State is coming

jtcmedic · April 12, 2021, 05:25:39 PM

Just got the call our local inspector is coming ot to the farm, I wasn?t expecting her till late fall usually every other year , she said they got caught up and and working on getting back to yearly so that?s good. I enjoy the chance to talk to someone else about bees and she very genuine.

Nock · April 12, 2021, 05:31:48 PM

Is that mandatory or voluntary? A Florida thing?

rast · April 12, 2021, 09:00:43 PM

Lisa called me this morning also. Nock, in FL its mandatory

jtcmedic · April 12, 2021, 10:41:55 PM

Quote from: rast on April 12, 2021, 09:00:43 PM
Lisa called me this morning also. Nock, in FL its mandatory

Becky is coming to my area haven?t met Lisa yet

jtcmedic · April 12, 2021, 10:43:23 PM

Quote from: Nock on April 12, 2021, 05:31:48 PM
Is that mandatory or voluntary? A Florida thing?

Yep mandatory they check for Disease and Africanized bees.

Nock · April 12, 2021, 11:35:48 PM

Thanks for answering.

BeeMaster2 · April 15, 2021, 12:02:36 PM

For a while bee hive inspections were pretty rare. They didn?t have enough Inspecters, pay is not very good. The inspectors could hardly keep up with the thousands of commercial hives that come into Florida every year let alone the massive number of new hobby beekeepers. If you collect swarms and do removals or sell queens or hives, they visit every six months. Guess how I know that. 😡
Jim Altmiller

rast · April 15, 2021, 09:51:56 PM

Jim do they do the genetic tests for Africanization that far North when they know you are selling?

BeeMaster2 · April 16, 2021, 09:12:52 AM

No unless they think that you have a hot hive. I had an inspector do an inspection with a storm coming and I warned him about it. One hive tore him up and he had them tested. Came out negative.
I should say to low a percentage to consider them Africanized.
Jim Altmiller

jtcmedic · April 16, 2021, 10:40:05 AM

Quote from: rast on April 15, 2021, 09:51:56 PM
Jim do they do the genetic tests for Africanization that far North when they know you are selling?

she didn?t test mine, our inspector loved our girls kept commenting on the calmness my wife laughed when I told her, she said come black during the dearth

Barhopper · April 17, 2021, 10:01:27 PM

Lisa has been our inspector in Marion County for quite a few years. She?s always been great with us. I know a lot of beekeepers that think that the state is out to get you but I can say that we had a neighbor problem that she took care of so we didn?t have to deal with them. We now have a yard in Alachua County and when I spoke to the inspector for that area he said she?d been doing our bees there since our home county is Marion.

jtcmedic · April 17, 2021, 10:24:43 PM

We had a great meeting, Becky is down to earth and was great, was happy with my bees and all my splits .

van from Arkansas · April 18, 2021, 12:07:10 AM

In Arkansas, our bee inspectors are great folks to deal with. My hives were tested by APHIS, see picture. Zero Nosema in my apiary, with about 186 bees tested. I did not know zero this was possible.

[attachment=0][/attachment]

Regarding AFB comments:
I try to keep track of African bees. The source is Arizona: with a large apiary that tested 83% African genetics which is maintained and queens shipped to many states due to advertising of Varroa tolerant bees. The apiary does not inform the public of the AFB heritage. Of course there are spin offs of bees, swarms, from innocent beeks that purchase bees/queens from this particular apiary that has spread to Florida and California to Nebraska and Arkansas, my state.

The Arizona AHB apiary owners have been warned by state inspectors which the apiary cried harassment and gained National attention; claiming we honest beekeepers being picked on by the state. National news media picked up on the news, conducted onsite inspection and saw first hand the real AFB bees that inflicted about 100 stings in the reporters protective gloves. To many stings to count. Without protection the reporters would have been stung to death. I saw the video myself of the reporters gloves and read the comments of the reporters that question the safety.

What is unbelievable is the apiary formed alliance with 100s of well intended but uniformed beeks supporting the AFB apiary. At least one supporter is prominent to this day.

The original AFB owners in Arizona, a husband and wife team is not so national this day. The husband has passed, sadly and I lost track of his crazy wife who made insane statements about honeybees that are repeated to this day. There biggest message: don?t treat for varroa, buy our bees, they are natural survival stock.., without mentioning AFB of 83%. So now there is AFB traces in most states.

Ben Framed · April 18, 2021, 12:36:31 AM

Quote from: van from Arkansas on April 18, 2021, 12:07:10 AM
In Arkansas, our bee inspectors are great folks to deal with. My hives were tested by APHIS, see picture. Zero Nosema in my apiary, with about 186 bees tested. I did not know zero this was possible.

[attachment=0][/attachment]

Regarding AFB comments:
I try to keep track of African bees. The source is Arizona: with a large apiary that tested 83% African genetics which is maintained and queens shipped to many states due to advertising of Varroa tolerant bees. The apiary does not inform the public of the AFB heritage. Of course there are spin offs of bees, swarms, from innocent beeks that purchase bees/queens from this particular apiary that has spread to Florida and California to Nebraska and Arkansas, my state.

The Arizona AHB apiary owners have been warned by state inspectors which the apiary cried harassment and gained National attention; claiming we honest beekeepers being picked on by the state. National news media picked up on the news, conducted onsite inspection and saw first hand the real AFB bees that inflicted about 100 stings in the reporters protective gloves. To many stings to count. Without protection the reporters would have been stung to death. I saw the video myself of the reporters gloves and read the comments of the reporters that question the safety.

What is unbelievable is the apiary formed alliance with 100s of well intended but uniformed beeks supporting the AFB apiary. At least one supporter is prominent to this day.

The original AFB owners in Arizona, a husband and wife team is not so national this day. The husband has passed, sadly and I lost track of his crazy wife who made insane statements about honeybees that are repeated to this day. There biggest message: don?t treat for varroa, buy our bees, they are natural survival stock.., without mentioning AFB of 83%. So now there is AFB traces in most states.

Thank you for posting this. I did not realize that folks were shipping bees to all parts from Arizona. I have watched special documentaries of bees in Arizona and the dominance of African genetic bees there. Wow.... I am at a loss for words.

AR Beekeeper · April 18, 2021, 01:43:12 PM

This is where the "Large Cell" fable started. Arizona used the cell size the bees were drawing to help determine if bees had African genes. The European Honey Bee has a natural cell size of 5.2, plus or minus 0.1, the African has 4.9 mm. The owners of the Apiary in question began spreading the story that our bees had been raised on foundation that was oversized and that the "real" natural cell size was in the 4.9 mm range, not the natural 5.2 mm. With a few articles in the Journals, and the power of the Net, the story stuck and hundreds of beekeepers were suckered.

My recollection is that the state of Arizona and the beekeepers came to an agreement that the beekeepers would no longer sell queens. However the propaganda continues that 4.9 is natural cell size and that it protects against varroa mites which has been proven not to be true. Search the old literature and you will find statements by Doolittle, C.C. Miller, and A.I. Root that the cell size range is 5.1 to 5.3 in comb drawn without the aid of foundation.

Ben Framed · April 18, 2021, 05:33:41 PM

Thanks, I did mot know this. Very enlightening... ✔️

van from Arkansas · April 18, 2021, 07:30:25 PM

Yes, AR you are correct. I avoided the term small cell. I did not mention on purpose so as not to elicit arguments., but the cat is out of the bag now.

AR, please do not mention the apiary name or a frenzy is likely on BeeMaster. Wise not to mention in your previous text. Just wanted to remind ya.

BeeMaster2 · April 18, 2021, 07:43:01 PM

AR,
I think Michael Bush will tell you differently. He has been using small cell and natural cell for a long time and he stays treatment free.
Hopefully he will add his 2 cents.
Jim Altmiller

van from Arkansas · April 18, 2021, 09:02:27 PM

About
I have taught organic beekeeping my whole life and was main tea her with usda for their labs and univ doings with contract until stopped by new research generation trained by a person with background in butterflies.

The above is cut and paste from the AHB apiary in Arizona. Absolutely false that she was main tea(space) her for USDA... until a butterfly expert??? University doings,,, totally nuts. This is all false. USDA utilities experts, highly educated folks. Ok maybe politics, can?t argue that but the point is to assert a spokesperson for USDA is highly deceptive. Where is the documentation for this ascertain? What was your title?

van from Arkansas · April 18, 2021, 09:10:18 PM

Quote from: sawdstmakr on April 18, 2021, 07:43:01 PM
AR,
I think Michael Bush will tell you differently. He has been using small cell and natural cell for a long time and he stays treatment free.
Hopefully he will add his 2 cents.
Jim Altmiller

Jim, I am trying to direct this tread towards the state and the states concern of African honeybees as the subject. I do not want to get off subject. The state?s concern is AHB and disease. I tried explaining the states concern/fight with the main shipping source of the African honeybees. AR correctly explained in more detail the rebuttal to the state by the Arizona African honeybee keeper.

All good things.