Bee friendly
As almond and stonefruit orchards blossom across Sunraysia, millions of bees emerge from tens of thousands of hives trucked down from NSW to pollinate fruit and nut crops.
Sadly, no one was surprised last Thursday when the ABC reported Victoria’s first varroa mite outbreak in Nangiloc, near Mildura. With bees moving around the country on an industrial scale it had been predicted that once here varroa would spread quickly.
Varroa mites eat bees’ fat body, the insect equivalent of a liver. A varroa-weakened bee becomes vulnerable to viruses and dies.
Last September in NSW, despite destroying 30,000 hives the Dept of Primary Industries gave up the fight against varroa declaring the mite endemic in Australia.
Until it arrived via the Port of Newcastle in 2022, Australia was the last varroa-free continent in the world.
The other day apiarist, Laszlo Kun, dropped into the Fair Food warehouse to talk about his project Beesfriend.
Laszlo’s day job at the CSIRO is working on super computers but in his spare time he rehouses bee swarms around Berwick.
Laszlo finds bees fascinating. He learned to beekeeping from veteran Melbourne apiarist Dietmar Klimkeit, who also runs the Amazing Bees website.
Bees are like my extended family, Lazlo explains, They’re very important and I believe we should prioritise them for their and our well-being.
From September to January you’ll find Laszlo carefully removing floorboards, cladding and corrugated iron off houses to remove swarms from roofs, walls and under floors, sucking them up with his homemade bee vacuum (that’s him in action below).
Laszlo relocates the swarms to over a hundred bright red insulated Scandinavian beehives he has spread across volunteer sites in Berwick, Harkaway, Beaconsfield, Narre Warren North and Cardinia.
Despite all the swarm drama Laszlo says beekeeping is a very calm and relaxing activity.
Bees in Berwick backyards may seem a thousand miles away from the troubles plaguing industrial agriculture, but the solution to varroa could be in the hands of suburban bee lovers like Laszlo.
Victorians have been warned that as varroa spreads feral European honey bees will die out leaving backyard fruit trees unpollinated. Like farmers, if people want fruit they’ll need beehives to pollinate their fruit trees.
Laszlo and his teacher Dietmar Klimkeit believe that for bee health it’s a far better strategy to have 1,000 beekeepers with two hives each, rather than one beekeeper with 2,000 hives.
As varroa mites have spread around the world some populations of feral honeybees have developed a natural resistance to varroa which may be a result of genetic variation.
Laszlo encourages genetic diversity in his bees. When he moves a swarm he lets the colony breed its own queens instead of the standard practice of re-queening with a clone.
Monoculture has got us into this pickle, using the same toolkit to get us out might not be the wisest approach.
Across Melbourne local beekeeping groups are bracing themselves for the inevitable arrival of varroa and are asking people to help get prepared.
Here are some things you can do;
If you have a swarm contact your nearest beekeeper for bee relocation
Establish a bee-friendly backyard to help local bees stay well fed and healthy
Put away your pesticides
Host and/or sponsor a beehive at your house
Become a beekeeper – there are many courses available, CERES runs bee workshops as well as a free bee group. Local business Bee Sustainable sells beekeeping gear and books.
You can support Laszlo’s work at Beesfriend and get some of his beautiful raw honey here at Fair Food.
Have a great week
Chris
