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"I'm treatment-free" is a particularly smug way of saying your apiary management strategy is to continuously bomb every surrounding apiary and whatever native p

"I'm treatment-free" is a particularly smug way of saying your apiary management strategy is to continuously bomb every surrounding apiary and whatever native pollinators may be in your area with parasites. There is a reason that professionals loathe hobby beekeepers.

fredoliveira 3y ago
Can you expand? Doesn't treatment free mean that their apiary is self-selecting? How does this mean cross-contaminating neighboring, treated apiaries? (I know very little about this. Just honestly asking for more info because I'm curious)
- Suppafly 3y ago
  Not the other guy, but presumably 'treatment free' means that you have hives full of diseased bees or bees infested with mites. Those sick/infested bees then spread those things to wild bees and to other apiaries. Even if the neighbors are willing to treat, that doesn't necessarily mean they'll survive being constantly reinfected by the non-treatment hives.
  - giantg2 3y ago
    Treatment-free should mean that you're using IPM methods. It should not be self selecting, but selection aided by the beekeeper heading off problems (requeening, brood breaks, and even treatment when absolutely necessary - like burning your hive if you get AFB, or treating for EFB). You still need to be monitoring your hives. "Even if the neighbors are willing to treat, that doesn't necessarily mean they'll survive being constantly reinfected by the non-treatment hives." This is not really how it works for most of the diseases and parasites. Yes, things like foulbrood would act this way. But the stuff that is commonly treated for are mites and parasites like nosema. Even if you treat for these, there will still be a level of it present in the hive. Even healthy hives have bees with one or more of the nosema species present in their guts to some degree. That's why diagnosis of nosema relies on concentrations counted under a hemocytometer.
    - forgetfreeman 3y ago
      "Even if you treat for these, there will still be a level of it present in the hive." True, which is why all hives need to be actively managed to optimize survival rates, but this comment coyly fails to acknowledge that mite counts in surrounding hives do measurably spike when a neighboring hive craters.
      - giantg2 3y ago
        Show me the data. If you define surrounding hives as those within 30 feet or so, yes due to drift they will see a spike. More distant hives should not. Actively managed and treatment-free are not antonyms. If someone thinks they are, that's a problem.
        forgetfreeman 3y ago
        I like that you're pretending in two places in the comments that sick hives don't get robbed out during their collapse. I posted some reading material for you elsewhere in the thread. Give it a once over, it looks like you might learn something.
        giantg2 3y ago
        "I like that you're pretending in two places in the comments that sick hives don't get robbed out during their collapse." Nice strawman. I make no such claim. Most hives that get robbed out are predominately done so by the hives in the same apiary. "Give it a once over, it looks like you might learn something." Based on my interaction with you, I highly doubt it has anything to offer.
        nothercastle 3y ago
        Treatment free is euphemism for the owner deciding it was cheaper to accept 50% losses then to manage the hive with treatment. It’s basically impossible to do treatment free unless you are on a island
        3y ago
  - gorjusborg 3y ago
    > doesn't necessarily mean they'll survive being constantly reinfected Also known as nature. On the other hand, the natural hives have to deal with resistant parasites and microbes, due to the prophylactic treatments not being 100% effective, creating an evolution chamber for the illness-causing agents.
    - Suppafly 3y ago
      Sure, but it's not really nature when you essentially have one keeper constantly raising and introducing extra disease and mites into the environment. It'd be like if you had an infectious disease and constantly went out into public instead of staying home to recover. Sure all the other people getting sick from your infection could be handwaved as being natural, but ultimately it's because you hung around them.
      - giantg2 3y ago
        This is great explaination for why commercial beekeepers should not be migrating hives - turning epidemics into pandemics.
      - gorjusborg 3y ago
        > Sure, but it's not really nature Yeah, bee keeping isn't really nature, it's agriculture (humans harnessing nature). That doesn't mean we have to go 'hardcore' because it isn't nature. We can try to keep it close if we want, and I think we should bias that way, where feasible.
      - Terr_ 3y ago
        Exactly, and even worse because the analogous disease would have no easy vaccine everyone else can use to ignore it. In other words, less like measles and more like drug resistant tuberculosis.
- forgetfreeman 3y ago
  Not really, no. The population is being artificially propped up by managed hive splits and a continuous influx of stock from breeder mills. To exert real selection pressure requires careful husbandry at industrial scale in an environment isolated from introduction of unmanaged genetics.
  - giantg2 3y ago
    The VSH bees fit that description as they are created from artificial insemination. Yes, it will take generations to make an impact due to feral colonies and the breeder mills not using VSH stock effectively.
giantg2 3y ago
"There is a reason that professionals loathe hobby beekeepers." Most hobby and small scale commercial beekeepers loathe the major beekeepers, and for good reason - trucking around diseases, exposing bees to fungicide and pesticides, creating unhealthy hive densities, etc. But I guess the large commercial outfits need someone to point the finger while the industry dies out due to cheap imports and the willingness of those large producers to subject their bees to active spraying during the pollination of many crops. You do realize the parasites and diseases that affect native bees are not generally controlled for by commercial beekeepers, right? Even when they are practicing prophylactic treatment, the treatments are not effective at completely eliminating the parasites nor their transmission. Honeybees are a transmission vector for many diseases and parasites regardless of if they are large scale producers or not. I would also hope that you realize that that just because someone says they're treatment-free doesn't mean thet are just bombing the surrounding areas with problems. IPM techniques can be effective at controlling pests and diseases. They simply aren't economical for the large commercial producers and they may not be as effective when those large producers subject their bees to the commonly poor conditions. If the large scale commercial practices were really better, we'd see it in the survival rates. But the numbers don't support that.
- forgetfreeman 3y ago
  Nonsense, every word. Commercial beekeepers aggressively manage for varroa and other diseases, if they didn't the resulting dieoffs would bankrupt them. Backyard hobbyists don't have more skin in the game than folks who literally pay their mortgage off their hives, and they sure af don't have more experience with any aspect of hive management than individuals who are successfully managing hundreds if not thousands of hives. IPM isn't "treatment-free" beekeeping which I think we'd both agree is gross neglegence. IPM techniques are also rarely used effectively. Don't agree? Figure out what percentage of hobby beekeepers in your area have reached the level of experience/education of a journeyman beekeeper. If it's 20:1 I'll kiss your ass. Regardless of treatment strategy one management fuckup leading to a single hive collapse absolutely sprays the surrounding 2-3 mile area with diseases and parasites. Given annual failure rates all beekeepers are bombing their surroundings with problems, hobby beekeepers just do so for their own personal amusement regardless of which treatment strategy they employ, and treatment-free beekeepers are way WAY worse about this than any other segment of the industry. Lastly, I advanced no claim that commercial practices are particularly superior at keeping bees alive, although they and related government ag programs are the only credible sources of ongoing breeding to improve varroa resistance, an effort that is vastly complicated by having to geographically isolate breeding operations to try to avoid cross-breeding from unmanaged populations (read backyard hives).
Nifty3929 3y ago
I wonder if it's possible for one farm to put up a literal screen, a physical barrier, to keep out neighboring bees. It might not have to go all the way around, but maybe just block most of the major flight paths from one to the next. Seems like it wouldn't need to block 100%, but maybe 80-90% would be a big help. As someone who knows zero about this, I'm just curious if something like this would be feasible.
- giantg2 3y ago
  Bees typically fly at tree top levels and have a typical range of about 2.5-3 miles. This is part of why certified organic honey produced in the US is non-existent. The USDA is working on an organic certification for honey, but without being able to certify the food sources within a 2.5 mile radius (the draft mentioned this as the likely cutoff), it's practically impossible in most areas. However, hive spacing can have a big impact. While some transmission does happen at shared flowers, the transmission is very likely between hives due to worker or drone drift. If you have 4 hives on a single pallet (common commercial practice) you will see a lot of bees returning to hives that were not their own. Increasing hive spacing can reduce the number of drifting bees, and possibly reduce transmission.
Modified3019 3y ago
Yeah, I don’t give a damn about European honeybees (which are imported cattle), it’s the native pollinators I worry about. Ironically “hooray more bees!” headlines just mean more stress on natives due to disease (which isn’t just mites, but imported virus complexes and possibly fungi as well) and sometimes even local food source depletion by honeybee hives.
- pvaldes 3y ago
  > I don’t give a damn about European honeybees Do you like to eat "American" apples?, or almonds?
  - giantg2 3y ago
    Other types of bees that are more effiecent at pollination could be used, such as Mason bees. It would require a little more more work to change things over and there wouldn't be the benefit of honey.
    - pvaldes 3y ago
      Mason bees have their own set of problems. Like the need to breed it and import the insects each time in some areas where they can't survive winter, or favouring some ornamental trees over most common cultured fruit trees.
      - giantg2 3y ago
        It seems they're already in limited use. https://extension.psu.edu/orchard-pollination-solitary-mason-bees https://extension.psu.edu/orchard-pollination-solitary-mason...
        Modified3019 3y ago
        In alfalfa, leafcutting bees are used, which are also “solitary” (often gregarious). Honestly they’re much more pleasant to be among when walking alfalfa. Honeybees (or at least the old “guard” bees) which are used in the blueberry fields here, can become angry when large clouds move and cause things to suddenly go from shaded to full sun. If it’s consistently either they’re fine, but I’ve been run out of fields a few times before I fully realized what to avoid.

fredoliveira 3y ago

Can you expand? Doesn't treatment free mean that their apiary is self-selecting? How does this mean cross-contaminating neighboring, treated apiaries? (I know very little about this. Just honestly asking for more info because I'm curious)

Suppafly 3y ago
Not the other guy, but presumably 'treatment free' means that you have hives full of diseased bees or bees infested with mites. Those sick/infested bees then spread those things to wild bees and to other apiaries. Even if the neighbors are willing to treat, that doesn't necessarily mean they'll survive being constantly reinfected by the non-treatment hives.
- giantg2 3y ago
  Treatment-free should mean that you're using IPM methods. It should not be self selecting, but selection aided by the beekeeper heading off problems (requeening, brood breaks, and even treatment when absolutely necessary - like burning your hive if you get AFB, or treating for EFB). You still need to be monitoring your hives. "Even if the neighbors are willing to treat, that doesn't necessarily mean they'll survive being constantly reinfected by the non-treatment hives." This is not really how it works for most of the diseases and parasites. Yes, things like foulbrood would act this way. But the stuff that is commonly treated for are mites and parasites like nosema. Even if you treat for these, there will still be a level of it present in the hive. Even healthy hives have bees with one or more of the nosema species present in their guts to some degree. That's why diagnosis of nosema relies on concentrations counted under a hemocytometer.
  - forgetfreeman 3y ago
    "Even if you treat for these, there will still be a level of it present in the hive." True, which is why all hives need to be actively managed to optimize survival rates, but this comment coyly fails to acknowledge that mite counts in surrounding hives do measurably spike when a neighboring hive craters.
    - giantg2 3y ago
      Show me the data. If you define surrounding hives as those within 30 feet or so, yes due to drift they will see a spike. More distant hives should not. Actively managed and treatment-free are not antonyms. If someone thinks they are, that's a problem.
      - forgetfreeman 3y ago
        I like that you're pretending in two places in the comments that sick hives don't get robbed out during their collapse. I posted some reading material for you elsewhere in the thread. Give it a once over, it looks like you might learn something.
        giantg2 3y ago
        "I like that you're pretending in two places in the comments that sick hives don't get robbed out during their collapse." Nice strawman. I make no such claim. Most hives that get robbed out are predominately done so by the hives in the same apiary. "Give it a once over, it looks like you might learn something." Based on my interaction with you, I highly doubt it has anything to offer.
      - nothercastle 3y ago
        Treatment free is euphemism for the owner deciding it was cheaper to accept 50% losses then to manage the hive with treatment. It’s basically impossible to do treatment free unless you are on a island
        3y ago
- gorjusborg 3y ago
  > doesn't necessarily mean they'll survive being constantly reinfected Also known as nature. On the other hand, the natural hives have to deal with resistant parasites and microbes, due to the prophylactic treatments not being 100% effective, creating an evolution chamber for the illness-causing agents.
  - Suppafly 3y ago
    Sure, but it's not really nature when you essentially have one keeper constantly raising and introducing extra disease and mites into the environment. It'd be like if you had an infectious disease and constantly went out into public instead of staying home to recover. Sure all the other people getting sick from your infection could be handwaved as being natural, but ultimately it's because you hung around them.
    - giantg2 3y ago
      This is great explaination for why commercial beekeepers should not be migrating hives - turning epidemics into pandemics.
    - gorjusborg 3y ago
      > Sure, but it's not really nature Yeah, bee keeping isn't really nature, it's agriculture (humans harnessing nature). That doesn't mean we have to go 'hardcore' because it isn't nature. We can try to keep it close if we want, and I think we should bias that way, where feasible.
    - Terr_ 3y ago
      Exactly, and even worse because the analogous disease would have no easy vaccine everyone else can use to ignore it. In other words, less like measles and more like drug resistant tuberculosis.
forgetfreeman 3y ago
Not really, no. The population is being artificially propped up by managed hive splits and a continuous influx of stock from breeder mills. To exert real selection pressure requires careful husbandry at industrial scale in an environment isolated from introduction of unmanaged genetics.
- giantg2 3y ago
  The VSH bees fit that description as they are created from artificial insemination. Yes, it will take generations to make an impact due to feral colonies and the breeder mills not using VSH stock effectively.

giantg2 3y ago

"There is a reason that professionals loathe hobby beekeepers." Most hobby and small scale commercial beekeepers loathe the major beekeepers, and for good reason - trucking around diseases, exposing bees to fungicide and pesticides, creating unhealthy hive densities, etc. But I guess the large commercial outfits need someone to point the finger while the industry dies out due to cheap imports and the willingness of those large producers to subject their bees to active spraying during the pollination of many crops. You do realize the parasites and diseases that affect native bees are not generally controlled for by commercial beekeepers, right? Even when they are practicing prophylactic treatment, the treatments are not effective at completely eliminating the parasites nor their transmission. Honeybees are a transmission vector for many diseases and parasites regardless of if they are large scale producers or not. I would also hope that you realize that that just because someone says they're treatment-free doesn't mean thet are just bombing the surrounding areas with problems. IPM techniques can be effective at controlling pests and diseases. They simply aren't economical for the large commercial producers and they may not be as effective when those large producers subject their bees to the commonly poor conditions. If the large scale commercial practices were really better, we'd see it in the survival rates. But the numbers don't support that.

forgetfreeman 3y ago
Nonsense, every word. Commercial beekeepers aggressively manage for varroa and other diseases, if they didn't the resulting dieoffs would bankrupt them. Backyard hobbyists don't have more skin in the game than folks who literally pay their mortgage off their hives, and they sure af don't have more experience with any aspect of hive management than individuals who are successfully managing hundreds if not thousands of hives. IPM isn't "treatment-free" beekeeping which I think we'd both agree is gross neglegence. IPM techniques are also rarely used effectively. Don't agree? Figure out what percentage of hobby beekeepers in your area have reached the level of experience/education of a journeyman beekeeper. If it's 20:1 I'll kiss your ass. Regardless of treatment strategy one management fuckup leading to a single hive collapse absolutely sprays the surrounding 2-3 mile area with diseases and parasites. Given annual failure rates all beekeepers are bombing their surroundings with problems, hobby beekeepers just do so for their own personal amusement regardless of which treatment strategy they employ, and treatment-free beekeepers are way WAY worse about this than any other segment of the industry. Lastly, I advanced no claim that commercial practices are particularly superior at keeping bees alive, although they and related government ag programs are the only credible sources of ongoing breeding to improve varroa resistance, an effort that is vastly complicated by having to geographically isolate breeding operations to try to avoid cross-breeding from unmanaged populations (read backyard hives).

Nifty3929 3y ago

I wonder if it's possible for one farm to put up a literal screen, a physical barrier, to keep out neighboring bees. It might not have to go all the way around, but maybe just block most of the major flight paths from one to the next. Seems like it wouldn't need to block 100%, but maybe 80-90% would be a big help. As someone who knows zero about this, I'm just curious if something like this would be feasible.

giantg2 3y ago
Bees typically fly at tree top levels and have a typical range of about 2.5-3 miles. This is part of why certified organic honey produced in the US is non-existent. The USDA is working on an organic certification for honey, but without being able to certify the food sources within a 2.5 mile radius (the draft mentioned this as the likely cutoff), it's practically impossible in most areas. However, hive spacing can have a big impact. While some transmission does happen at shared flowers, the transmission is very likely between hives due to worker or drone drift. If you have 4 hives on a single pallet (common commercial practice) you will see a lot of bees returning to hives that were not their own. Increasing hive spacing can reduce the number of drifting bees, and possibly reduce transmission.

Modified3019 3y ago

Yeah, I don’t give a damn about European honeybees (which are imported cattle), it’s the native pollinators I worry about. Ironically “hooray more bees!” headlines just mean more stress on natives due to disease (which isn’t just mites, but imported virus complexes and possibly fungi as well) and sometimes even local food source depletion by honeybee hives.

pvaldes 3y ago
> I don’t give a damn about European honeybees Do you like to eat "American" apples?, or almonds?
- giantg2 3y ago
  Other types of bees that are more effiecent at pollination could be used, such as Mason bees. It would require a little more more work to change things over and there wouldn't be the benefit of honey.
  - pvaldes 3y ago
    Mason bees have their own set of problems. Like the need to breed it and import the insects each time in some areas where they can't survive winter, or favouring some ornamental trees over most common cultured fruit trees.
    - giantg2 3y ago
      It seems they're already in limited use. https://extension.psu.edu/orchard-pollination-solitary-mason-bees https://extension.psu.edu/orchard-pollination-solitary-mason...
      - Modified3019 3y ago
        In alfalfa, leafcutting bees are used, which are also “solitary” (often gregarious). Honestly they’re much more pleasant to be among when walking alfalfa. Honeybees (or at least the old “guard” bees) which are used in the blueberry fields here, can become angry when large clouds move and cause things to suddenly go from shaded to full sun. If it’s consistently either they’re fine, but I’ve been run out of fields a few times before I fully realized what to avoid.