
Are Saskatraz bees an answer to colony collapse? - vezycash
https://whathappensonthehomestead.com/what-are-saskatraz-bees-and-are-they-an-answer-to-colony-collapse-disorder/
======
worldvoyageur
My dad is a beekeeper and I've been with bees all my life. A bee colony is a
wonderful, inspiring emergent organism.

When you know the bees, you can optimize for any dimension among many.

Depending on the needs around our farm, we'd optimize for honey production,
for pollen, for pollination services, for bee or queen production among
others.

Now, my dad optimizes for joy. A bit of honey to give the grandkids, friends
and neighbours. Pollination services for the berry farms (those farmers are
his buddies) in that critical time when blossoms must be pollinated or there
will be no berries, nukes (what we call fresh new bees with a queen, the
nucleus 'nuke' of a colony) for other beekeepers that need more bees, teaching
at the local community college.

Sometimes, we go into the bees with no protective gear. If you know the bees,
you can do that. There is a sense of calm/zen/awe you get when among the bees
that is hard to describe.

All this is to say, it is misleading to think of colony collapse as a problem.
Rather, it is a choice some beekeepers increasingly make to optimize other
things. Death rates under 10% are quite possible with a different set of
choices. We get single digit death rates, even near zero, but getting there
gives up a lot of other dimensions.

Bee production itself is so effective that it often makes economic sense to,
in effect, stress a colony to death and replace it with a fresh one, rather
than give the colony the space or attention needed to make it through.

The economics is clearer if you have dozens or hundreds of colonies. Then, you
have to handle them en mass and accept higher losses as a result.

If you are going to hit peak pollination time in Florida, then truck your
colonies across the continent to catch the sweet pollination money from
California, you are going to stress your colonies far beyond what they can
handle and lose a lot as a result. But, the oranges and the almonds will be
pollinated and what you make will more than cover the cost of buying fresh new
colonies.

Running the bees to burn through them is not a choice I'd make, but I
understand the math even as I don't need the bees to support my family.

~~~
LargeWu
I've always wondered why these bees get shipped all over the place, instead of
just keeping local colonies. Is it just the pure economics of having "idle"
bees in the offseason vs. keeping them employed all year?

~~~
xyzzyz
The sheer number of bees being shipped means that at best you would ship them
shorter distances, as there is no way you could sustain enough bees around
monoculture crops that flower once a year.

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kpgraham
I am a beekeeper and I have not had a colony collapse since I started treating
the varroa mites with oxalic acid solution. Colony collapse is a generic term
for hive failure and not a specific disease. Varroa is the main reason why my
hives failed. The oxalic acid seems to fix this. I treat them after I harvest
the honey in the fall. The varroa infestation dies down and the bees do well.
The crisis in beekeeping is largely a misrepresentation of the facts by the
press. Bees are doing well and the count of total hives is increasing each
year in the US. I am going to order some Saskatraz queens, but mainly because
they sound like an interesting hack.

~~~
newsreview1
I've read (and experienced with my Carnolians) that oxalic acid treatments can
sometimes take more toll than the mites themselves. Any thoughts about this?
Have you had any causalities with its use?

~~~
kpgraham
Oxalic acid is not very toxic. I've read it slows down the bees for a few
days, but I've not seen any impact on population. You get oxalic acid in a
rhubarb pie and it is harmless. Bees get a very weak solution dribbled on the
top of the frames for tens of thousands of bees. They don't get much at all.

As far as pesticides, I am sure they harm bees, but CCD has pretty much gone
since the aggressive treatment of varroa started. Russian bees are thought to
have brought varroa with them. Before that there were pesticides and most were
much more toxic including DDT but the bees were just fine.

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Pfhreak
Maybe some of the beekeepers in this thread can help me understand this. I
live in the PNW, I've got a garden that I love to tend, and I make sure that
I've always got something flowering.

I've been really curious about maintaining a beehive for honey (and as an
interesting project), but the amount of conflicting information online about
raising bees in a suburban environment is unreal. Everything from, "You are
doomed and also the honey will poison you because there's a rhododendron
within 10 miles" to "Everyone should raise honeybees in their backyard!
Totally maintenance free infinite honey!"

A lot of the sites are super, for lack of a better term, "woo-woo".

I wish there were more sites that focused on the mechanical elements, broke
down the costs and what to expect, and really took you through the
bootstrapping process. (Maybe these sites exist and I just haven't found them
yet.)

~~~
rdtwo
I keep bees in Seattle, I’d be happy to anwser questions. It’s not that hard
but kind of pricy to start budget $600-1000. Some years you will get honey
some years you won’t but so far I haven’t gotten crazy amounts as that’s where
the skill comes in. Treat for mites twice a year and make nice with your
neighbors for the inevitable times that half of the bees swarm and fly off
into your neighbors tree. Also bee boxes are heavy so don’t have back problems

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evandev
I highly recommend reading the Saskatraz bee project report which has a lot
more information and research on the bees:

[http://www.saskatraz.com/pages/review.htm](http://www.saskatraz.com/pages/review.htm)

------
aritmo
Varroa mites are a big issue with bees. They weaken the hive and introduce
other disease.

The article content does not match the title. The title should have been about
the answer to varroa mites, not colony collapse.

~~~
evandev
As per the article:

> Infestation of varroa mites and tracheal mites have resulted in the
> declining health and death of many honey bee colonies. It is also considered
> to be a factor in the increase of colony collapse disorder that’s plaguing
> many areas of the world.

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tonyarkles
It's always cool to see my province on HN for this or that.

It seems that beekeeping has exploded in popularity around here in the last,
say, decade or so. Driving around, there's a huge number of tents set up in
canola and alfalfa fields to support colonies of Leafcutter Bees.

------
tvanantwerp
I just spent two weeks in central Europe and was blown away by how many bees I
saw. In the DC area, I might see one or two individual bees a week. But in one
park in Prague, I saw several dozen buzzing among the flowers at once. And
there were plenty more in every other location I visited, both urban and
rural.

This is just my anecdotal experience and it may mean nothing, but I was truly
shocked by the differences in what I see.

~~~
cafard
Plant milkweed and other plants they like, and you will see bees. I won't say
that I've seen dozens at once in our front yard (in Washington, DC), but
certainly a half dozen. And they visit our birdbath for water.

------
topologistics
The answer to colony collapse is medicinal mushrooms.

[https://beemushroomed.com/](https://beemushroomed.com/)

Extracts from certain medicinal mushrooms have been shown to have surprising
efficacy against the leading viruses responsible for colony collapse disorder.
You can participate in the solution by purchasing and using a simple bee
feeder in your own backyard. Thanks to Paul Stamets for figuring this out and
providing the means for all of us to participate in the restoration of bee
populations.

Save the bees, secure the food supply, and all of us will benefit.

------
Railsify
This is great as long as they don't require a license fee or are engineered to
have a limited life span thus requiring beekeepers to buy more every year from
Monsanto.

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war1025
Happened to listen to a podcast about bee keeping and colony collapse just
this past weekend. Thought it was pretty interesting and worth a listen.

[https://www.thepermaculturepodcast.com/2019/caring-for-
bees/](https://www.thepermaculturepodcast.com/2019/caring-for-bees/)

~~~
celias
99% Invisible did a podcast on bees recently

[https://99percentinvisible.org/episode/on-
beeing/](https://99percentinvisible.org/episode/on-beeing/)

------
tehChromic76
I ran two Saskatrqz colonies this year and one of my clients (I run a city-
wide apiary network) was two more.

We also capture around 50 'wild' swarms around town or year - some of these
are from backyard hives but many are from well known, well established wild
colonies living in trees or houses.

In all cases the wild swarms outperformed Saskatrqz in terms of growth during
the summer. But this is almost always the case that swarms outperform
packages. We will do mite counts headed into fall and then will have a little
bit of information.

Colony loss from mites is over 50% yearly in town so it's #1 cause of death
and a big concern for backyard keepers (in all the USA #1 cause of death is
winter for backyard keepers, but here we don't have much winter). Varroa is #1
cause of death in industry as well. This is largely a human-made problem at
this point.

A local expert (UC Davis) told me that if industry quit treating for mites,
95% of hives would die which would be catastrophic for food. However the
resulting stock would bounce back with strong Varroa resistance. I understand
that in South Africa they undertook a practical application of the let nature
run her course strategy and it worked.

However in the USA at the heart of the big commercial AG industry, it's all
treatment, all the time. That mentality bleeds into the backyard culture - the
extension program which trains backyard beekeepers statewide teaches that if
you don't treat for Varroa then you are a nuisance - the model says that when
a hive dies from Varroa it's infected bees don't so die, they abandon colony
and move into nearby colonies. I attended a conference once where they
compared an untreated have to an atom bomb - the speaker had a huge screen
behind him and there was an atom bomb video on loop. After his presentation
they were giving away mite treatment strips from a major brand - this was an
academic speaker, not an industry rep.

The trouble with treating heavily for mites follow similar models which are
well documented and fail: the rather pest gets resistance, the host gets
weaker. Here in an small city in AG land where we are surrounded by commercial
keepers, we have zero chance of developing local mite resistance. Our good
survivor queens mate with drones from treated colonies where the is no
selective pressure on bees to grow tolerance and higenic behavior. Likewise
those commercial drones are a death sentence for wild bees.

Even so, we continue to have colonies that persist year after year, generation
after generation in town, and although most colonies for each year we end up
with as many swarms as lost colonies, so break even. Many of my colonies
across town count fewer mites than they did a few years ago. I think that in
spite of industry, the small pocket of organic keeping going on here in town
is having an event. I think as well industry is buying hiegenic queens.

That's all speculation, although more informed than average. Mite resistant
queens have been on the market for a decade - Russians, Carniolans, even a
breed of blond Italian that was billed as varroa resistant was being sold in
this neck of the woods. I tried all of them and lost them all to mites
eventually. Before these breeds because available a local professor and
breeder had developed an all black bee with reported excellent resistance.
Saskatraz are only the lastest and the greatest. Maybe they will be the magic
bullet.

What's important is that the hiegenic genes remain in the population. To that
end marketing like this when it's backed up by evidence is a positive thing.
However what remains the most effective response to varroa is to do little and
let nature run her course: let it bee.

------
rdtwo
The site content is kind of weak, they had this bee strain for all of a year
on how many hives? Not exactly convincing numbers

~~~
cameron_b
I agree, I'd be interested in a followup in the second summer. How did they
fare through the winter on how much honey? Were they interested in swarming,
or how vigorously did swarm management / splits take place? And moreover (
assuming the queen was mated previously ) how did the real progeny workers do
compared to the Italians?

~~~
dwater
The original article includes a link at the bottom to a part 2 posted 6 months
later that addresses many of your questions.
[https://whathappensonthehomestead.com/an-update-about-our-
sa...](https://whathappensonthehomestead.com/an-update-about-our-saskatraz-
bees-theyre-doing-incredible/)

------
adultSwim
native bees > honey bees

~~~
evandev
With the large scale agriculture in America that native bees aren't well
adapted for, we do need honeybees to pollinate the various plants. Especially
if we want to reduce our consumption of beef and other animal products.

------
ropiwqefjnpoa
The answer is to stop the overuse of pesticides.

~~~
tptacek
Yeah. And Varroa destructor mites. We should definitely stop overusing those
too.

~~~
ropiwqefjnpoa
Varroa destructor mites are a scapegoat, an issue in some areas with some
hives. Corporations like to point to this in an attempt to shift blame.

~~~
tptacek
They literally eradicated feral honeybees.

~~~
nemo
Thomas Seeley's written extensively on feral honeybees. According to him they
are thriving, and he's done a whole lot of fieldwork looking into this topic.

[https://www.amazon.com/Lives-Bees-Untold-Story-
Honey/dp/0691...](https://www.amazon.com/Lives-Bees-Untold-Story-
Honey/dp/0691166765)

~~~
tptacek
[https://beesource.com/point-of-view/adrian-wenner/varroa-
mit...](https://beesource.com/point-of-view/adrian-wenner/varroa-mite-spread-
in-the-united-states/)

~~~
nemo
Weird. I'm not a beekeeper, nor a biologist, but Seeley's one of the top
authorities on both - he picked up Karl von Frisch's work and extended it
further translating bee language/communications.

His accounts of site analyses across the country don't exactly agree with the
claim of feral bees dying off. He does agree in a sense, but he's presented a
lot of very compelling evidence that wild/feral bee colonies are evolving and
adapting to survive Varroa mites through natural selection.

~~~
tptacek
We don't have to agree completely; all that we have to agree on is that Varroa
mites have in fact been a very big deal both to feral and controlled honey bee
hives, and that they are not a smokescreen put up by pesticide companies.

~~~
nemo
Varroa mites in the wild are a big deal. They are very troublesome with
European honeybees, esp. those kept in Langstroth hives. In the wild, bees
swarm regularly, and any time they swarm and form a new hive, the new hive not
only rids itself of parasites but increases the genetic diversity that is
needed to deal with pest resistance. The methods of modern beekeeping work
diligently to prevent this. In the 20 years since the article you first linked
to was written, more careful/extensive study of wild/feral bee populations has
shown how they are better adapted to deal with this pest, which is a very
important development in our knowledge of the issue. They aren't a smokescreen
put up by pesticide companies, but they are a greater problem as a result of
modern practices that limit natural behaviors and natural evolutionary
responses that reduce the impact of the mites in wild and feral populations.

~~~
tptacek
I've got no trouble believing any of that, though I'll observe that the honey
bees don't "belong" in North America to begin with --- they're an invasive
species.

~~~
nemo
I think we agree, but I'd mention that they're non-native, but they're really
not classified as invasive. I think those labels are worth being careful about
when discussing ecology. Issues with honeybees aren't ecological issues, so
much as human issues tied to agriculture, where if humans want to manage
issues with parasites, we can turn to nature to find answers.

~~~
tptacek
This all makes sense. Thanks!

------
aritmo
The article is indeed weak in detail and appears as a PR piece.

It talks about a hybrid bee (Apis melifera) that has resistance to varroa
mites. It does not explain how they achieve this resistance and just hints
that maybe it is due to the longer legs of this hybrid. Or, they produce more
propolis than other bees.

While the article is titled about colony collapse, it talks about a hybrid
that is somehow less susceptible to mites. Does not mention neonicotinoids,
which mainly cause the colony collapse.

~~~
evandev
This article is just a PR piece not for the type of bees, but this
individual's blog. The research behind the bee is very sound in terms of
varroa resistance.

~~~
newsreview1
Looks like a subjective hobby farmer blog. Not meant to be an expert. I can
appreciate the piece, but would rather see more research, and less anecdotal
or subjective information.

