The upcoming 2010 Northeast Treatment Free Beekeeping Conference, 7/29/10-8/1/10, to be held at Doyle Conservation Center in Leominster, MA (reportedly the birthplace of Johnny Appleseed) is sure to be an interesting three days of information sharing and exchange. See http://beeuntoothers.com/conference.html for details. I'm emerging from my first year keeping bees without chemicals. The honeybee crisis among commercial beekeepers hive loss is approaching 40%/yr and clearly this is not a sustainable way of doing things; all the more reason to continue supporting local agriculture and holistic orchards. My beekeeping odyssey is only one year old but has been filled with much joy and fulfillment. There is a movement in the beekeeping world to care for bees in a natural and non-toxic way; moving away from the need for any inputs to the hive and let the bees "do their thing". Smaller bee size (breeding a more natural size bee), various hive management issues to raising disease resistant bees are among some of the areas of focus in this movement. The speakers at the conference are among the leaders in this movement and it should be very informative. So where does this all fit into your holistic orchard plans? What are your needs for pollination? What you spray on your trees has a direct effect on the health of all pollinators, both native and honeybee alike. There is strong evidence that CCD (Colony Collapse Disorder) affecting the honeybees is related to the toxic build up of pesticides in the hive, most notably the neonicotinoids, that affect the honeybees' GPS navigation system. A holistically managed orchard will, by default, create the environment to sustain the health of all pollinators and beneficial insects therefore they will be more likely to stick around and pollinate your fruit blossoms. All the best this coming season!

Regarding pollinators… being in a suburban setting, having a hive set up is not an option but I do try to have something in bloom from early spring to fall frost to keep the local bee/wasp population happy. I’m on the north edge of the Detroit suburbs and the honey bees have been active in my yard before the snow finished melting. The object of their desire is crocuses. Crocuses may not be an answer in a large scale orchard, but are fairly inexpensive, have varieties that bloom from very early to late spring and work well in an urban setting. They do bring the bees to my lot early in the season, hopefully to hang around during apple blossom. It was mentioned that a holistically managed orchard will create the environment to keep the pollinators around, but what can we do to help this along? What plants and nesting conditions have you used to attract and keep the pollinators living year round in the orchard? Do you actually spend any time or resources attracting pollinators? Is it time well spent considering all the other things that need to get done?

I am reading this post with great interest. We kept bees for a number of years but being in Australia it may not be of much help to you. I wonder what is normal practice in America for keeping bees. Our bees are all kept naturally as far as I am aware. Commercial growers of bees here simply move their bees, under agreement with land holders, around to where there is food sufficient to sustain the bees and produce necessary quantities of honey. There are not additives to the hives at all - all being sustained by the natural vegetation in the district. We had commercial growers bring their bees to our area at various times of the year - mostly when the wattles, eucalypts etc were in flower in our district. We grew lots of bee attracting plants in our place - don't know if it is much use though to list the varieties as it may be very different in America. We are currently planning to have bees again on our new property but instead of the usual commercial hives we are planning this time to use African hives which are shaped like a flat bottomed V shape with single boards on the top which the underside gets painted with beeswax so that the bees start forming their combs on that. This provides 25% less honey but heaps more wax to make candles. The bees, we believe, are then working in a more natural environment. I will let you know how it goes.

The primary interest I had in deciding to keep bees was one of healing and caring for them in a safe and sustainable way. When I heard of the practice of carting tractor trailer loads of bees across the country to pollinate various crops in season, was an eye opening moment. Why don't these growers have bees as part of their operation? For the most part, commercial bees are treated like slaves, being exploited for there natural impulse to collect pollen and nectar. The stress that they undergo every several weeks as they follow the latest crop in bloom would make any being's immune system start to break down and be susceptible to illness; which is a huge part of their current decline. Couple that with the fact that they are forced to feed on the same pollen/nectar for weeks at a time, which in turn is fed to their germinating brood (would you feed a mother and child bread and water for weeks on end?). This is often amidst crowded orchard conditions (growers frequently will pay for extra hives in their orchards to in effect saturate the landscape and make sure that their almonds or whatever are fully pollinated). It's amazing that there aren't more colony losses. Added to this is the fact that they are then force fed high fructose corn syrup when they get to their destination as the are starving from their long distance trip. Then the honey they made is not from natural sources but an inferior precursor. So then we, if we are not properly informed, think we are eating this "natural" substance but in effect an inferior one composed of these sugary remnants and by products. And a large percentage of honey these days comes from China, and I don't have to elaborate on the quality control nightmares that are inherent in that dynamic. Needless to say, it all points back to caring for the bees humanely, leaving them enough honey for them to survive and graciously extracting any extra that they have collected for our benefit and enjoyment. There are health benefits to eating local pollen and honey. I have one hive in an urban setting and they have thrived, collecting upwards of 125 lbs of honey, much of it which they needed to survive the winter. Now they are out and about beginning there life cycle again. This may sound crazy, but they appear "happy". I don't even know what to do with all of the honey...lots of gifts I presume this year. Planting bee friendly plants not only beautifies your landscape but also invites other beneficials to set up their home and propagate. A nice list of bee friendly plants can be found at http://www.thedailygreen.com/going-green/tips/2790. With just the planting of several of these last season, I noticed a wide range of natural pollinators visiting my garden throughout the growing season. They will be a definite part of my future orchard landscape. Another useful resource on pollination is www.pollinator.org.

I used to keep bees. Long ago Kirk Webster (now of Champlain Valley Bees and Queens) took over my hives and moved them with him when he moved to Vermont. He has a wonderful operation there now in Bridgeport and is a superb source of the very best bee stock for the North. He is also a writer on methods of natural bee care. I have copies of many of his articles, but I believe you can get them off the Web since he is a frequent speaker at bee conferences. We now have a commercial bee keeper here at Hutchins Farm. His methods are not organic but at least close. His overwintering average these last few years is about 80 percent and his colonies have looked very healthy so far this Spring. We have plenty of wild bees of various sources that I see throughout the orchard blocks in bloom. Without question, the best observed pollinating goes on in the late afternoon with honeybees. Bumblebees are good in cooler weather but their numbers are not enough. Mason bees are over the top, but tend to congregate on small groupings of trees (working 3 or 4). I believe totally that dandelions are really helpful since they multiply ahead of apple bloom helping pollen supplies for raising brood. They close up by 3 in the afternoon, allowing for the bees to switch to apples as the winds diminish later in the day. Our various apple blocks are spread about 60 acres of vegetables intermixed with maybe eight acres of hardwood trees. The beekeeper has about 50-75 colonies in one location -- pretty much in the middle and away from any spraying of our organic materials. We pay him 500 dollars a year and purchase a lot of his honey to sell . But Kirk's is better. We have one block with no resident managed bees a mile away where polination in most years and reasonable weather is fine.