THE BEEKEEPER’S LAMENT: HOW ONE MAN AND HALF A

BILLION HONEY BEES HELP FEED AMERICA

By Hannah Nordhaus

ABOUT THE BOOK

• Journalism following fourth generation Beekeeper John Miller• Covers topics such as:

•History of beekeeping (Langstrom)•History of disease•Causes of CCD•Opposition between industry, farmers, bees• Problems facing modern-day beekeepers

THE HONEY BEE

• Cute and fuzzy (except can sting)

• Cannot be controlled

• Dying at an alarming rate and we don’t

know why

• Sick of being jostled around cross country,

placed in food deserts, and being sick

THE BEEKEEPER

• Multi-generational

• Harder every year

• Faces declining populations and

unpredictability

• Competition among each other

• No real monetary gain

• Sick of his bees dying

THE INDUSTRY

• Rich men

• Only cares because of money

• Not really willing to help the bees

• Wondering why bees are dying after

spraying a million pesticides on almonds

• Afraid to lose money

“The fact is, you don’t always

know why bees die. Sometimes,

they just do.” … “‘They got fed and

medicated; they don’t have many

ticks,’ Miller said. ‘I can’t tell why

they are crappy bees.’”...”When

confronted with high virus levels,

they seem to know they are sick

and leave on purpose, so as not

to infect others, sacrificing

themselves the same way our

ancestors must have. Miller likes

that idea. It makes the ruthlessly

indiscriminate way that bees die

seem somehow almost

meaningful.”

“In Paradise Lost, John Milton compared the zealous industry of bees to the labor of angels.

As bees in springtime, when the sun with Taurus rides

Pour forth their populous youth about the hive

In clusters; they among fresh dews and flowers

Fly to and fro, or on the smoothest plank,

The suburb of their straw-built citadel.

The angels he described were fallen; they were building hell. So too today’s honeybees pour forth in the almonds, unstinting, diligent, forbearing; they are assembling their own demise. The almond industry is killing John Miller’s bees. But it allows him to do what he loves, which is to keep bees - so all in all, it is a pretty good deal with the devil.”

“It’s no surprise, then, that record almond profits, combined with depressed prices for other crops that also grow on land suited for almonds, have enticed a lot of Central Valley farmers to plow over their cotton, wine grapes, peaches, and apricots and plant more almonds. Growing almonds makes perfect sense for a farmer seeking to maximize his profit and minimize his labor costs and headaches”

“In fairness to other beekeepers, Miller’s nuking line is truly appalling. He is the first to admit it” … “They blast through the air and cluster on coffee tins and honey pails and shrubs. They litter the carpet in his office. It is no fun for the bees; it is no party for the beekeeper’s, either. During nuking season, Miller’s hands and gloves are speckled with stingers. He sees bees in his dreams. But he knows no better option. The survival of the bees, of his business, and indeed, of the honey bee in America, depends on this violent springtime ritual.”

“Unpredictability is predictable”

- John Miller

“Almonds didn’t always require this degree of intervention -- nor did all the other insect-pollinated crops that farmers grow and we eat. When farms were smaller and crops were varied, growers could rely on native pollinators and local beehives to get the work done”

“Bees need meadows. They need nectar, pollen, honey. They need things that bees were meant to eat. This is not a new revelation: ‘Few things in practical beekeeping are more important than the feeding of the bees; yet none have been more grossly mismanaged or neglected,’ Langstroth wrote more than 150 years ago.”

“There are few leisurely vacations; few golf club memberships”

“On the back roads near Modesto, it was

easy to spot an almond rancher’s home…

Miller likes to draw a graph of the rise of

“cabins owned by almond guys” at Lake

Tahoe from 1970 to the present - a soaring

diagonal, approaching infinity. Meanwhile,

says Miller, “bee guys don’t even have

timeshares.”

“With pollination prices at an all-time high during the CCD years, the almond industry, which always cared about bees to the extent that it needed them alive to pollinate crops, now cares about bees even more and has poured more money than ever into bee research”

WHAT DOES EACH CONTENDER THINK?“In 2006, Paramount Citrus encountered the same problem and attempted a similar cleansing. They sent beekeepers near Paramount’s mandarin groves a letter explaining that their bees were “trespassing” on Paramount’s clementine crop and should move their hives a minimum of two miles away”

“The nation’s CCD loses poses no comparison. In Miller’s grandfather’s day, a beekeeper’s major problem was American foulbrood infection… But the varroa mite moves from hive to hive on its own, at a speed that has confounded beekeeper’s ability to react to it.”

“Bees will hurt you that way. They don’t care who owns them. They don’t care who loves them. They do what they do. They forage; they build; they leave; they rob; they die;

they sting. Oh, do they sting.”