September 20th, 2022 AABA Meeting

6:30  Hive Dive or Q&A Led by President Ryan Smith (If doing hive dive please bring at least your veil.)
7:00  Who are the Mites Really Biting with Dr Zac Lamas

Followed by general Q and A.  Until 8:45.

Program:  Dr. Zac Lamas on ” Who are the Mites Really Biting?”

After hand sampling over 30,000 bees we have new findings on the seasonal distribution of Varroa in a honeybee colony. Come listen to the talk on Varroa biology, viral transmission and management.

Zac  Lamas is a postdoctoral researcher focusing on how Varroa feeding behavior drives viralDr. Zachary Taylor transmission in a honey bee colony. His current work uncovered how varroa are actively feeding and switching from one adult bee to another, and that relatively few mites are responsible for a majority of parasitized bees. During his PhD he was the recipient of the PAm-Costco award where he studied the vectorial capacity of Varroa destructor. He actively speaks at bee clubs and professional conferences, largely sharing information on beekeeping management. Zac previously worked for Michael Palmer at French Hill Apiaries in Saint Albans, Vermont. On the side Zac is the owner and operator of RockStar Queens. He produces quality nucleus colonies and queens in central Maryland.

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August 16th, 2022 AABA Meeting

6:30  Hive dive, or Q&A in room
If doing hive dive please bring at least your veil.

7:00  How to store your honey super frames  with Kim Mehalick

7:15 Break

7:30  Cybil Preston will be giving a talk on ” Hive inspections, and what to expect when getting an apiary inspection”

 

Cybil Preston is the State Apiarist/Chief Apiary inspector for the Maryland Department of Agriculture. She started as a hobbyist backyard beekeeper in 1997 and became a regional Apiary Inspector for the Maryland Department of Agriculture in 2004.  She’s a former president of the Susquehanna Beekeepers Association.  Cybil continues to educate new beekeepers by teaching the short course for Susquehanna Beekeepers in conjunction with Harford Community College.  In 2013 she became an EAS certified Master Beekeeper in 2013 at West Chester College. She was promoted to the State Apiarist position for the MDA in 2014 and is responsible for 13 counties during the season and the whole state during the off season.  In 2015 Cybil trained with the Maryland Department of Corrections and Public Safety along with her Dog Mack to become certified in American Foulbrood disease detection.  In 2018 she trained a second dog, a springer spaniel named Tukka.  Mack and Tukka are currently the only certified American Foulbrood detector dogs in the United States.  In addition to working her own honeybee colonies, Cybil enjoys spending time with her family which also includes her 4 dogs and her 5 senior miniature donkeys and 3 goats.

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July 12th 2022 AABA Meeting

Arlington Echo Nature Center Millersville MD

6:30 Hive dive and/or general Q and A discussion.
Please bring your veil and protective gear if you are going on the hive dive.
This will be weather dependent.  There will always be beekeepers in the room to answer your questions.

7:00 How to use the varroa management tool, to make your own treatment decisions

7:30 Allan Storm: When do you start to prepare for overwintering?

A big concern for beekeepers at this time of year – after harvesting honey – is worrying about whether or not hives will survive the winter months.  There are several reasons why a hive may not make it to Spring and many of those are preventable.  Maryland’s winter seasonal changes can be hard for a beekeeper.  Weather extremes, hot and cold, can affect your bees survival.  So winter planning and management in advance is extremely important.  Many beekeepers say that preparing for winter starts in the summer season – the end of July and first part of August?  Why is this is a perfect time?  What tips may you want to consider to start winterizing your bees?  What can we do now that is best for the bees?  What resources do our bees need?  What about moisture and insulation?  So how can we ensure our bees stay warm and dry and with the correct resources?  How do we ensure our “Fat Bees” are healthy and are starting to build up virus free?  What are some of the bee behavior that we need to look for?  When do bees start to cluster and quit gathering resources?  How much honey do I need?  And when should I quit feeding?  Remember, it is important to keep your hives healthy and get an early jump on the winterizing process that will help your bees survive the winter.

A regular participant and speaker to Anne Arundel and neighboring bee associations, Storm keeps an assortment of, plus or minus, 50 hives which include Langstroth, Slovenian AZ, Layen, Warre and Top Bar.  Having traveled internationally, he has observed beekeeping methods in Japan, Korea, Spain, Thailand, the Balkans, and Turkey – culminating with studying with the Beekeeping Academy of Slovenia where he was first introduced to Slovenian AZ hives.  Now with over 16 years of “consecutive” beekeeping, here in Maryland as well as in Belgium.   He has completed University of Montana’s online Beekeeping Certificate program which consists of three university-level courses at the apprentice, journeyman, and master levels, culminating in a certificate as a “Master Beekeeper”  And as a veteran he has completed University of Michigan’s “free” on-line beekeeper’s course.  He belongs to the Anne Arundel Beekeepers Association, Bowie/Upper Marlboro Bee Association (BUMBA), and DC’s Bee Alliance (DC’s association of beekeepers) and enjoys teaching during their beginner classes.   He is also the Maryland Apiary Inspector for Anne Arundel, Calvert, St. Mary’s and St. Charles counties under the guidance of Cybil Preston, the Maryland State Apiary Inspector and will hopefully finish his Maryland Honey Judge apprenticeship after this year’s Maryland State Fair.


 

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AABA June 21st, 2022 Meeting

Join us for our June AABA Meeting! It will be held Tuesday, June 21st, 2022 at 6:30-9:00 PM at Arlington Echo.
6:30 President Ryan Smith: Open Hive Dive (weather permitting) or General Q&A
7:00 Valerie Wampler:  Rendering Wax
:  Demonstration with Tips and Tricks
7:30: Break
7:40 Valerie Wampler:  An Introduction to Native Bees to include Anatomy, Forage, Nesting, Characteristics 

Hive Dive and/or General Q and A Discussion

Please bring your veil and protective gear if you are going on the hive dive.   This will be weather dependent.  There will always be beekeepers in the room to answer your questions.

Program

Valerie Wampler

Rendering Wax:  Demonstration with Tips and Tricks
An Introduction to Native Bees to include Anatomy, Forage, Nesting, Characteristics 

Valerie Wampler has been a beekeeper since 2014.  She started with 2 hives in the first year and is now up to 60.  She has served as the Howard County Bee Club Treasurer and has provided talks to various Maryland Bee Club organizations on topics such as Building Bait Hives and Making Splits as well as hosting training sessions on how to make hot and cold process soaps and lotion bars.  Valerie has also volunteered in many outreach events throughout Maryland and is honored to provide mentoring/support to Mission Beelieve. Valerie grows award winning Dahlias and is a American Dahlia Society Senior Judge

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May 17th, 2022 AABA Meeting

AABA May Meeting

Arlington Echo Nature Center Millersville MD

6:30 Hive dive and/or general Q and A discussion
***Please bring your veil and protective gear if you are going on the hive dive. This will be weather dependent. There will always be beekeepers in the room to answer your questions.

7:00 Candee Van Iderstine: Practical tips for making your hive inspections easier
A wonderful walk through various tools and hacks that work to make your beekeeping work more enjoyable and easier

7:30 David Dobbs: Shaking Bees: Why and How it’s done

Dave recently had the experience of shaking over 175 hives making 184, 3 lb packages with a commercial beekeeper. The video and pictures are from April 15th at Larriland Farm Mt Airy Maryland. Dave will show a video and walk us through the process and business side of this all day event.

Dave Dobbs

Dave has been a beekeeper for 7 years. Having flower and vegetable gardens prompted him to get into beekeeping for the pollination qualities.

After seeing an “undertaker Bee” throw a dead bee off the bottom board – Dave was hooked on the intricacies of honey bee biology and their social interactions.

He expanded his apiary to 8 colonies his second year and started producing honey and candles for sale. Being an equipment geek, Dave used his proceeds and started purchasing larger production extraction equipment and now has a “Honey House” with a full sideliner set up. He expanded to twelve colonies the next year and since then has had as many as 20.

Already having an LLC for his Cyber Security Consulting company called Baltimore Information Group (BIG), he expanded into another division calling it BIG Bee Apiary.

A lifetime teacher, Dave has shared what he knows about bees including: teaching a Life Science Course and starting bee colonies at a Montessori School, using his bee business as the case study for the Entrepreneur 101 course at AACC, supports 2-3 outreach events a year and submits 6-7 products to be judged at the Howard County Fair.

He also enjoys queen rearing, splitting, and collecting pollen. This year, he has a local scientific study determining active dates of the local honey flow of Western Howard County region using a procedure in Bee Culture Magazine. In addition, he is a member of the Howard County “Bee City Pollination Committee”, which supports the education and hands-on discussion of honey bee pollination in the county. He has a registered “Pollinator Garden” on his property and continues to expand it every year.

Dave has been very active in the Howard County Beekeepers Association starting with establishing the t-shirt committee, hosting bait box builds, mentoring 3-5 newbees every year, is the out-yard coordinator, has been Vice President and currently sits on the Board of Directors as Past President. Dave is currently working on becoming a Maryland Certified Honey Judge and is a candidate for the EAS Master Beekeeper certification having passed 2 of the 4 exams at last year’s convention.

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April 19th, 2022 AABA Meeting

This will be an in person meeting at the Arlington Echo Nature Center, Millersville MD.

6:30 President Ryan Smith, open hive dive at Arlington Echo  *** Bring your veils
7:00 David Clark, Skill:  How to wire wax foundation properly
7:30 Russell Sprangel, Raising queens using grafting

 


Russell Sprangel is the current Vice President of Howard County Beekeepers and the past President and VP of Carroll County Beekeepers.  He is very active in Carrol County over his five years as a beekeeper attending every meeting and almost every outreach event.  These events are  to educate the community on the benefits of beekeeping and supporting all pollinators.  He teaches during the beekeeping calendar in the clubs training Apiary, all any aspects of beekeeping students ask for.  Early in his second year of beekeeping he decided that queen rearing could not be the black magic everyone said, and you should not need 10 years of experience to do it.  So, with a little book learning, and no formal instruction, he jumped in to find what the fuss was about.  Turns out it is magical, but in a good way, and can be one of the most rewarding aspects of beekeeping even on the small backyard scale.

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Make Mead the Super-Charged Mead Making Way

Making drinkable, award winning mead in 1 year or less. 

Some researchers believe that mead takes so long to age into drinkability because the slow, protracted fermentation forms bad tasting chemicals.  To avoid this problem, the faster the fermentation, the better. The result is a drinkable, and salable, product in less time with greater profitability.  In order to make mead in a lot less time we need to push the primary fermentation as hard as we can. To do this, we will use the Staggered Nutrient Addition (SNA) method. Additional chemicals will be added to the “yeast bomb” with SNA additions whenever the measured sugar content drops 5 percent.The SNA is the mixture of 1/4 cup honey, 1/2 cup sugar. 1/2 teaspoon each of both DAP and Diastatic Malt Powder.  Follow the traditional mead making instructions for preparing mead outlined in the Mead + Supercharged PDF.

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March 15th, 2022 AABA Meeting

Tuesday, March 15, 2022
6:30 pm (Eastern Time)
 
Dewey Caron will present on Deadouts: (dead colonies have tales to tell) and Caring for Smaller, Weaker Colonies (to make them stronger)
 
 
6:30  Opening questions and answers moderated by President Ryan Smith
7:00 Club Announcements
7:05   Dr. Dewey Caron

Dr. Dewey Caron is  Emeritus Professor of Entomology & Wildlife Ecology, Univ of Delaware, & Affiliate Professor, Dept Horticulture, Oregon State University.  He had professional appointments at Cornell (1968-70), Univ of Maryland (1970-81) and U Delaware 1981-2009, serving as entomology chair at the last 2.  A sabbatical year was spent at the USDA Tucson lab 1977-78 and he had 2 Fulbright awards for projects in Panama and Bolivia with Africanized bees. Following retirement from Univ of Delaware in 2009 he moved to Portland, OR to be closer to grandkids.

Dewey has been active with Eastern Apicultural Society, serving in many positions, including President and Chairman of the Board and Master Beekeeper Program developer and advisor.  Since being in the west, he has served as organizer of the Western Apicultural (WAS) Society annual meeting and President of WAS in Salem OR in 2010, and is currently member-at-large to the WAS Board.  Dewey represents WAS on the Honey Bee Health Coalition.

In retirement he remains active in bee education, writing for newsletters, giving Bee Short Courses, assisting in several Master beekeeper programs, and giving presentations to local, state and regional bee clubs.  He is author of Honey Bee Biology & Beekeeping, a major textbook used in university and bee association bee courses.  He has a new bee book, The Complete Bee Handbook published by Rockridge Press in 2020.  Each April he does Pacific Northwest bee survey of losses and management and a pollination economics survey of PNW beekeepers.

Dr. Dewey Caron is  Emeritus Professor of Entomology & Wildlife Ecology, Univ of Delaware, & Affiliate Professor, Dept Horticulture, Oregon State University.  He had professional appointments at Cornell (1968-70), Univ of Maryland (1970-81) and U Delaware 1981-2009, serving as entomology chair at the last 2.  A sabbatical year was spent at the USDA Tucson lab 1977-78 and he had 2 Fulbright awards for projects in Panama and Bolivia with Africanized bees. Following retirement from Univ of Delaware in 2009 he moved to Portland, OR to be closer to grandkids.
Zoom details:

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February 15th, 2022 AABA Meeting

AABA will host Steve Repasky who will be speaking on : Nucs in your Bee Yard: A Keystone to Sustainability

We will be discussing a variety of ways to produce, manage and utilize nucs in your own beeyard as a means of becoming sustainable and profitable.
This will be a zoom only meeting, credentials to the right.

Agenda:

6:30-7  President Ryan Smith moderates Q&A
bring your beekeeping questions for open discussion

7-8:30  Nucs in your Bee Yard: A Keystone to Sustainability
Stephen Repasky

Special welcome to all the new short course participants!
Stephen Repasky
A second-generation beekeeper, Stephen Repasky is a nationally recognized speaker, author and consultant from Pittsburgh, PA.  He is a certified Master Beekeeper through the Eastern Apicultural Society and is the current President of the Pennsylvania State Beekeepers Association, past president and co-founder of Burgh Bees, and a past member of the Board of Directors for the American Beekeeping Federation.  He is also an active member of the PA Queen Bee Improvement Project and is a member of the Penn State Center for Pollinator Research Advisory Board and the Pennsylvania State Apiary Advisory Board.  Stephen manages approximately 200 colonies (mostly as single brood chambers) in western Pennsylvania and is involved in honey production, queen rearing and the selling of nucleus hives each spring and summer to those interested in starting or expanding their own beekeeping adventure!
He also manages the apiary program at Pittsburgh International Airport where there are nearly 100 colonies used in honey production, research studies and queen production. Pittsburgh International is home to the largest apiary program in the country located entirely on airport property.
Stephen had his first book published by Wicwas Press in 2014 entitled ” Swarm Essentials” and can be found teaching beekeeping classes and workshops in the Pittsburgh area and presenting lectures on a variety of beekeeping topics at local clubs and many regional and national conferences around the United States.
Anne Arundel Beekeepers Association is inviting you to a scheduled Zoom meeting.
Topic: AABA February Meeting
Time: Feb 15, 2022 06:30 PM Eastern Time (US and Canada)
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