April 02-May 02 Next Meeting is: Tuesday, May 28, 2002 7:30pm Cafeteria, Falls Church High 7521

Jaguar Trail Falls Church, Virginia 22042

President Alan Fiala Vice-Pres. Patricia Haskell Editor Chris Reed 703-790-8044 703-560-3484 703-534-2117 Treasurer Bennie Liles 703-671-1010 Secretary Pearl Liles 703-671-1010

The May 28, 2002, meeting will feature a question and answer session with a panel of some of our Upcoming Events most experienced beekeepers answering your questions. Lots of us like the part of our meetings May 28, 2002 BANV meeting where we can just talk to other beekeepers for July 19-20, 2002 VSBA meeting in their opinion about whats going on in our hives, Lynchburg, VA how to manage them, and so forth. This exchange August 5-9, 2002 EAS meeting in usually takes place before and after the program Ithaca, NY. and during the break with the result that we dont August 15-18, 2002 Arlington County always get to hear everything that was said. At Fair the May meeting were going to give everyone the September 21-23, 2002 Capital Home opportunity to ask our experts those questions in and Garden Show a more structured setting allowing everyone to September 24, 2002 BANV meeting hear. Pearl and Bennie Liles, John Ferree, Dane November 26, 2002 BANV meeting Hannum, and perhaps others will participate in a panel chaired by Pat Haskell. Bring your questions on anything to do with beekeeping, honey and wax production, marketing, and pollination no topics barred! Find out whether or not its true that if you ask four experienced beekeepers a question, youll get at least six firm opinions advocating all sides of the issue. On March 26, 2002, Alan Fiala began his first meeting as BANV president by welcoming newcomers Ed Vanderhoeven, George Wagner, Betty Jackson, Paul Powell, Howard Bass and Cliff Taylor. Regular members were encouraged to wear newly made name-tags to help the newcomers learn members names. A survey for the benefit of the state apiarist was then passed around the meeting room to assess the number of colonies lost this winter in Northern Virginia. Dane Hannum reported that the Spring Capital Home and Garden Show was the best ever for BANV. Participating beekeepers sold $5,331 worth of honey and other hive products during the three day show in Chantilly. President Alan Fiala initiated a discussion during the Our Booth at the Spring Capital Home and Garden Show meeting about the need for a

BANV web page and a study group for master beekeeper certification. John Ferree announced that he will head up the BANV booth at the Arlington County Fair again this summer. There was no treasurers report as our Treasurer, Bennie Liles and our Secretary, Pearl Liles (who was reported to be seriously ill in the hospital) were absent. Pat Haskell and Marvin Ward generously provided abundant refreshments. Lucky Eli Alford won the 50-50 game. Our guest speaker at the March 2002 meeting was the award-winning photographer and Maryland beekeeper Stephen McDaniel. A freelance photographer since 1975 and EAScertified Master Beekeeper, Stephen took us on a tour inside the life of the honey bee colony. He projected beautiful slides of worker bees collecting nectar and pollen on various flowers, bees carrying propolis loads on their legs, the transfer of nectar from one bee to another, hungry bees sucking up honey from a cell, and a tidy worker bee combing the hairs on her back. He has also photographed a drone walking on a persons tongue, queens fighting on the comb, queens emerging from queen cells, queens piping, a queen in a swarm cluster and an airborne swarm. Seldom seen close-up photos of new eggs in cells, a larva spinning its cocoon, two larvae in one cell (caused by a laying Photographer Stephen McDaniel worker), a pupa shedding its skin and a new worker bee emerging from its cell were enjoyed by all. Stephen even demonstrated with his slides that bees fold their proboscis (organ for sucking up liquids) under their head when it is not in use; the proboscis is not retracted into the bees head. Other rare color slides included a bee louse, a varroa mite and a laying worker in the act of laying an egg. Mr. McDaniel revealed a photographers tip; a 50 mm camera lens used backwards makes a great magnifier for visual work. Finally, our generous guest speaker gave away one of his photographs as a door prize. The lucky winner of Mr. McDaniels artwork was Lloyd Sours.

Presidents Corner
By Alan Fiala
The one-day seminar held on April 20, 2002 was the idea of Brenda Kiessling, who was, of course, unable to participate. Special thanks go to Paul Diehl for arranging for the use of the outdoor lab, Pat Haskell for tending to a myriad of details of advertising, housing, hives, and food, Paul, Pat, and Dane Hannum for providing hives, Betty and Don Jackson for being ad hoc registrars, and Jeff Pokorny and Marvin Ward for being ad hoc general assistants. Everyone who participated was enthusiastic about the program, and wants to have more. There are more short-course programs available, and Pat and I are looking into working them into our future activities. Next time, though, we will be asking for volunteers to help us. We are also looking into the possibility of hosting a Virginia State Beekeepers Association meeting before too very long. We can only do that if we have lots of volunteer help. There are lots of activities between our May and September meetings: the Arlington County Fair, the VSBA meeting in Lynchburg, the EAS meeting at Cornell University in Ithaca, NY, the fall home and garden show and the c lub picnic. Participate as much as you can! I do not expect to be at our May meeting, but hope to see you at other events this summer.

Adventures in Australian Beekeeping

By Brenda Kiessling
G'day. After 7 weeks in the WAY-outback, I am now in a town near the middle of Queensland called Roma where sheep, cattle, oil and gas are the main industries. I hadn't realized that I'd gotten used to the dust in the streets, on the scrub vegetation, on the red rocks or on the people of Mt. Isa, but landing at the Roma Aerodrome was a surprise--it is green, cute, clean and flat. There are lush fields of crops, pastures for livestoc k and "Bottle" trees (the trunks are convex and look like a bottle). The roads here are littered with dead Wallaroos (a dark gray smallish kangaroo), victims of passing vehicles. Only the week before I left Mt. Isa, I discovered the biggest beekeeper in that town, the kind Mr. L. G. who invited me to his apiary. The apiary was in his backyard--although I think some of his twelve colonies are somewhere else--he was a little vague about it. He had just packaged up a two hundred milliliter sample of honey that he is required to send to the state every two years. The honey is checked for disease and then he gets a clean bill of apiary health. Mr. L. G. obtains a label which goes on the honey sample by paying the state a fee required for keeping bees. I was curious about the number of colonies in my hosts apiary because I had visited another beekeeper the week before who had only one colony and who had told me that that was the legal limit. In response to my inquiry, Mr. L. G. offered another vague answer. Mr. L. G. took me out to his dark apiary--all this had to happen after office hours; it was my only chance, dark or not. Surrounding his backyard apiary was a net forming an arcade perhaps 20 feet long and 8 feet high, open at both ends. There is a story to that. A girl in his neighborhood got stung a few years ago and the city council came to him and said that they understood that bees were important to the environment , but couldn't he do something to c hange their flight path? So he cooked up this camouflage scheme resulting in no more complaints from neighbors. Mr. L. G. has a log hive in his apiary, home to a colony of native Australian sting-less bees. The sting-less bees bite like an ant, Mr. L. G. explained. I was naturally very anxious to meet some of these bees. He banged on and shook the log but the sting-less bees just wouldn't come out. The next day, during lunch time at the office, a jar appeared with two of the sting-less bees in it. They were about four millimeters long, even smaller than the Australian flies I had encountered. The two sting-less bees are now in formalin where I hope I can get a better look at them later. American foulbrood and wax moths worry the local beekeepers most. One beekeeper tapes his supers to keep out wax moths--says he has had trouble even within a strong colony. Another beekeeper reports he's only had wax moth trouble in unused equipment. I think it might be a different moth--the size he showed me looked smaller than ours. Bugs, in general, are everywhere. I'm reminded that this is the tropic s, or close to it. Cockroaches seem to come alive about sundown when they come into houses--even nice, pretty, upscale houses. Some cockroaches are about 2 inches long, but all of them are dead by morning with their feet literally up in the air. If you don't sweep your floors every day you get quite a collection of dead cockroaches in your home. And the flies! In Mt. Isa, small, persistent flies were always present. You can't blow them off. If you do, they settle right back down. You end up with your whole back and face covered with flies. I was riding my pushbike home in Mt. Isa one day when the shadows were growing long. My journey was uphill so I was pumping my bike and I was a little winded; my mouth was open as I tried to the blow the flies off my face. I got to thinking of long ago, maybe 1950, when National Geographic magazine had just come in the mail (and I was lucky enough to get it before my siblings). In the magazine was an article on Australian aborigines with a black and white photo showing a solemn aborigine face with FLIES on his eyelids, lips and all over his face. I couldn't understand why a person wouldn't just brush off the flies. T hen, in the real world, I inhaled a fly! I was trying not to crash my pushbike while gradually turning blue trying to decide whether to cough up the fly or breathe. I coughed, the fly came up and there was no crash! Now I know why the aborigine didn't try to get the flies off his face.

Editors Note: Adventures in Australian Beekeeping was created from E-mail messages sent by Brenda Kiessling, former BANV President, between March 3, 2002 and May 3, 2002.

Extracting Service will bring extractor to your place and help you extract for a share of the honey. Call Ken Hood at 703 780-0474.

For Sale

Beekeeping Workshop for Beginners, June 1, 2002

A one-day workshop for beginning beekeepers in need of introductory information will take place at the Three Lakes Park in Henrico County (400 Saluda Dr., Richmond, VA) on Saturday, June 1, 2002. The workshop, sponsored by the Richmond Beekeepers Association, will cover honey bee biology and behavior, selection of an apiary site, annual management requirements, and assembly and care of beekeeping equipment. Mark Bennett from Dadant has been invited to demonstrate and display his company's wares. A bee cage will be set up for afternoon demonstrations of hive inspection and management. Admission is free; however, the workshop will be limited to 30 people. Interested persons should contact Bob Stapleton at 804-672-8408 or Bert McLaughlin by email at bertm cl@aol.com.

Attendees of the April 20, 2002 Short Course on Management of Bee Diseases and Pests The April 20, 2002, BANV-sponsored seminar presented by the extension services of Virginia Tech was a big success. Instructors Dr. Rick Fell, Keith Tignor, and Marjorie Browning began the seminar by describing Integrated Pest Management and how to best achieve it. Every disease and pest currently known to affect honeybees was described, along with current treatment methods. The afternoon portion of the one-day seminar held at the Arlington Outdoor Education Laboratory in Broad Run was devoted to six hands-on laboratory or hive demonstrations on detecting diseases and discouraging pests. Members of the three local Beekeeping Associations and a couple of members from Richmond filled the class quota of thirty. All the participants, instructors and students alike, agreed that it was a very worthwhile, information-packed day, held at a very appropriate and beautiful location.

5830 Piedmont Drive Alexandria, VA 22310-1853