produc-
tion it did several years ago.
“If we can get a honey
crop, it defi nitely relaxes it
(production margins) a bit
… but I count it as a bonus;
I don’t plan on it to begin
with,” he said.
While beekeepers have be-
come adept at replacing and
rebuilding colonies, it’s not
without consequences.
“It’s stressful, just not
knowing what’s going to
happen long term,” McGuire
said. If you get a high die-off,
you lose money, he said.
“Like anything in agricul-
ture, you just don’t know what
natural disaster might hit —
but natural disaster is becom-
ing a little more common in
the bee world,” he said.
It’s important to fi nd solu-
tions to all the factors killing
bees, he said.
“It’s important to every-
body, not just beekeepers but
also the farmers who grow the
crops that take pollination and
the people that eat the crops,”
he said.
“There hasn’t been a
lot of sunshine on how the
Corps determines its juris-
diction,” she said.
Enforcement of the
Clean Water Act is prob-
lematic because it’s often
unclear what’s a viola-
tion of the statute, Quist
said.
“There are due process
concerns if you don’t know
what’s expected of you or
what is lawful or unlawful,
and when there’s criminal
penalties involved,” she
said.
It is possible that fed-
eral agencies will simply
stop offering “jurisdictional
determinations”
when
they’re requested by land-
owners, since no statute re-
quires such decisions, Funk
said.
However, that isn’t like-
ly because the government
benefits from the process,
since landowners volun-
tarily turn over information
instead of forcing federal
agencies to compile data
themselves, he said.
The government issues
tens of thousands of juris-
dictional determinations a
year, but only a handful are
disputed administratively,
said Hopper.
Since most landowners
accept the government’s
conclusions, it’s unlikely to
stop responding to such re-
quests, he said. “The agency
has no incentive to change
its current practice.”