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A message from Dr. Ramesh Sagili - OSU Apiculture Professor Oregon Beekeepers:
OSU Citizen Science Project: Swarm Study Attention beekeepers who would like to participate in a study on swarms! Establishing pollinator-friendly habitats and food sources for bees, butterflies and birds www.pollinator-pathway.org
Connie Axelrod, 2021 COBKA Haiku Contest Winner
| June in your Central Oregon ApiaryAaah we’ve got warmer weather, thunderstorms and lots of flowers. IT’S SWARM SEASON! We’ve all bee talking about the swarm season, usually starts mid may and goes to the end of June. It’s a natural process of procreation for our colonies and at some point, they’ll GET THAT URGE. YOU need to decide what you’ll be doing about it. There are primarily 4 techniques that work in different fashions. In past years, I’ve thought the nucs were somewhat immune to swarming the first year as they take time to get up to speed. This year however I’ve seen several of this year’s nucs filling their hive boxes and swarming.
In May, we may have been resting on our laurels with respect to Varroa. This month you need to do mite counts and treat accordingly. Generally, your nucs and packages will keep their levels pretty low until later in the summer, but the overwintered colonies can start having some higher numbers. You need to decide on you’re acceptable mite levels. Look at the HBHC tools for varroa management for specifics, however the variables you’ll need to watch for treatments are average temperature (highs and lows (and this month is a good month for not too high of temperatures)), whether there is (or will be) a honey super on and how high the mite counts are. Some are quite good at killing lots of mites but are harder on our bees and queens (more drastic to “knock down” the mite numbers). Others aren’t quite as good with the mites, but with lower initial mite counts, don’t hurt the bees as much (keep the numbers under control). Finally, if your colony isn’t doing well at this point (doubled or tripled in size since looking at it in April) you need to fix it. New queen, add brood, move to a better foraging location, treat for mites find other diseases, combine with another. If they aren’t flourishing now, there is an issue and they won’t get better through the summer without an intervention. Enjoy the springtime and early summer. Remember that sunscreen. Allen Engle COBKA Meeting Slide/Video Archives “Voiceless Flowers” among greenery quiet blossom safari olfactory binds Naomi Price, 2020 Haiku Contest honorary mention OUR MISSIONThe Mission of the Central Oregon Beekeeping Association (COBKA) is to promote effective, economic and successful regional beekeeping through education, collaboration, communication and research in the spirit of friendship. |