Vermont Beekeepers Association

Apiology

The study of honeybees...

Drone and Worker Brood Microclimates Are Regulated Differentially in Honey Bees, Apis mellifera

Honey bee (Apis mellifera) drones and workers show differences in morphology, physiology, and behavior. Because the functions of drones are more related to colony reproduction, and those of workers relate to both survival and reproduction, we hypothesize that the microclimate for worker brood is more precisely regulated than that of drone brood.

More:Microclimate

'Intensive' beekeeping not to blame for common bee diseases

More "intensive" beekeeping does not raise the risk of diseases that harm or kill the insects, new research suggests.

Intensive agriculture—where animals or plants are kept crowded together in very high densities—is thought to result in higher rates of disease spreading.

But researchers from the University of Exeter and the University of California, Berkeley found this is not the case for honeybees.

More:Intensive

RNA virus spillover from managed honeybees (Apis mellifera) to wild bumblebees (Bombus spp.)

The decline of many bumblebee species (Bombus spp.) has been linked to an increased prevalence of pathogens caused by spillover from managed bees. Although poorly understood, RNA viruses are suspected of moving from managed honeybees (Apis mellifera) into wild bumblebees through shared floral resources.

More:Bombus

Seasonal variation of pollen collected by honey bees (Apis mellifera) in developed areas across four regions in the United States

For honey bees (Apis mellifera), colony maintenance and growth are highly dependent on worker foragers obtaining sufficient resources from flowering plants year round. Despite the importance of floral diversity for proper bee nutrition, urban development has drastically altered resource availability and diversity for these important pollinators.

More: Pollendiversity

Toward Audio Beehive Monitoring: Deep Learning vs. Standard Machine Learning in Classifying Beehive Audio Samples

Electronic beehive monitoring extracts critical information on colony behavior and phenology without invasive beehive inspections and transportation costs. As an integral component of electronic beehive monitoring, audio beehive monitoring has the potential to automate the identification of various stressors for honeybee colonies from beehive audio sample

More:AudioMonitoring

Reduced density and visually complex apiaries reduce parasite load and promote honey production and overwintering survival in honey bees

Managed honey bee (Apis mellifera) colonies are kept at much greater densities than naturally occurring feral or wild colonies, which may have detrimental effects on colony health and survival, disease spread, and drifting behavior (bee movement between natal and non-natal colonies).

More:HoneybeeDrift

The North American Pollinator Protection Campaign Scientists Report on Honey Bee Stressors

The North American Pollinator Protection Campaign (NAPPC) is a collaborative group of scientists, government agencies, NGO’s, private industries and agricultural and environmental concerns that work together to bring the plight of pollinators to national attention and to be the most trusted resource for information and behaviors in support of pollinating animals and the plants with which they interact.

More:Pollinator Protection

Beekeeping in Vermont

'Virtually sting-proof' bee suit made after allergy concern

The Sentinel Pro 3D Bee Suit, created by Ian Roberts, is made from material thicker than the average bee sting.

The suit is being used by horticulture students at the National Botanic Garden of Wales in Carmarthenshire.

More:BEESUIT

Details: Last Updated: 28 March 2018 28 March 2018

Draft Guidance for Industry: Declaration of Added Sugars on Honey, Maple Syrup, and Certain Cranberry Products

The purpose of this draft guidance is to advise food manufacturers of our intent to exercise enforcement discretion related to the use in the Nutrition Facts label of a symbol immediately after the added sugars percent Daily Value information on single-ingredient packages and/or containers of pure honey or pure maple syrup and on certain dried cranberry and cranberry juice products that are sweetened with added sugars and that contain total sugars at levels no greater than comparable products with endogenous (inherent) sugars, but no added sugars.

More:FDA

Details: Last Updated: 26 March 2018 26 March 2018

CATCH THE BUZZ : 16 Grants to Address Declining Pollinator Health.

WASHINGTON, March 13, 2018 -The Foundation for Food and Agriculture Research, a nonprofit established through bipartisan congressional support in the 2014 Farm Bill, today announced 16 grants totaling $7 million for research to address declining pollinator health, an ongoing threat to agricultural productivity in the United States. The FFAR awards are matched by more than 50 companies, universities, organizations and individuals for a total investment of $14.3 million toward research and technology development.

More:Grants

Details: Last Updated: 26 March 2018 26 March 2018

New Zealand's highest rate of colony loss

South Canterbury beekeepers have faced a challenging summer with drought and the varroa mite impacting hives.

The Ministry for Primary Industries (MPI) released its Bee Colony Loss Survey report for 2017 on March 16, which sampled 30 per cent of New Zealand beekeepers to determine the rate of hive loss and the main reasons for it.

MPI aquatic and environment health manager Dr. Michael Taylor said a severe drought for the middle of the South Island last year was the leading contributor to the jump in colony loss.

The drought's main impact was causing nectar and pollen sources to deplete, leading to bees dying from starvation, Taylor said.

For the middle of the South Island, encompassing Canterbury and the West Coast, the loss was 11.4 per cent compared to 7.2 per cent in 2016.

Pleasant Point Apiaries beekeeper Paul Bartrum said, however, the varroa mite - a parasite that attaches to bees and sucks fat from them - has been the main killer of his South Canterbury hives because the mites are gaining a resistance to treatments.

More:New Zealand

Details: Last Updated: 26 March 2018 26 March 2018

CATCH THE BUZZ: Why Do Bees Sting?

Researchers have unraveled the neuro-molecular mechanism of defense by honey bees when exposed to the sting alarm pheromone that they release in the face of a threat.

The team of researchers led by Prof. Martin Giurfa from the Universite de Toulouse in Toulouse, France has found that smelling isoamyl acetate, the main component in the alarm pheromone, increases the level of serotonin and dopamine in their brains, which, in turn, increases the stinging behaviour in bees and thus repels a threat. By itself, the alarm pheromone does not behave as a stimulus but increases the likelihood of bees guarding the hive to repel a threat by stinging.

More:Sting

Details: Last Updated: 21 March 2018 21 March 2018

How Honey Bee Gut Bacteria Help to Digest Their Pollen-rich Diet

The honey bee gut is colonized by specialized bacteria that help digest components of the floral pollen diet and produce molecules that likely promote bee health. In a recent study published in PLOS Biology, a group of researchers from Switzerland uncovered which bacterial species perform which specific digestive functions in the bee gut.

More PLOS: