May 18th, 2021 AABA Meeting

AABA Events
11
May 2021

Our next AABA meeting will be held on May 18th.

6:30 Q&A moderated by President Ryan Smith. This is an opportunity to ask your questions, and get inputs from fellow club members
7:00 Lessons learned from the MCBA Training Apiary, Maureen Jais-Mick
Maureen Jais-Mick, Manager of the Montgomery County Beekeepers Association Bee Yard, will speak on
“Lessons from the MCBA Training Apiary,” including the yard’s purposes, apiary beekeeping philosophy,
legal requirements, bee yard rules, and day-to-day management.
7:30 Beekeeping in Europe, Allan Storm
Storm will provide a discussion about beekeeping in Europe.  By late Middle Ages, beekeeping was well
established in Europe due to the demands for wax and candles by the church.  Almost every region had
its traditional form of housing for bees.  Some had hinged doors or open backs that could be covered until
time to remove honey.  He will also talk about some of the European regulations and how they manage
the threats of honey bee health, hive management, and honey quality control.

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Tuesday November 17 AABA Online Meeting

AABA Events
30
Oct 2020

Tuesday November 17
6:30 meeting open discussion begins, all welcome
7:00 Winter Feeding for Bees, Debbie Hewitt
7:30 Observing Honey Bees at Home  Frank Linton, EAS Masterbeekeeper

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Observing Honey Bees at Home
You cannot be a good beekeeper if you don’t know much about bees. And it is hard to learn much about bees when they are hidden away in an opaque wooden box in a far corner of the yard. What to do?

One possibility, one I learned a lot from, and recommend, is to keep a small colony in a glass hive in your house, an observation hive. I kept an observation hive in the room where I spent a lot of time, and every time their tone changed, I took a look.

I saw more in a year than many backyard beekeepers see in a lifetime. And every year is different. In this talk I will show you how to keep bees in an observation hive and provide several examples of the ‘learning opportunities’ that the bees gave me.

Frank Linton, Ed.D, retired artificial intelligence engineer, and Research Associate at Appalachian State U., has kept honey bees since 2005. An EAS-Certified Master Beekeeper, one of his main interests is in finding ways to use remote sensing technologies to monitor and improve honey bee colony health and productivity.

Author of The Observation Hive Handbook, maintainer of the websites thebeepeeker.com and colonymonitoring.com, contributor to beekeeping magazines, invited speaker at beekeeping associations and civic groups, and mentor to new beekeepers, Frank runs a few hives near his urban apartment and invites swarms of honey bees to take up residence on his balcony.

 

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AABA October Meeting Minutes October 20, 2020

AABA Events
27
Oct 2020

Main Speaker – Cybil Preston, State Apiary Inspector
Maryland Beekeeping, Bee Inspection,
What’s New with MD Dept of Agriculture
Cybil reported that beekeeping in Maryland is growing in all categories, which she attributes to the Short
Courses and community outreach provided by the area bee associations. Cybil, four part-time
inspectors, and her two trained dogs inspected 4430 colonies last year. The dogs make a difference in
the number and speed of colony inspections for American Foul Brood, but they only work during winter
when bees are not flying. The dogs primarily inspect the ~2000 colonies that travel from Maryland to
pollinate California almonds in February. Cybil and the other inspectors handle the other seasons.

The statistics for 2019:
# Beekeepers: 2161
# Apiaries: 2716
# Colonies: 15,923

The Apiary Program is short several inspectors and hopes to hire additional inspectors next February.
Anne Arundel is one of the counties that needs an inspector. Cybil has been covering the territory this
season. Contact her if you are interested in becoming an inspector.

Cybil also stated that Maryland is monitoring for Asian hornets (aka “Murder hornets”), but despite
fielding 800 calls reporting this insect, they were found to be European hornets (which have been here
since the 1800s) and cicada killers that people never noticed in their gardens before.

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