As the truck pulled out of my driveway, I suddenly realized that an era was ending. On the back of it was one of the last vestiges of my local honeybee enterprise, a lone hive standing some six supers high.

It was a healthy and strong hive, but it was the only good one I had left. After the winter we had last year, I lost 75 percent of my bees in town. My friend in Wilkes who helped get me started lost 90 percent. I sent my last Alleghany hive to his house so he could try to rebuild. They have sourwood, so that's definitely a good reason to 'bee up' down there right now. Just a few years ago I was running gallons and gallons of honey here under my own label. Now I'm scrabbling hard just to find enough honey for myself.

I usually go through somewhere in the neighborhood of a pint a month, but sometimes I go through four times that much if we use honey for cooking. But mostly I put it in my coffee. I've already talked about the health benefits of honey, but apparently it's not doing all that much for the bees, considering that they seem to be dying off at an alarming rate.

Yes, it's been a rough run for bees lately, with many of the hives suffering year after year due to weather and one malady or another. Some are just disappearing, others are starving out or freezing out, still others die from mites or disease.

Last year was too wet overall, since bees aren't very active in the rain. That meant that they couldn't build up a sufficient honey supply to feed me and themselves. Coupled with last year's harsh winter, several hives of bees didn't even make enough to survive.

However, the last fully healthy hive in my stand at home was still strong and producing honey, which is more than I could say for the others. One had died out over the winter, one had died down and was moth infested and the other was just not doing well. It's still there, but there is almost no chance of it surviving another year. In fact, I feel sure that death is imminent.

Beekeepers use menthol, antibiotics and other treatments to combat mites. However, wild bees will either have to build their own resistance or they will simply become extinct. Most of the wild bees around here come from swarms that escape from domestic hives. Therefore, they don't exactly have an evolutionary leg up on the competition.

Then there are the Africanized bees, which do have an evolutionary edge to survive, but are totally inappropriate to use for honey production. They will attack en masse at the first sign of disturbance. Thankfully, those don't live near here. I've been told that a hive of Africanized bees can attack people for well over a hundred yards from the hive. Most of the bees I work with will only bother a person who gets either very close or right in front of the hive.

Then one who runs away would be left alone and safe after traveling about 50 feet or so. In fact, I've even taken off the honey and had the bees leave and calm down after traveling only a short distance. As you might imagine, they typically don't like it very well when someone takes away their food.

While bees seem to be in trouble in a lot of ways, there is some hope.

Some of the beekeepers have been trying new things to fight mites other than medicinal treatments, like open screens on the bottoms of the hives and slotted bottom boards that the bees climb through on their way in the hive. That helps make sure that the mites which fall off end up leaving the hive (through the screen) and not collecting in the bottom. However, how well that might work is questionable here in the cold winter months.

And then there's aforementioned "Colony Collapse Disorder," which causes all the bees to just leave without a trace. Some bees have brood (baby bees) in the combs, honey and no signs of problems, but the bees just aren't there. No one really knows what causes that and I've heard from several local beekeepers who have suffered losses and I'm just another one.

When I look at what has happened and what could happen, I'm left to ponder the future of agriculture. We're very dependent on bees for pollination. Squash, melons, pumpkins and many other fruits and vegetables benefit from the actions of the lowly honeybee-not to mention Honey Cereal Os.

But for now, I've had to come to the realization that bees need more upkeep than I have time to deliver. With my family and other parts of my life needing attention, I couldn't provide the amount needed to keep the hives healthy, inspected and medicated. Not to mention that the location at my house isn't exactly the best one I've ever seen. The land near my house used to be rolling pastureland, but now is a tree farm. The trees need plenty of space and sunshine in order to thrive, while the bees need the things that compete with the trees. Clover, goldenrod, thistle and other 'weeds', along with locust and poplar trees, are what bees use to make their living.

At any rate, I've save back a few things just in case I catch the 'bug' again, but I figure I might be done for at least a while. I've noted a pattern here: rabbits, chickens, gardening, construction. I consider having diverse interests a good thing, even if it means changing hobbies a little too often. Besides, I think it's much better to know a little about everything than a lot about one thing and nothing else.
 

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