MOUNT VERNON — Although 2006 and early 2007 were tough times for Ohio honeybees, they’ve been on a streak of good luck since then. Though concerns about colony collapse disorder remain in many areas worldwide, the problem has yet to strike locally. Ohio’s bee problems in recent years have been weather-related, according to bee supply merchant Carlton Simpson.
“Things are looking much better for the beekeepers,” said Simpson.
He said that after the difficult start, last year proved to be a decent year for pollination and honey production.
“The bees were able to put in a nice supply of pollen and nectar for winter food supplies, so the bees are faring much better today,” he said.
CCD gained its name when bee colonies were discovered in recent years abandoning their hives en masse. Although many fanciful and far-fetched theories about both the cause and effect of CCD made the rounds last year, scientists continue to narrow in on the root cause of the problem, which seems to involve Israeli acute paralysis virus and/or nosema, a gastrointestinal disease.
Both the virus and the gastrointestinal disease have tended to be much higher in colonies suspected to have been hit by CCD than in healthy colonies, according to a survey of the Apiary Inspectors of America. The inspectors said that of the honeybee colonies in the United States which died last winter, 29 percent are thought to have died of CCD.
Some scientists have theorized that CCD may be what happens when a number of known problems strike a hive simultaneously, or that it may result when these known factors unite with an as-of-yet unknown factor. That CCD has been traced spreading from hive to hive and from area to area proves that it is a disease, and not something caused by cell phones or pesticides as some of the rumors had suggested.
Honeybees are important for the pollination of many plants, though an alleged quote purportedly by Albert Einstein saying that human civilization would collapse if bee populations collapsed has been proven a hoax.
Problems for bees in the Knox County area in the last couple of years have been primarily weather-related. A late freeze in the spring of 2006 killed numerous bees, according to Simpson. This was followed by the rainy summer of 2006, which frequently kept bees out of the air. As a result, the insects went into the following winter with very low stored-food supplies.
When it proved to be a warm winter, the bees were unable to maintain hibernation, and ate up their food. Thus many bees ended up dying of starvation during the winter of 2006-07. Those who survived were weak, and when the severe Easter freeze hit in March 2007, it killed off massive numbers of bees. Fortunately for the bees, the subsequent summer and fall were on the dry side, allowing recovery and better food storage.
“We had a bit of a cold snap this spring that destroyed a number of colonies of bees,” Simpson said, “but we had a very light loss this year as compared to the last two years.”
The cool and rainy weather of recent weeks has not been ideal for bees, but they are in a stronger position this spring than they’ve been in a number of years.
