AFB is a bee disease caused by a bacterium and it affects the bee babies, the brood. The brood are turned to brown goo - literally. If you uncap a cell in an AFB-infected hive, you'll see something similar to the contents of your nose when you've got a bad cold, but brown. Because the brood dies colonies cannot replenish their populations and so they collapse.
AFB is deadly, and even worse, there is no treatment. We are just checking our hives regularly and being extremely hygiene-conscious, because if an apiary is found to have AFB the bees must be shut in their hive and the whole lot burned: hives, combs, even the ground underneath the hive, and yes, the bees.
AFB is a notifiable disease, ie. if you find it in your hives you are legally obliged to report it. The apiary cannot be used for years afterwards as the bacteria can live on in the soil. European foul brood is similar but not quite as dire; if it's caught early enough, it can be treated. But unfortunately the stuff found just a few miles away from us is the untreatable AFB.
This leads me to the subject of this post: bees and beaurocracy. As a beekeeper I find it frustrating sometimes the number of hurdles there are to jump through. If you want to sell your honey, the label must conform to exacting standards. The weight written on the label must be at least 4mm high with one space between the "numerical value" and the unit. You must have the country of origin written on the label separate from the beekeeper's contact address. You must have a batch code and best before date (best before date on honey? honey is antibacterial, antiseptic, anti this and anti that - why it needs all this hoohah I don't know) etc etc etc. Fortunately there aren't as many regulations as this in other areas of beekeeping, but there are still methods of best practice etc. often set out by old men stuck in their ways, and often I don't agree with them.
However, now that we're threatened with AFB, I've come to realise just how important this beaurocracy is. In our association this year I believe there is a new member who has been keeping bees for a while but has only joined this year. I am sure there are many beekeepers across the country who are still going it alone. They may not even be members of the national BBKA, let alone a local or regional association.
And for me, this is a problem. In being unconnected to other beekeepers through some kind of association, these beekeepers risk having to deal with their problems alone. If one of their hives catches AFB, who do they tell? Everything I know about notifiable diseases has come from my association. Without an association, beekeepers need to keep up to date by themselves. And in a busy world, I'm guessing that lots of us don't have the time to do that. So if they don't know who to phone up about AFB, or even what it is, how do we know that there aren't hives across the UK cultivating this and other serious bee diseases? And vice versa; if members of an association find foulbrood in their area, how would an independent beekeeper find out about this so they could take steps to protect their hives?
Recently in an article I read in a beekeeping magazine, someone had written about the huge fluctuations in the quality of beekeeping courses. The writer mentioned a course he had heard of that didn't even mention varroa in passing. This concerns me too. Beekeeping is growing in popularity, and we need to be able to support new beekeepers. They need to know about all the problems the bees face at the moment in detail, so that we are protected, and so are they. If a course doesn't even mention varroa, which we kow how to treat and has now been in the UK for about a decade, then what else doesn't it mention? Chalkbrood, sack brood, foul brood, nosema, small hive beetle, Asian hornets? I really believe that there needs to be some kind of system to ensure that these courses deliver up to date information and offer sound scientific advice.
Then there are those who don't even take courses; I'm one of them, and so is one of our neighbours who has started beekeeping this year. Luckily, my Dad was serious about beekeeping and took a course, and he taught me. We're now mentoring our neighbour, and we still ask the more experienced beekeepers of our association questions fairly regularly. But unless you have this kind of close mentorship, how are you going to know about bee health, and who will you go to when you hit a problem?
Another factor to consider is the exam system. This year I'm sitting my BASIC exam, as are Dad and some new beekeepers. When Dad and I attended a practical session with some of the new beekeepers, it was clear that they hadn't handled real live bees much in the past. Of course everyone needs time to learn, and I'm just soo happy that our association is growing in size every day! But I was really surprised that they felt ready to take the exam. I think the exam system needs to be a bit more controlled, even a bit more beaurocratic. I think that the BASIC should be something that people are encouraged to achieve, but that it represents a tangible level of expertise and experience - "the candidate will have kept bees for at least 1 year" as an entrance criterium would help with this. I don't like to see people doing a course and rushing to gain a qualification for the sake of doing a qualification; what's wrong with getting to know bees, to really understand how they behave and how to handle them, and to prove the extent of your knowledge only when you can back the theory up with real experience? Courses need to be more practical, and should, in my view, encourage new beekeepers to continue learning for at least 1 whole beekeeping year.
Naturally, well-rounded courses and association membership cost time and money, but I would argue that so does beekeeping; if you're able to keep bees, then you're definitely able to do it properly and go down the necessary routes to make sure that you are keeping your own and others' bees safe. Bee health really is a serious issue. Despite what celebrity farmer Jimmy Doherty would have you believe in a recent article in Country Smallholding mag ("the bee health situation isn't really that serious", or words to that effect) bees are crucial to the world's ecosystems. There's a saying amongst beekeepers that if the bees die out, we would follow them within four years. And whether this is just an old wives tale or not, myself, I definitely don't want to find out.
So, if you read this blog and think that all our beekeeping antics sound fun, then good for you! It's really fantastic that so many people are getting interested, as we've got a real opportunity now to save the bees. But please, do it properly:
- Look things up in books (try your local library) or on the internet.
- Find out where your nearest association is, and go along to an open day - lots of associations have them, or similar events, and will be over the moon if you turn up and say you're interested in starting to keep bees.
- Take a course to find out more (there are even distance learning courses you can do!) but subscribe to a beekeeping magazine such as Beecraft to expand your knowledge of the bees. Subscriptions only cost a few quid a year.
- Make sure your course has a practical element - you don't know whether you're going to be able to cope with having angry bees flying at you until you've experienced it!
- Join the most local association you can - we pay for membership to our local one and are automatically members of the regional and national associations. If you can affford it, you could even join more than one local association. We're on a county border, so this could be particularly helpful if you're in a similar situation.
- Go to apiary meetings, honey shows, open days etc. to find out more about beekeeping and to meet more of the beekeeping community.
- And befriend an experienced beekeeper(s) who can offer advice and support.
And if beekeeping isn't for you, but you still want to save the honey bee, there are some really simple things you can do to help. Find out more about honey bees at some of the addresses below. Grow bee-friendly plants in your garden, balcony or window box. Buy local honey, and talk to the beekeepers who produce it - ask them about the health of their hives, what they think is going on with varroa, CCD, etc. You can still be part of the beekeeping community even if you aren't a beekeeper.
For more info on bee diseases, joining associations, etc. see the links below. I hope this rant has been helpful and motivating. I don't want to put anyone off keeping bees - I have never done anything so fun, fascinating and relaxing as beekeeping. I think it really does keep me sane! But when my bees are threatened, I want to be able to trust other beekeepers to look after their bees with the same level of dedication I show to mine. This doesn't have to mean more beaurocracy - beekeeping can and should remain a relaxing, accessible hobby - but I do think standards need to be kept high. And that calls for a more integrated, connected system.
http://www.britishbee.org.uk/ - The British Beekeepers' Association (BBKA). Loads of info on what it's all about, exams, where to find courses near you, etc etc.
http://www.defra.gov.uk/ - DEFRA - the government body responsible for all things countryside.
https://secure.csl.gov.uk/beebase/ - National Bee Unit - DEFRA'S bee bit.
http://www.bee-craft.com/ - one of the best beekeeping mags
http://www.dave-cushman.net/bee/newhome.html - Dave Cushman's site all about beekeeping, with a section dedicated to New Beekeepers, and just about every aspect of bees and beekeeping imaginable.
A good book to start out with is "Guide to Bees and Honey" by Ted Hooper - a must have.
1 comment:
You are absolutely right to educate us. Thank you!
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