January 3, 2026 • 43 mins
Ron chats with Barbie Bletcher, a retired state apiarist and queen bee. They dive into the world of honey bees, discussing the decline in bee populations and the importance of pollinator-friendly gardens. Ron and Barbie explore the impact of habitat loss, pesticide use, and the varroa mite on bee colonies. They also touch on the benefits of beekeeping classes and the role of education in promoting bee conservation. With Barbie's expertise and Ron's curiosity, this conversation is a must-listen for anyone interested in the fascinating world of bees.
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Speaker 1 (00:36):
Our total free number eight hundred eight two three eight
two five five. Good morning. I am Ron Wilson, your
personal yard boy, talking about yarding on this first Saturday
and twenty twenty six. Happy New Year. Let's get it
off to a good start, you know, putting those gardening
resolutions together. What are you gonna do this year? What
are you gonna do differently? You're gonna do everything the same,
gonna cut back. If you're listening to our first hour
(00:59):
of our show, I mean basically what I'm what I
was saying there is as you're looking at your resolutions,
maybe you cut back. Maybe you make it a little
bit easier on yourself. It's okay to do that. Just
keep in mind all the things that you're going to
be doing in addition to the gardening and yardening and
taking care of houseplants in that are you traveling, got
the kids involved with a lot of chokran net work,
(01:21):
all that in because it does take time. Uh, and
the weather a little bit of you know, is it
gonna be good weather, bad weather? Whatever?
Speaker 2 (01:28):
Uh?
Speaker 1 (01:28):
And uh, And start doing your resolutions that way and
set yourself up to be successful or a little bit
more successful rather than putting so much pressure on yourself
that you know it doesn't work out for you. And
that's that's the way I look at it. And I
do want to remind you again as I did in
the last hour, is that you know there's going to
be failures and if you lose things, you lose them.
(01:50):
We figure out why we move forward. That's what guarding
is all about. Being very optimistic. Uh And and you
know you try out trowel and error, that's what it's
all about. And use your independent, locally owned, independent garden centers.
They are the experts.
Speaker 3 (02:05):
You know.
Speaker 1 (02:05):
If you've got issues, use them, that's what they're there for.
Use us. That's what we're here for. Got a website
for you, you can email us, you can call us.
That's what we're here for to help you be more
successful in all your yardning endeavors. So don't fail to
use us, bother us, pike us, pick on us, whatever
may be during twenty twenty six, because that's what it's
(02:26):
all about. Eight hundred eight two three eight two five
five is the number. Holiday season, Christmas, New Year's now
behind us. Now we start to look forward to twenty
twenty six. Of course coming up next will be what
Groundhog Day? Can you believe that in about four weeks
that'll be right around the corner for us. Then Valentine's Day,
then we're into spring, March my birthday, and don't forget,
(02:47):
and we'll make sure you'll give you three or four
weeks advance warning when Danny's Birthday's coming up. He does
like gift cards, he does take cash, but we'll give
you the exact address where you can mail both of
those for his birthday, and now will be in March.
Speaker 2 (03:00):
Yeah, sixteenth if you think sixteenth, if you if you it,
they hear the sixteenth, Yes, if you think you know,
you won't remember, just mail it first of March and
then you've got it covered absolutely.
Speaker 1 (03:14):
A couple of things with your holiday plants that wanted
to bring up this time, and then I'm not going
to bring it up anymore unless you ask, But don't
forget on your Amarillis if you have those, and if
you don't, have you been out to your local garden
centers or your local home improvement stores that sell paper
white and Mamarilla's kits. If you have, and get out there,
they're on sale half price or more. Make sure you
(03:36):
look in the box to see what kind of conditions
are in Sometimes those amarillis that they've been growing and
kind of circling around in the box. Not a good idea.
Look for other bulbs that haven't grown quite as much
in there. But you can scarf up some great deals
right now on both of those kits. And if you
if you are growing one, remember that once it's done,
flour and cut that foot those stems off. Grow it
(03:58):
as a house plan all all winter outside in the summer,
feeded heavily, and in late August stopped watering it, cut
it back, stored away inside, cool in the dark, and
bring it out right before the holidays, about six to
eight weeks in storage and you get it to flower again.
And then if you want, I have a tip sheet
on that, just email me and I'll walk you through
(04:18):
the whole process. But don't forget that on your amarillas.
Paper whites. Interesting thing came up this week. My sister
in Lass posted a picture got a paper white kit,
and of course they were up and flowering and it
was gorgeous, absolutely gorgeous. And she just set up put
a picture up there and said something unerneath it, and
I fired back and said, are they fragrant? And her
(04:43):
husband said, Uh, yeah, if you like smelling, you know,
like a funeral or something. This is horrible. And it's
interesting with paper whites because I've always said they have
a very distinct fragrance. It's very strong. It's a very
divisive scent. And what's interesting about paper whites the fragrance
(05:04):
is that some people, like myself, when I smell it,
I think it's sweet and floral, like like jasmine or
or orange blossoms that that I think it smells like that.
Then you have other people that find it so overpowering
that it's that they hate it. That smells horrible. I've
even had people say it smells like cat urine or
(05:27):
manure or feces. And it's interesting how they can go
both ways. But it's kind of like cilantro. You know,
some folks love cilantro and some folks hate cilantro. Says
it tastes like soap to them. Can't you can't give
me enough cilantro. I love cilantro, But there's a chemical
(05:47):
in the cilantro that makes you your taste buds react
differently depending on your taste buds, and the same thing
happens with paper whites. It's uh, there are different varieties.
Obviously they're stronger than others. But there's a compound in
them called endolely or indole and that compound that's in
(06:09):
there actually found in feces. It is actually found in
feces an equal eye that's not dangerous to you or anything,
but that particular scent comes from that chemical compound. So
some people pick it up their scents, pick it up
as a fragrant smell, and other people pick it up
(06:30):
as a feces smell. So it just depends on you
whether you like it as a sweet smell or a
foul smell. And they are working plant breeders are working
on actually coming up with paper whites that are less fragrant,
have less fragrance Earlier, I think is when it's out there.
(06:51):
Avalanche is when that's out there, has very low to
little smell. You can't smell very much at all. But again,
great white, great show. And remember when you're doing paper whites,
if you have a hard time with them, they get
tall and they fall over, get real lanky. Two things
one is keep them cooler, helps to keep them shorter,
grow them in a vase. If you want, put some
(07:13):
gravel on the bottom of the vase. Put those down
to the bottom of the vase. The vase holds them upright,
so if they get tall, it doesn't matter. Or when
you do, add water to the bottom of your paper
weight bulbs in that gravel. Just put a splash of
a clear alcohol like tequila or vodka in that. Just
(07:34):
a splash, splash for you, splash for the plants. Put
that in the water. That actually helps to keep them shorter.
They still flower the same, still smell the same, but
it keeps them shorter. And that's I think you can
use actually any kind of alcohol, but I think the
clear is usually the best. In the vodka gen tequila
(07:54):
is something like that, but just a splash, not much
and that's it. And then you could do a little
bit more than the if you need it, but that'll
help to keep them shorter. But again, I thought it
was interesting because that smell, it always depends on who
you are and what you know your sense is because
some people pick it up as a great smell, other
people pick it up as a horrible smell. And it's
(08:15):
because of the chemical compound called endole or endolay, which
is found in actually in feces and equal high to
give it a bad smell, So it depends on how
you pick it up. I think some maneuvers don't smell
too bad at all. How about that? All right, we're
gonna take a quick break. We come back. Barbie Bletch you,
our Queen Bee is going to be with us. We've
got a lot of things to talk about with Barbie today.
(08:37):
A lot of interesting things we're going to chat about,
including looking at the honeybees, cultivated honeybees from World War
two to today. Who had more during World War two
or beekeepers today. We'll find out about that. We'll look
at what's going on with the bees. Just a lot
of great information. We always learned something from Barbie every
time we have her on our show. Here in the
(08:59):
Garden with Ron Wilson.
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Speaker 1 (11:42):
Welcome back. You're in the garden with Ron Wilson and
in his time for our queen Bees. She is a
retired state API arist. I have known her forever. She
knows more about bees and bees know about bees. As
a matter of fact, She sent me a very disturbing
video yesterday about queen bees. Talk more about that as well,
Ladies and gentlemen, the one, the only, Miss Barbie b Letter.
(12:10):
I didn't know bees could clap like that.
Speaker 3 (12:12):
I was gonna say, those bees are really active for
this early in the morning.
Speaker 1 (12:16):
Well, it's warm in here, so they all they dragged
themselves here and now they're all warmed up. Barbie, did
you have a great.
Speaker 3 (12:23):
New Year's I did, Yes, it was happy twenty twenty six.
Speaker 1 (12:27):
Happy twenty twenty six to you as well. How long
we known each other?
Speaker 3 (12:31):
Oh gosh, twenty some years. I remember Katie when she
was nine. You were talking about Katie's crops.
Speaker 1 (12:40):
Yes, I think, yes, yes.
Speaker 3 (12:41):
I knew her when you well, I mean I didn't
know her, but I remember when she was nine when
you were interviewing her.
Speaker 1 (12:47):
That's been Yeah, it's been a long, long long time.
I know that you and I really got involved with
the bee situation, not only talking about honey bees, but
you know, we really started talking about the native bees
and bringing there to the forefront is awareness as well.
But it really started to come to really happen back
in twenty was at twenty six when the colony collapses.
Speaker 3 (13:10):
I was at Ohio State that time.
Speaker 1 (13:13):
Yeah, and the colony collapse disorder really yeah, yeah, and
like everybody was in this what is going on? And
the you know, everybody the bees are dying. And of
course it's probably one of the best things that ever
happened because funding and research and everything escalated, and you know,
we know more seriously about bees today, native and honey
bees than we ever have.
Speaker 5 (13:34):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (13:35):
We needed that research and we needed awareness. And that's
you know, one of our biggest problems us, the bee keepers,
is we don't have we don't promote ourselves as well
as we sure the average person walking down the street
has no idea how important honey bees are to their diet,
to their nutrition. So it was important. And now everybody
(13:57):
and their brother, you know, if you tell somebody that
you keep these, everybody wants to know how the bees
are different. And that's wonderful. I'm happy for that.
Speaker 1 (14:07):
Oh absolutely, And again I think that I also look
I look at it too, because I mean the records
and what's happening with bees in the environment. Most of
that information is coming from honey bees because they are cultivated,
grown as a crop or as a livestock or whatever
how you want to say it. But you know, they're grown,
so the records and observing is much easier than with
(14:30):
the native bees. But fortunately it has brought the situations
with native bees at the front as well. And so
now we've got, you know, in both hands. With one hand,
we've got the honey bees and the other hand we
have all the native bees. And you know, a lot
of the problems that well, the biggest problem that's going
on with both of them obviously is lack of habitat,
which we know is major. I mean, and I still
(14:51):
I bring this up at garden talks. You know, what's
the biggest issue for both of these Because we have
issues for either, you know, individually on both hands, but
the biggest issue, and of course misuse of pesticides come up. Yep,
that's a part of it, there's no doubt about it.
But the biggest issue that affects both of these is
the lack of habitat.
Speaker 3 (15:11):
Yeah, and to that point, and I just lost my place.
We had no shoot, I just lost my place.
Speaker 1 (15:20):
Okay.
Speaker 3 (15:20):
I was just going to tell you how much we've
lost in Ohio. We've lost six point nine million acres
of farmland just since nineteen fifty. Wow, So we had
twenty six thousand plus acres in nineteen forty five, twenty
(15:41):
six thousand acres of farmland. Now we have about thirteen
I'm sorry, twenty six million those zeros.
Speaker 1 (15:49):
Darn it, Hey it is seven twenty four in the morning.
Speaker 3 (15:52):
I mean, hey, no, not a morning bird. Twenty six
million plus acres and yeah, nineteen fifty we now have
about thirteen point five million, So we've lost more than
half of our a goods of farms.
Speaker 1 (16:10):
Yeah. And again even with that, I mean that the
farms weren't all farming practices also took away. I mean,
farmers at one time would leave the you know, twenty
feet from the fence. They would leave that grow up,
you know, et cetera, et cetera. And of course then
they started farming to the fence. And now they're kind
of backing off and adjusting that so they can bring
that back again, that that that habitat. But yeah, the
(16:33):
loss of and of course homes and developments and you know,
downtowns and roads and everything like that takes it all away.
Speaker 3 (16:40):
And we have forty nine million acres of asphalt in
the United States. That's forty nine million acres.
Speaker 1 (16:46):
And we're gonna have more. I mean, that's just reality.
That's what that's the way it's going to be. So
we look at facts and figures like that, and we've
all got to be convinced here that it's up to
you and me and everybody out there. We're not asking
people to be keepers bb but to be a bed
and breakfast for all the bees, both honey and native
bees that are out there today. Be a bend and
(17:07):
breakfast in your gardening practices, in what you plant. You know,
the old pollinator thing here, Planning for pollinators is more
important now than it ever was.
Speaker 3 (17:17):
Yet another point with your farming is that they had
multiple crops. You know, they are more or less sustainable
for themselves. So they had, you know, coal crops, they
had some corn, they had beans, they had a lot.
They had a lot of diversity in what they grew.
And now you know, it's millions of acres of corn
(17:38):
and soybean, so we've lost that diversity. Bees don't really
get any nutrition from either one of those. They'll get
nectar and pollen from them, but it's not nutritious. So I mean,
you have those those diverse gardens you know of your
own cropsure beans and herbs and whatever. Those bees get
(17:59):
so much nourishment from all those different flowering plants.
Speaker 1 (18:03):
Unbelievable. Talk about bar Blet here. She is our queen
bee and has provided us for all these years twenty
since twenty six, Yeah, that's when we first had you
on here talking about the colony collapse disorder, and have
learned so much from you over the years. You presented
me with some facts and figures, and I don't know
if you remember this or not, but you were looking
way back to the amount of high, you know, hives
(18:26):
that are out there today versus the amount of hives
that we had back during the World War two.
Speaker 3 (18:35):
Yes, and it's it's startling. So an interesting fact then
I'll try to remember, is when we will the Buamites
showed up. We lost a lot of beekeepers and a
lot of colonies. So I'm getting ahead of myself, but
we had like fifty five thousand some colonies in the
(19:00):
early nineteen eighties and then we're in a conty collapse
disorder showed up. We went down to twenty two thousands.
So we are now we're back up to fifty five
thousand colonies in Ohio. However, we had two hundred and
sixty thousand back in nineteen forty, and we were the
(19:20):
top third honey producing state in the United States in
the early forties, nineteen forty forty one forty two, we
were the number thirty or four top honey producing state
in the United States.
Speaker 1 (19:35):
Two hundred and sixty thousand hives.
Speaker 3 (19:38):
Two hundred and sixty thousands.
Speaker 1 (19:39):
In nineteen forty and then today it's back up too.
Now we have fifty five thousand.
Speaker 3 (19:45):
Back up to fifty five thousand.
Speaker 1 (19:47):
Unbelievable. That's crazy stuff. Talk with Barbie Bletcher, our Queen Bee.
Take a quick break, we come back. We've got Barbie
all the next half hour, so stay tuned. Lots of
great information here in the gardens with Ron Wilson.
Speaker 7 (20:14):
Not gardening questions.
Speaker 4 (20:16):
Ron has the answers. At one eight hundred and eighty
two three Talk You are in the garden with Ron Wilson.
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Speaker 1 (21:49):
Welcome back to the Garden with Ron Wilson's Special Guest's
Warning The Queen Bee Barbie a letter. We've been talking
with Barbie.
Speaker 2 (21:59):
Uh.
Speaker 1 (21:59):
I've noted for a long time, but since twenty oh
six when the colony collapses order hit big time and
the beehigh's they were just disappearing. And ever since then
we've been talking about bees. And of course now that
you know it's the buzz out there now is to
you know, be pollinator friendly, bee polite, and pollinator friendly
in our gardens, and we try to promote that more
and more. But look at some old stats and I
(22:20):
think that was it just kind of blew me away
with the two hundred and sixty thousand hives in Ohio
in nineteen forty compared to and it was as low
as twenty two thousand in Ohio just a few years ago,
but back up to around fifty five thousand, that's crazy. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (22:35):
Yeah, we were up there with New York, in Iowa, Minnesota,
so it was concentrated over on the eastern Saturday United
States except for Iowa. I don't know where they came from,
but yeah, Ohio and New York another one. Yeah, well,
I guess Minnesota and Iowa sorot not just the eastern side.
(23:00):
But there wasn't too much going on out in the Southwest.
But then about so we had a war going on
in the early forties sometime toward the end of the war,
California started to beef up their almond almond production and
then California ended up getting the number one spot for
(23:23):
honey production. But we were I think our max nineteen
forty five, we had three hundred and twenty six million
colonies of bees.
Speaker 1 (23:35):
Wow, that's a lot of bees.
Speaker 3 (23:38):
Producing ten let's see, I'll get my zero's wrong again.
Ten ten let's see, Yeah, ten million pounds of honey.
Ten million pounds of honey.
Speaker 1 (23:56):
So how much honey is produced today? Any idea?
Speaker 3 (24:00):
Thirteen? Let's say one point three million in Ohio. Wow,
one point three million. So yeah, we've gone away and
the other states are like that too, but we're way down.
We're like number twenty five now for honey production in Ohio.
Speaker 1 (24:14):
So as we look at the at honeybee hives and
honeybee raising bees and all, as we look to that
from nineteen forties to today, you know, back then, did
they have colony collapse disorder and issues like that? And
why are we you know, was that an issue? Those
things issues back then? I mean you look at I
(24:36):
look at the insecticide I mean DDT and stuff like
that was out there. At that time. You know, I
don't know, but did you know have things changed over
the years.
Speaker 3 (24:47):
You know what's interesting because I did I did some research,
not not this weekend, but several years ago when they
were going to take the neo NICATORI dofa mark it
completely in the United States, and they've done that over
in Europe and they actually found that without the ne nicketinoids,
(25:09):
they're going back to the harder pesticide some mouth ion,
diasmon hydrogenated CA yeah, or those things that organo phosphates.
Not only do they lose their crops and they had
to replant two or three times because of the insects,
(25:29):
but they still are they're still losing insects because they're
using harder products, so they're still losing bees. So even
without the neons.
Speaker 1 (25:38):
So you take the NEOs off the market, and then
you just have to next thing. You know, you're using
more tools out of the toolbox.
Speaker 3 (25:44):
Yeah, they're using the hammers.
Speaker 1 (25:46):
Yeah, which you know you would occasionally get out of
the toolbox if necessary, but otherwise you don't. Now you're
using more of the hammers and it's not working out.
Speaker 3 (25:59):
No, And we had like the dwindling disease in the
Isle of Dwight disease, but those were back in the
eighteen hundreds, so there wasn't really a big colony collapse
that we knew about in the nineteen hundreds. And of
course that was before social media, so it's kind of
(26:20):
hard to tell. But as far as I as I
could determine, we didn't have any huge b die off
in the nineteen hundreds, so it wasn't until two thousands,
and you know, they determined the causes for that. There
were multiple One was, you know, as we said, lack
of nutrition, and then the vuamite had just shown up,
(26:44):
had been here, you know, twenty some years. We were
using harder products trying to control the veramite, and that's
when they really discovered all the viruses, so we didn't
have the royal weed. The scientists didn't have technology to
FI viruses before, you know, in the eighties and nineties
(27:05):
they finally were able to determine all these viruses. And
there's like thirty some viruses that affect honey bees.
Speaker 1 (27:12):
Now mostly vectored by the mite, by.
Speaker 3 (27:15):
The yes, vectored by the might.
Speaker 1 (27:17):
So where did this vera might come from? I mean
when when did it finally start twenty years ago? You
say that really came to being.
Speaker 3 (27:27):
Yeah, like the mid eighties. It showed up in Ohio.
I think it was just further south earlier than that.
I forgot. I was going to say, oh, so it
came from So there's another honey bee that's kept over
in Asia called the APIs serana. It's like a larger
bee and honey Those bees, the APIs serana, were able
(27:50):
to adapt to the veramite. They have a I think
their life cycle is a little bit faster, so the
veromites aren't able to really take a colony down. So
the APIs sorana honey bee had adapted to this feramite.
But somehow those that APIs sorana was brought to the
(28:11):
United States, and I don't know if they ever determined
how that was, and the auromites that were on those
bees got into our bees, and our our honey bees
had no no, no way to tolerate it, no resistance
to it, never come in contact with it. And just
like you know, native plants that have a new invasive
(28:34):
past that attack it, they have no way to break
it down. So and they're still you know, even today.
You know, honey bees have a poorer tolerance of honey
of floramites, but we do have some that have you know,
developed some tolerance or some way of adapting with it. Yeah,
(28:55):
it's been a it's been a slow road.
Speaker 1 (28:57):
I was gonna say, it just seems like, you know,
with the technology that we have today and the research
is being done, I mean, you and I and again
you and I've been talking about this since twenty six
and this viral might's been at the top of the list.
It just seems like, like, what's the deal. I mean,
you know and you you know, you told me one
time think about this though. You know, we're trying to
(29:18):
come up with a pesticide to take care of an
insect and we've got bees, which are an insect. Yeah,
and how do you come up with something that's not
going to harm the bees? But you have to take
this might out? And you know, of course cultural practices
have come into play. I know you've told me that,
and be breeding obviously coming up with new varieties that
(29:40):
are more tolerant or you know, of the of this
viral might. But it just seems like something would like
the silver bullet would come along some yeah.
Speaker 6 (29:48):
Please.
Speaker 3 (29:48):
You know, every every four or five years we have
a new product and we all like rush to use
that product and then it doesn't work all that great.
But yeah, you know, this this thing, this erect it
is it's feeding on the mite. So whatever we use
it has to be hard enough to kill the thing
that's feeding on the bee without telling the bee. Yeah.
(30:09):
That that's that. That sciences has just been apparently much
harder to do than we thought.
Speaker 1 (30:16):
It's crazy stuff talking with Barbie Butcher, our queen bee.
You know it's f I printed this out. I didn't
send it to you, but I just got a thing
in the from uh. I forget which news releas this is,
but talking about scientists finally identify the cause between behind
the US biggest honey bee die off ever recorded, which
was this past winter, h with the with the millions
(30:37):
that were lost, and of course what's the big picture there,
the vermite.
Speaker 3 (30:42):
In the virus system, the virus right, and I think,
I yeah, I sent you somes in a presentation this fall.
It may show that even five highly virulent veramites, five
little veramites, so that would fit in your finger, those
be those mitra so highly infective that they could kill
(31:06):
an entire yard of bees and that just blows me away.
Speaker 1 (31:11):
Yeah, crazy stuff. Talking with Barbie Blecher, our Queen Bee.
It's taking out of a break. We've got more with
Barbie Blecher. Here in the garden with Ron.
Speaker 4 (31:20):
Wilson landscaping ladies. Ear with your personal yard boy. He's
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Speaker 1 (33:01):
Welcome back. You're in the garden with Ron Wilson talking
with Barbie Well that there are Queen Bee and what's
going on with our honey bees out there. You know
that at the end of this, and this was from
Science News, it was talking about I guess is it
amatros amtra Demetriz talking about you know, can still consider
one of the least toxic options. But on the same token,
(33:23):
if you spray a lot of it, you can weaken
the colonies. But yet now they're seeing the that they're
becoming resistant to this, and it's just like crazy stuff
and then they're just nothing they can find, you know,
is really doing the job. So nothing you and I
can do about that at this stage besides helping to
support the funding for this research. But there are things
that you and I can do to help bees, both
(33:46):
honey bees and navy bees to continue on and be
as healthy as possible.
Speaker 3 (33:52):
Yeah, a lot of research has shown that if bees
have the proper nutrition, they can they can overcome viruses.
You know, I know beekeepers that have hives out in
the middle of nowhere, out in beautiful flowering you know,
beautiful forests and woodlands and fields and pasture lands. They
have their bees have viruses, but they don't have high
(34:16):
enough levels to hurt the bees. They may have some mites,
but they don't have enough mites to damage to you know,
make the bees sick. So they can tolerate mites and
viruses if they have paper nutrition. And you think about
you and I, you know, we when we're not eating right,
we're not getting enough sleep, blah blah blah, we're more
(34:38):
sussible to getting sick. It's the same thing with the bees.
So one we try not to have our hives on
top of each other, which is it's difficult to do
with all the cities and the construction and you know,
urban areas. So another interesting fact is that you know
beekeepers back in the day, back in the forties, you know,
(34:59):
they would have one thousand colonies each. Now, you know,
our average beekeeper has five hives or less because we're urban, right,
So you look at Cincinnati in nineteen forty, your population
was four hundred and fifty thousand. You had four and
fifty thousand people in the Greater Cincinnati area. You now
(35:20):
have one point two million. So where are you gonna
keep bees?
Speaker 1 (35:26):
And not everybody wants to be hive in their next
door neighbor's yard.
Speaker 3 (35:31):
Yeah, you have to train them. You had to bribe
them with honey.
Speaker 1 (35:34):
Yeah. True, and to show that you know, it's okay
that you're not going to get stung, and they don't,
you know, take off after you and they're not going
to chase you and the kids down and the dog
who nine years.
Speaker 3 (35:44):
Yeah, So education, we have to educate. We need to
promote beekeeping. We need to have more Ron Wilson's out there.
But talk about you know, let that clover grow, let
the dandelions grow, and you know, we teach beekeeping every spring,
and I know you and I have talked about that.
Even if you don't want to be a beekeeper, taking
(36:05):
those beekeeping classes helps you understand what it takes to
keep colonies alive.
Speaker 1 (36:10):
Yeah, I still remember I got an email from a
gentleman said that he and his grandson had signed up
for one of the bee classes. I think about Knox
County and they weren't beekeepers. They were going to learn
about bees, and that's why they were taking it. Just
to learn about bees and if they became If they
became beekeepers, great, but just to learn more about them.
Because if you know more about them, you know what
(36:31):
you need to be doing in your own yard and
garden and maybe your homeowners association and get everybody involved.
They have these communities that are now pollinator communities to
help out all the pollinators, including the honey bees and
the native bees, and the butterflies and the whole nine yards.
You plan for them that you're planning for all of
them and it helps them all out and things that
we can do to be more friendly in our gardens
(36:53):
and more pollinator polite. So these classes and they're available.
I just you're talking about the Southwestern Beekeepers Associated having
their classes coming up in February. They're all you know,
through our state of Ohio, many of them out there,
the Ohio was it the Ohio Beekeepers Association, Yeah.
Speaker 3 (37:09):
Ohiose State Beekeepers Association has a listing of the most
most counties have a beekeeping club and most of these
clubs teach beekeeping. So I would actually take several because
each you know, you have a group of beekeepers and
they teach a certain way. If you go to another
class somewhere else, they're going to teach you different things.
Speaker 1 (37:32):
So gather up all the information and there's a good
chance you might find bar B Bletcher or one of
the three Stingers, or all the three Stingers at these
classes as well. And if they all three show up
at the same time, you're in for a hoop. Trust that. Yeah.
Really talking with Barbarie Bletcher, our queen Bee, and what
you can do to be more friendly in your yard
(37:53):
and gardens, you know, become a bee bed and breakfast
or a pollinator bread and bed and breast, and really
how and it does work, whether it's a kind of
container or whatever you're doing in your yard and garden practices,
it does work. Talking to Darby Blesher, I sent her
a scenario. I said, I got a question for you, Barb,
if by chance this time of the year, of course,
(38:14):
the bees are all in their hives and it was
it was interesting. Uh. Nina sent me a picture of
the yellow spots all over the concrete and she said, oh,
it's a poop day where they'd all gotten out and
flown and did their little poop and then went back
in the in the hive. So they're all gathered around
the high And by the way, does she really wake
you up at five thirty this morning?
Speaker 3 (38:36):
Well, my phone went off, but I ignored her.
Speaker 1 (38:39):
Geez. I went off minded too, and I was like,
you gotta be don't bother her. She got another hour
to sleep anyway, Uh, I know, I guess stuff from
her four in the morning. It's like, whoa, what are
you doing? But anyway, there, so they're all gathered around
that queen, protecting her over the wintertime. Obviously, what happens
if the queen bee dies and there's no queen to protect,
(39:01):
do they all fall apart and take off during the
winter or do they stick with each other and stay
in that hive until the spring season.
Speaker 3 (39:10):
It really depends on what typo winter we have. They
will stick together, especially if there's brood, they will stick
together until so the worker bees and queen bees all
put out of pheromone. You know, winter time, it's not
as obvious, but as the season goes on, this winter
goes on, it's going to become more obvious that, hey,
(39:32):
there's no queen here, they're not gonna be able to
smell her anymore. Brood will produce a certain pheromone too,
like a smell ascent. And so if they're not if
the worker bees don't smell her, or there's not very many,
not a lot of brood, and there's no new brood
coming along, they're going to realize that there's something wrong
(39:54):
and they'll start to wander off. But as long as
it's really cold, they're gonna stay clustered, so they will
they probably won't realize. Yeah, so they well, they won't
realize that there's no queen until it starts getting warm
and they start spreading out.
Speaker 1 (40:09):
And part of Barb's answer to me was to send
me a video of two queen bees fighting each other,
stinging each other in the head and in the face
and going at it, and that could be pretty nasty time.
Speaker 3 (40:22):
Oh that was horrible. Yeah, I've never seen them actually
stinging each other in the face. That was I thought
they were just beheaded.
Speaker 1 (40:29):
I was a little taken back with you sending me
something like that, and you know, actually it was kind
of interesting to see that. But wow, kind of crazy stuff.
Talk with Barb Bletcher how important it is for you
to be ee friendly in your in your gardens and
why it's so important. And of course classes out there
over the wintertime. Be sure and take There's plenty of
books out there as well. Mm hmm, yeah, Kim, I
(40:53):
think Kim Kim Flopman's is one. I liked that book,
especially for beginners.
Speaker 3 (40:58):
Yeah, Backyard bee Keeper. He just had a fifth edition
shortly before he passed away. Just another one that he did,
Better Beekeeping, which is an oldie, better goodie. So yeah,
backgrouard Beekeeping. You know a lot of us, like seventy
five percent of the beekeepers in Ohio are backyard beekeepers.
So that book, it talks about disease, It talks about
(41:21):
being kind to your neighbor, It talks about providing food
and flora. It has a little bit about you know,
promoting bees and just biology. So it covers a lot.
Speaker 1 (41:34):
And again it's I sales stay the same, old, same,
but when you know more about them, it makes it
easier for you to do things in your yard and
garden to make it, you know, to make it right
for them. So you learn more about them through all
these great books, through these great classes, through videos, hanging
out with the three Stingers, and you learn a lot
from there. Oh, by the way, thanks, I appreciate you
(41:54):
follow us in with all this great information. I got
one last question for you, very quickly. Yes, when you
smell paper whites, smell good. It's the smell bad.
Speaker 3 (42:02):
I like the smell. It's a it's a little strong.
But I like that smell.
Speaker 1 (42:06):
So you like spring, so it doesn't smell like a
minority you.
Speaker 3 (42:09):
No, it's aya for me.
Speaker 1 (42:11):
Queen Bee likes the smell of paper whites.
Speaker 3 (42:14):
But then I like cats.
Speaker 1 (42:15):
So there you go. Barbie Bletcher, always a pleasure, great information.
Happy New Year. I look forward to talking to you
more in twenty twenty six.
Speaker 3 (42:25):
Happy new year.
Speaker 1 (42:26):
All right, thank you, Barbie Bletcher. Are Queen Bee and
retired state apiarist. Apiarist Nope, should mess around with apes.
It's with these eight yarist all right, pick quick, GREATU
come back. Phone lines are open for you. Eight hundred
eight two three eight two five five Here in the
Garden with Ron Wilson.
Speaker 7 (42:51):
How is your garden growing?
Speaker 4 (42:53):
Call Ron now at one eight hundred eight two three
Talk you're listening to In the Garden with Ron Willison
said
Our total free number eight hundred eight two three eight
two five five. Good morning. I am Ron Wilson, your
personal yard boy, talking about yarding on this first Saturday
and twenty twenty six. Happy New Year. Let's get it
off to a good start, you know, putting those gardening
resolutions together. What are you gonna do this year? What
are you gonna do differently? You're gonna do everything the same,
gonna cut back. If you're listening to our first hour
(00:59):
of our show, I mean basically what I'm what I
was saying there is as you're looking at your resolutions,
maybe you cut back. Maybe you make it a little
bit easier on yourself. It's okay to do that. Just
keep in mind all the things that you're going to
be doing in addition to the gardening and yardening and
taking care of houseplants in that are you traveling, got
the kids involved with a lot of chokran net work,
(01:21):
all that in because it does take time. Uh, and
the weather a little bit of you know, is it
gonna be good weather, bad weather? Whatever?
Speaker 2 (01:28):
Uh?
Speaker 1 (01:28):
And uh, And start doing your resolutions that way and
set yourself up to be successful or a little bit
more successful rather than putting so much pressure on yourself
that you know it doesn't work out for you. And
that's that's the way I look at it. And I
do want to remind you again as I did in
the last hour, is that you know there's going to
be failures and if you lose things, you lose them.
(01:50):
We figure out why we move forward. That's what guarding
is all about. Being very optimistic. Uh And and you
know you try out trowel and error, that's what it's
all about. And use your independent, locally owned, independent garden centers.
They are the experts.
Speaker 3 (02:05):
You know.
Speaker 1 (02:05):
If you've got issues, use them, that's what they're there for.
Use us. That's what we're here for. Got a website
for you, you can email us, you can call us.
That's what we're here for to help you be more
successful in all your yardning endeavors. So don't fail to
use us, bother us, pike us, pick on us, whatever
may be during twenty twenty six, because that's what it's
(02:26):
all about. Eight hundred eight two three eight two five
five is the number. Holiday season, Christmas, New Year's now
behind us. Now we start to look forward to twenty
twenty six. Of course coming up next will be what
Groundhog Day? Can you believe that in about four weeks
that'll be right around the corner for us. Then Valentine's Day,
then we're into spring, March my birthday, and don't forget,
(02:47):
and we'll make sure you'll give you three or four
weeks advance warning when Danny's Birthday's coming up. He does
like gift cards, he does take cash, but we'll give
you the exact address where you can mail both of
those for his birthday, and now will be in March.
Speaker 2 (03:00):
Yeah, sixteenth if you think sixteenth, if you if you it,
they hear the sixteenth, Yes, if you think you know,
you won't remember, just mail it first of March and
then you've got it covered absolutely.
Speaker 1 (03:14):
A couple of things with your holiday plants that wanted
to bring up this time, and then I'm not going
to bring it up anymore unless you ask, But don't
forget on your Amarillis if you have those, and if
you don't, have you been out to your local garden
centers or your local home improvement stores that sell paper
white and Mamarilla's kits. If you have, and get out there,
they're on sale half price or more. Make sure you
(03:36):
look in the box to see what kind of conditions
are in Sometimes those amarillis that they've been growing and
kind of circling around in the box. Not a good idea.
Look for other bulbs that haven't grown quite as much
in there. But you can scarf up some great deals
right now on both of those kits. And if you
if you are growing one, remember that once it's done,
flour and cut that foot those stems off. Grow it
(03:58):
as a house plan all all winter outside in the summer,
feeded heavily, and in late August stopped watering it, cut
it back, stored away inside, cool in the dark, and
bring it out right before the holidays, about six to
eight weeks in storage and you get it to flower again.
And then if you want, I have a tip sheet
on that, just email me and I'll walk you through
(04:18):
the whole process. But don't forget that on your amarillas.
Paper whites. Interesting thing came up this week. My sister
in Lass posted a picture got a paper white kit,
and of course they were up and flowering and it
was gorgeous, absolutely gorgeous. And she just set up put
a picture up there and said something unerneath it, and
I fired back and said, are they fragrant? And her
(04:43):
husband said, Uh, yeah, if you like smelling, you know,
like a funeral or something. This is horrible. And it's
interesting with paper whites because I've always said they have
a very distinct fragrance. It's very strong. It's a very
divisive scent. And what's interesting about paper whites the fragrance
(05:04):
is that some people, like myself, when I smell it,
I think it's sweet and floral, like like jasmine or
or orange blossoms that that I think it smells like that.
Then you have other people that find it so overpowering
that it's that they hate it. That smells horrible. I've
even had people say it smells like cat urine or
(05:27):
manure or feces. And it's interesting how they can go
both ways. But it's kind of like cilantro. You know,
some folks love cilantro and some folks hate cilantro. Says
it tastes like soap to them. Can't you can't give
me enough cilantro. I love cilantro, But there's a chemical
(05:47):
in the cilantro that makes you your taste buds react
differently depending on your taste buds, and the same thing
happens with paper whites. It's uh, there are different varieties.
Obviously they're stronger than others. But there's a compound in
them called endolely or indole and that compound that's in
(06:09):
there actually found in feces. It is actually found in
feces an equal eye that's not dangerous to you or anything,
but that particular scent comes from that chemical compound. So
some people pick it up their scents, pick it up
as a fragrant smell, and other people pick it up
(06:30):
as a feces smell. So it just depends on you
whether you like it as a sweet smell or a
foul smell. And they are working plant breeders are working
on actually coming up with paper whites that are less fragrant,
have less fragrance Earlier, I think is when it's out there.
(06:51):
Avalanche is when that's out there, has very low to
little smell. You can't smell very much at all. But again,
great white, great show. And remember when you're doing paper whites,
if you have a hard time with them, they get
tall and they fall over, get real lanky. Two things
one is keep them cooler, helps to keep them shorter,
grow them in a vase. If you want, put some
(07:13):
gravel on the bottom of the vase. Put those down
to the bottom of the vase. The vase holds them upright,
so if they get tall, it doesn't matter. Or when
you do, add water to the bottom of your paper
weight bulbs in that gravel. Just put a splash of
a clear alcohol like tequila or vodka in that. Just
(07:34):
a splash, splash for you, splash for the plants. Put
that in the water. That actually helps to keep them shorter.
They still flower the same, still smell the same, but
it keeps them shorter. And that's I think you can
use actually any kind of alcohol, but I think the
clear is usually the best. In the vodka gen tequila
(07:54):
is something like that, but just a splash, not much
and that's it. And then you could do a little
bit more than the if you need it, but that'll
help to keep them shorter. But again, I thought it
was interesting because that smell, it always depends on who
you are and what you know your sense is because
some people pick it up as a great smell, other
people pick it up as a horrible smell. And it's
(08:15):
because of the chemical compound called endole or endolay, which
is found in actually in feces and equal high to
give it a bad smell, So it depends on how
you pick it up. I think some maneuvers don't smell
too bad at all. How about that? All right, we're
gonna take a quick break. We come back. Barbie Bletch you,
our Queen Bee is going to be with us. We've
got a lot of things to talk about with Barbie today.
(08:37):
A lot of interesting things we're going to chat about,
including looking at the honeybees, cultivated honeybees from World War
two to today. Who had more during World War two
or beekeepers today. We'll find out about that. We'll look
at what's going on with the bees. Just a lot
of great information. We always learned something from Barbie every
time we have her on our show. Here in the
(08:59):
Garden with Ron Wilson.
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Speaker 1 (11:42):
Welcome back. You're in the garden with Ron Wilson and
in his time for our queen Bees. She is a
retired state API arist. I have known her forever. She
knows more about bees and bees know about bees. As
a matter of fact, She sent me a very disturbing
video yesterday about queen bees. Talk more about that as well,
Ladies and gentlemen, the one, the only, Miss Barbie b Letter.
(12:10):
I didn't know bees could clap like that.
Speaker 3 (12:12):
I was gonna say, those bees are really active for
this early in the morning.
Speaker 1 (12:16):
Well, it's warm in here, so they all they dragged
themselves here and now they're all warmed up. Barbie, did
you have a great.
Speaker 3 (12:23):
New Year's I did, Yes, it was happy twenty twenty six.
Speaker 1 (12:27):
Happy twenty twenty six to you as well. How long
we known each other?
Speaker 3 (12:31):
Oh gosh, twenty some years. I remember Katie when she
was nine. You were talking about Katie's crops.
Speaker 1 (12:40):
Yes, I think, yes, yes.
Speaker 3 (12:41):
I knew her when you well, I mean I didn't
know her, but I remember when she was nine when
you were interviewing her.
Speaker 1 (12:47):
That's been Yeah, it's been a long, long long time.
I know that you and I really got involved with
the bee situation, not only talking about honey bees, but
you know, we really started talking about the native bees
and bringing there to the forefront is awareness as well.
But it really started to come to really happen back
in twenty was at twenty six when the colony collapses.
Speaker 3 (13:10):
I was at Ohio State that time.
Speaker 1 (13:13):
Yeah, and the colony collapse disorder really yeah, yeah, and
like everybody was in this what is going on? And
the you know, everybody the bees are dying. And of
course it's probably one of the best things that ever
happened because funding and research and everything escalated, and you know,
we know more seriously about bees today, native and honey
bees than we ever have.
Speaker 5 (13:34):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (13:35):
We needed that research and we needed awareness. And that's
you know, one of our biggest problems us, the bee keepers,
is we don't have we don't promote ourselves as well
as we sure the average person walking down the street
has no idea how important honey bees are to their diet,
to their nutrition. So it was important. And now everybody
(13:57):
and their brother, you know, if you tell somebody that
you keep these, everybody wants to know how the bees
are different. And that's wonderful. I'm happy for that.
Speaker 1 (14:07):
Oh absolutely, And again I think that I also look
I look at it too, because I mean the records
and what's happening with bees in the environment. Most of
that information is coming from honey bees because they are cultivated,
grown as a crop or as a livestock or whatever
how you want to say it. But you know, they're grown,
so the records and observing is much easier than with
(14:30):
the native bees. But fortunately it has brought the situations
with native bees at the front as well. And so
now we've got, you know, in both hands. With one hand,
we've got the honey bees and the other hand we
have all the native bees. And you know, a lot
of the problems that well, the biggest problem that's going
on with both of them obviously is lack of habitat,
which we know is major. I mean, and I still
(14:51):
I bring this up at garden talks. You know, what's
the biggest issue for both of these Because we have
issues for either, you know, individually on both hands, but
the biggest issue, and of course misuse of pesticides come up. Yep,
that's a part of it, there's no doubt about it.
But the biggest issue that affects both of these is
the lack of habitat.
Speaker 3 (15:11):
Yeah, and to that point, and I just lost my place.
We had no shoot, I just lost my place.
Speaker 1 (15:20):
Okay.
Speaker 3 (15:20):
I was just going to tell you how much we've
lost in Ohio. We've lost six point nine million acres
of farmland just since nineteen fifty. Wow, So we had
twenty six thousand plus acres in nineteen forty five, twenty
(15:41):
six thousand acres of farmland. Now we have about thirteen
I'm sorry, twenty six million those zeros.
Speaker 1 (15:49):
Darn it, Hey it is seven twenty four in the morning.
Speaker 3 (15:52):
I mean, hey, no, not a morning bird. Twenty six
million plus acres and yeah, nineteen fifty we now have
about thirteen point five million, So we've lost more than
half of our a goods of farms.
Speaker 1 (16:10):
Yeah. And again even with that, I mean that the
farms weren't all farming practices also took away. I mean,
farmers at one time would leave the you know, twenty
feet from the fence. They would leave that grow up,
you know, et cetera, et cetera. And of course then
they started farming to the fence. And now they're kind
of backing off and adjusting that so they can bring
that back again, that that that habitat. But yeah, the
(16:33):
loss of and of course homes and developments and you know,
downtowns and roads and everything like that takes it all away.
Speaker 3 (16:40):
And we have forty nine million acres of asphalt in
the United States. That's forty nine million acres.
Speaker 1 (16:46):
And we're gonna have more. I mean, that's just reality.
That's what that's the way it's going to be. So
we look at facts and figures like that, and we've
all got to be convinced here that it's up to
you and me and everybody out there. We're not asking
people to be keepers bb but to be a bed
and breakfast for all the bees, both honey and native
bees that are out there today. Be a bend and
(17:07):
breakfast in your gardening practices, in what you plant. You know,
the old pollinator thing here, Planning for pollinators is more
important now than it ever was.
Speaker 3 (17:17):
Yet another point with your farming is that they had
multiple crops. You know, they are more or less sustainable
for themselves. So they had, you know, coal crops, they
had some corn, they had beans, they had a lot.
They had a lot of diversity in what they grew.
And now you know, it's millions of acres of corn
(17:38):
and soybean, so we've lost that diversity. Bees don't really
get any nutrition from either one of those. They'll get
nectar and pollen from them, but it's not nutritious. So I mean,
you have those those diverse gardens you know of your
own cropsure beans and herbs and whatever. Those bees get
(17:59):
so much nourishment from all those different flowering plants.
Speaker 1 (18:03):
Unbelievable. Talk about bar Blet here. She is our queen
bee and has provided us for all these years twenty
since twenty six, Yeah, that's when we first had you
on here talking about the colony collapse disorder, and have
learned so much from you over the years. You presented
me with some facts and figures, and I don't know
if you remember this or not, but you were looking
way back to the amount of high, you know, hives
(18:26):
that are out there today versus the amount of hives
that we had back during the World War two.
Speaker 3 (18:35):
Yes, and it's it's startling. So an interesting fact then
I'll try to remember, is when we will the Buamites
showed up. We lost a lot of beekeepers and a
lot of colonies. So I'm getting ahead of myself, but
we had like fifty five thousand some colonies in the
(19:00):
early nineteen eighties and then we're in a conty collapse
disorder showed up. We went down to twenty two thousands.
So we are now we're back up to fifty five
thousand colonies in Ohio. However, we had two hundred and
sixty thousand back in nineteen forty, and we were the
(19:20):
top third honey producing state in the United States in
the early forties, nineteen forty forty one forty two, we
were the number thirty or four top honey producing state
in the United States.
Speaker 1 (19:35):
Two hundred and sixty thousand hives.
Speaker 3 (19:38):
Two hundred and sixty thousands.
Speaker 1 (19:39):
In nineteen forty and then today it's back up too.
Now we have fifty five thousand.
Speaker 3 (19:45):
Back up to fifty five thousand.
Speaker 1 (19:47):
Unbelievable. That's crazy stuff. Talk with Barbie Bletcher, our Queen Bee.
Take a quick break, we come back. We've got Barbie
all the next half hour, so stay tuned. Lots of
great information here in the gardens with Ron Wilson.
Speaker 7 (20:14):
Not gardening questions.
Speaker 4 (20:16):
Ron has the answers. At one eight hundred and eighty
two three Talk You are in the garden with Ron Wilson.
Speaker 5 (20:39):
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Speaker 1 (21:49):
Welcome back to the Garden with Ron Wilson's Special Guest's
Warning The Queen Bee Barbie a letter. We've been talking
with Barbie.
Speaker 2 (21:59):
Uh.
Speaker 1 (21:59):
I've noted for a long time, but since twenty oh
six when the colony collapses order hit big time and
the beehigh's they were just disappearing. And ever since then
we've been talking about bees. And of course now that
you know it's the buzz out there now is to
you know, be pollinator friendly, bee polite, and pollinator friendly
in our gardens, and we try to promote that more
and more. But look at some old stats and I
(22:20):
think that was it just kind of blew me away
with the two hundred and sixty thousand hives in Ohio
in nineteen forty compared to and it was as low
as twenty two thousand in Ohio just a few years ago,
but back up to around fifty five thousand, that's crazy. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (22:35):
Yeah, we were up there with New York, in Iowa, Minnesota,
so it was concentrated over on the eastern Saturday United
States except for Iowa. I don't know where they came from,
but yeah, Ohio and New York another one. Yeah, well,
I guess Minnesota and Iowa sorot not just the eastern side.
(23:00):
But there wasn't too much going on out in the Southwest.
But then about so we had a war going on
in the early forties sometime toward the end of the war,
California started to beef up their almond almond production and
then California ended up getting the number one spot for
(23:23):
honey production. But we were I think our max nineteen
forty five, we had three hundred and twenty six million
colonies of bees.
Speaker 1 (23:35):
Wow, that's a lot of bees.
Speaker 3 (23:38):
Producing ten let's see, I'll get my zero's wrong again.
Ten ten let's see, Yeah, ten million pounds of honey.
Ten million pounds of honey.
Speaker 1 (23:56):
So how much honey is produced today? Any idea?
Speaker 3 (24:00):
Thirteen? Let's say one point three million in Ohio. Wow,
one point three million. So yeah, we've gone away and
the other states are like that too, but we're way down.
We're like number twenty five now for honey production in Ohio.
Speaker 1 (24:14):
So as we look at the at honeybee hives and
honeybee raising bees and all, as we look to that
from nineteen forties to today, you know, back then, did
they have colony collapse disorder and issues like that? And
why are we you know, was that an issue? Those
things issues back then? I mean you look at I
(24:36):
look at the insecticide I mean DDT and stuff like
that was out there. At that time. You know, I
don't know, but did you know have things changed over
the years.
Speaker 3 (24:47):
You know what's interesting because I did I did some research,
not not this weekend, but several years ago when they
were going to take the neo NICATORI dofa mark it
completely in the United States, and they've done that over
in Europe and they actually found that without the ne nicketinoids,
(25:09):
they're going back to the harder pesticide some mouth ion,
diasmon hydrogenated CA yeah, or those things that organo phosphates.
Not only do they lose their crops and they had
to replant two or three times because of the insects,
(25:29):
but they still are they're still losing insects because they're
using harder products, so they're still losing bees. So even
without the neons.
Speaker 1 (25:38):
So you take the NEOs off the market, and then
you just have to next thing. You know, you're using
more tools out of the toolbox.
Speaker 3 (25:44):
Yeah, they're using the hammers.
Speaker 1 (25:46):
Yeah, which you know you would occasionally get out of
the toolbox if necessary, but otherwise you don't. Now you're
using more of the hammers and it's not working out.
Speaker 3 (25:59):
No, And we had like the dwindling disease in the
Isle of Dwight disease, but those were back in the
eighteen hundreds, so there wasn't really a big colony collapse
that we knew about in the nineteen hundreds. And of
course that was before social media, so it's kind of
(26:20):
hard to tell. But as far as I as I
could determine, we didn't have any huge b die off
in the nineteen hundreds, so it wasn't until two thousands,
and you know, they determined the causes for that. There
were multiple One was, you know, as we said, lack
of nutrition, and then the vuamite had just shown up,
(26:44):
had been here, you know, twenty some years. We were
using harder products trying to control the veramite, and that's
when they really discovered all the viruses, so we didn't
have the royal weed. The scientists didn't have technology to
FI viruses before, you know, in the eighties and nineties
(27:05):
they finally were able to determine all these viruses. And
there's like thirty some viruses that affect honey bees.
Speaker 1 (27:12):
Now mostly vectored by the mite, by.
Speaker 3 (27:15):
The yes, vectored by the might.
Speaker 1 (27:17):
So where did this vera might come from? I mean
when when did it finally start twenty years ago? You
say that really came to being.
Speaker 3 (27:27):
Yeah, like the mid eighties. It showed up in Ohio.
I think it was just further south earlier than that.
I forgot. I was going to say, oh, so it
came from So there's another honey bee that's kept over
in Asia called the APIs serana. It's like a larger
bee and honey Those bees, the APIs serana, were able
(27:50):
to adapt to the veramite. They have a I think
their life cycle is a little bit faster, so the
veromites aren't able to really take a colony down. So
the APIs sorana honey bee had adapted to this feramite.
But somehow those that APIs sorana was brought to the
(28:11):
United States, and I don't know if they ever determined
how that was, and the auromites that were on those
bees got into our bees, and our our honey bees
had no no, no way to tolerate it, no resistance
to it, never come in contact with it. And just
like you know, native plants that have a new invasive
(28:34):
past that attack it, they have no way to break
it down. So and they're still you know, even today.
You know, honey bees have a poorer tolerance of honey
of floramites, but we do have some that have you know,
developed some tolerance or some way of adapting with it. Yeah,
(28:55):
it's been a it's been a slow road.
Speaker 1 (28:57):
I was gonna say, it just seems like, you know,
with the technology that we have today and the research
is being done, I mean, you and I and again
you and I've been talking about this since twenty six
and this viral might's been at the top of the list.
It just seems like, like, what's the deal. I mean,
you know and you you know, you told me one
time think about this though. You know, we're trying to
(29:18):
come up with a pesticide to take care of an
insect and we've got bees, which are an insect. Yeah,
and how do you come up with something that's not
going to harm the bees? But you have to take
this might out? And you know, of course cultural practices
have come into play. I know you've told me that,
and be breeding obviously coming up with new varieties that
(29:40):
are more tolerant or you know, of the of this
viral might. But it just seems like something would like
the silver bullet would come along some yeah.
Speaker 6 (29:48):
Please.
Speaker 3 (29:48):
You know, every every four or five years we have
a new product and we all like rush to use
that product and then it doesn't work all that great.
But yeah, you know, this this thing, this erect it
is it's feeding on the mite. So whatever we use
it has to be hard enough to kill the thing
that's feeding on the bee without telling the bee. Yeah.
(30:09):
That that's that. That sciences has just been apparently much
harder to do than we thought.
Speaker 1 (30:16):
It's crazy stuff talking with Barbie Butcher, our queen bee.
You know it's f I printed this out. I didn't
send it to you, but I just got a thing
in the from uh. I forget which news releas this is,
but talking about scientists finally identify the cause between behind
the US biggest honey bee die off ever recorded, which
was this past winter, h with the with the millions
(30:37):
that were lost, and of course what's the big picture there,
the vermite.
Speaker 3 (30:42):
In the virus system, the virus right, and I think,
I yeah, I sent you somes in a presentation this fall.
It may show that even five highly virulent veramites, five
little veramites, so that would fit in your finger, those
be those mitra so highly infective that they could kill
(31:06):
an entire yard of bees and that just blows me away.
Speaker 1 (31:11):
Yeah, crazy stuff. Talking with Barbie Blecher, our Queen Bee.
It's taking out of a break. We've got more with
Barbie Blecher. Here in the garden with Ron.
Speaker 4 (31:20):
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in the garden and he's Ron Wilson.
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Speaker 1 (33:01):
Welcome back. You're in the garden with Ron Wilson talking
with Barbie Well that there are Queen Bee and what's
going on with our honey bees out there. You know
that at the end of this, and this was from
Science News, it was talking about I guess is it
amatros amtra Demetriz talking about you know, can still consider
one of the least toxic options. But on the same token,
(33:23):
if you spray a lot of it, you can weaken
the colonies. But yet now they're seeing the that they're
becoming resistant to this, and it's just like crazy stuff
and then they're just nothing they can find, you know,
is really doing the job. So nothing you and I
can do about that at this stage besides helping to
support the funding for this research. But there are things
that you and I can do to help bees, both
(33:46):
honey bees and navy bees to continue on and be
as healthy as possible.
Speaker 3 (33:52):
Yeah, a lot of research has shown that if bees
have the proper nutrition, they can they can overcome viruses.
You know, I know beekeepers that have hives out in
the middle of nowhere, out in beautiful flowering you know,
beautiful forests and woodlands and fields and pasture lands. They
have their bees have viruses, but they don't have high
(34:16):
enough levels to hurt the bees. They may have some mites,
but they don't have enough mites to damage to you know,
make the bees sick. So they can tolerate mites and
viruses if they have paper nutrition. And you think about
you and I, you know, we when we're not eating right,
we're not getting enough sleep, blah blah blah, we're more
(34:38):
sussible to getting sick. It's the same thing with the bees.
So one we try not to have our hives on
top of each other, which is it's difficult to do
with all the cities and the construction and you know,
urban areas. So another interesting fact is that you know
beekeepers back in the day, back in the forties, you know,
(34:59):
they would have one thousand colonies each. Now, you know,
our average beekeeper has five hives or less because we're urban, right,
So you look at Cincinnati in nineteen forty, your population
was four hundred and fifty thousand. You had four and
fifty thousand people in the Greater Cincinnati area. You now
(35:20):
have one point two million. So where are you gonna
keep bees?
Speaker 1 (35:26):
And not everybody wants to be hive in their next
door neighbor's yard.
Speaker 3 (35:31):
Yeah, you have to train them. You had to bribe
them with honey.
Speaker 1 (35:34):
Yeah. True, and to show that you know, it's okay
that you're not going to get stung, and they don't,
you know, take off after you and they're not going
to chase you and the kids down and the dog
who nine years.
Speaker 3 (35:44):
Yeah, So education, we have to educate. We need to
promote beekeeping. We need to have more Ron Wilson's out there.
But talk about you know, let that clover grow, let
the dandelions grow, and you know, we teach beekeeping every spring,
and I know you and I have talked about that.
Even if you don't want to be a beekeeper, taking
(36:05):
those beekeeping classes helps you understand what it takes to
keep colonies alive.
Speaker 1 (36:10):
Yeah, I still remember I got an email from a
gentleman said that he and his grandson had signed up
for one of the bee classes. I think about Knox
County and they weren't beekeepers. They were going to learn
about bees, and that's why they were taking it. Just
to learn about bees and if they became If they
became beekeepers, great, but just to learn more about them.
Because if you know more about them, you know what
(36:31):
you need to be doing in your own yard and
garden and maybe your homeowners association and get everybody involved.
They have these communities that are now pollinator communities to
help out all the pollinators, including the honey bees and
the native bees, and the butterflies and the whole nine yards.
You plan for them that you're planning for all of
them and it helps them all out and things that
we can do to be more friendly in our gardens
(36:53):
and more pollinator polite. So these classes and they're available.
I just you're talking about the Southwestern Beekeepers Associated having
their classes coming up in February. They're all you know,
through our state of Ohio, many of them out there,
the Ohio was it the Ohio Beekeepers Association, Yeah.
Speaker 3 (37:09):
Ohiose State Beekeepers Association has a listing of the most
most counties have a beekeeping club and most of these
clubs teach beekeeping. So I would actually take several because
each you know, you have a group of beekeepers and
they teach a certain way. If you go to another
class somewhere else, they're going to teach you different things.
Speaker 1 (37:32):
So gather up all the information and there's a good
chance you might find bar B Bletcher or one of
the three Stingers, or all the three Stingers at these
classes as well. And if they all three show up
at the same time, you're in for a hoop. Trust that. Yeah.
Really talking with Barbarie Bletcher, our queen Bee, and what
you can do to be more friendly in your yard
(37:53):
and gardens, you know, become a bee bed and breakfast
or a pollinator bread and bed and breast, and really
how and it does work, whether it's a kind of
container or whatever you're doing in your yard and garden practices,
it does work. Talking to Darby Blesher, I sent her
a scenario. I said, I got a question for you, Barb,
if by chance this time of the year, of course,
(38:14):
the bees are all in their hives and it was
it was interesting. Uh. Nina sent me a picture of
the yellow spots all over the concrete and she said, oh,
it's a poop day where they'd all gotten out and
flown and did their little poop and then went back
in the in the hive. So they're all gathered around
the high And by the way, does she really wake
you up at five thirty this morning?
Speaker 3 (38:36):
Well, my phone went off, but I ignored her.
Speaker 1 (38:39):
Geez. I went off minded too, and I was like,
you gotta be don't bother her. She got another hour
to sleep anyway, Uh, I know, I guess stuff from
her four in the morning. It's like, whoa, what are
you doing? But anyway, there, so they're all gathered around
that queen, protecting her over the wintertime. Obviously, what happens
if the queen bee dies and there's no queen to protect,
(39:01):
do they all fall apart and take off during the
winter or do they stick with each other and stay
in that hive until the spring season.
Speaker 3 (39:10):
It really depends on what typo winter we have. They
will stick together, especially if there's brood, they will stick
together until so the worker bees and queen bees all
put out of pheromone. You know, winter time, it's not
as obvious, but as the season goes on, this winter
goes on, it's going to become more obvious that, hey,
(39:32):
there's no queen here, they're not gonna be able to
smell her anymore. Brood will produce a certain pheromone too,
like a smell ascent. And so if they're not if
the worker bees don't smell her, or there's not very many,
not a lot of brood, and there's no new brood
coming along, they're going to realize that there's something wrong
(39:54):
and they'll start to wander off. But as long as
it's really cold, they're gonna stay clustered, so they will
they probably won't realize. Yeah, so they well, they won't
realize that there's no queen until it starts getting warm
and they start spreading out.
Speaker 1 (40:09):
And part of Barb's answer to me was to send
me a video of two queen bees fighting each other,
stinging each other in the head and in the face
and going at it, and that could be pretty nasty time.
Speaker 3 (40:22):
Oh that was horrible. Yeah, I've never seen them actually
stinging each other in the face. That was I thought
they were just beheaded.
Speaker 1 (40:29):
I was a little taken back with you sending me
something like that, and you know, actually it was kind
of interesting to see that. But wow, kind of crazy stuff.
Talk with Barb Bletcher how important it is for you
to be ee friendly in your in your gardens and
why it's so important. And of course classes out there
over the wintertime. Be sure and take There's plenty of
books out there as well. Mm hmm, yeah, Kim, I
(40:53):
think Kim Kim Flopman's is one. I liked that book,
especially for beginners.
Speaker 3 (40:58):
Yeah, Backyard bee Keeper. He just had a fifth edition
shortly before he passed away. Just another one that he did,
Better Beekeeping, which is an oldie, better goodie. So yeah,
backgrouard Beekeeping. You know a lot of us, like seventy
five percent of the beekeepers in Ohio are backyard beekeepers.
So that book, it talks about disease, It talks about
(41:21):
being kind to your neighbor, It talks about providing food
and flora. It has a little bit about you know,
promoting bees and just biology. So it covers a lot.
Speaker 1 (41:34):
And again it's I sales stay the same, old, same,
but when you know more about them, it makes it
easier for you to do things in your yard and
garden to make it, you know, to make it right
for them. So you learn more about them through all
these great books, through these great classes, through videos, hanging
out with the three Stingers, and you learn a lot
from there. Oh, by the way, thanks, I appreciate you
(41:54):
follow us in with all this great information. I got
one last question for you, very quickly. Yes, when you
smell paper whites, smell good. It's the smell bad.
Speaker 3 (42:02):
I like the smell. It's a it's a little strong.
But I like that smell.
Speaker 1 (42:06):
So you like spring, so it doesn't smell like a
minority you.
Speaker 3 (42:09):
No, it's aya for me.
Speaker 1 (42:11):
Queen Bee likes the smell of paper whites.
Speaker 3 (42:14):
But then I like cats.
Speaker 1 (42:15):
So there you go. Barbie Bletcher, always a pleasure, great information.
Happy New Year. I look forward to talking to you
more in twenty twenty six.
Speaker 3 (42:25):
Happy new year.
Speaker 1 (42:26):
All right, thank you, Barbie Bletcher. Are Queen Bee and
retired state apiarist. Apiarist Nope, should mess around with apes.
It's with these eight yarist all right, pick quick, GREATU
come back. Phone lines are open for you. Eight hundred
eight two three eight two five five Here in the
Garden with Ron Wilson.
Speaker 7 (42:51):
How is your garden growing?
Speaker 4 (42:53):
Call Ron now at one eight hundred eight two three
Talk you're listening to In the Garden with Ron Willison
said
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