Nixon Honey Farm in Red Deer County (Kevin Nixon)

By Alessia Proietti

U.S. Import Restrictions

Varroa mite causes Red Deer beekeepers to lose hives

Jul 14, 2022 | 1:50 PM

The bees in Red Deer and across the nation are having a hard time getting busy with a persistent mite.

The varroa destructor mite reproduces in a honey bee colony, attaching to the body of a bee and weakening it by sucking the fat and spreading viruses.

Kevin Nixon, co-owner of the family-run Nixon Honey Farm in Red Deer County, sells internationally and domestically for commercial use, at the retail level and provides pollination services for canola farms in southern Alberta.

This year, Nixon says he lost roughly 40 per cent of his hives.

“We’ve had losses in the past but not like this. When we see significant loss in the past, it’s usually isolated to a region and not to the extreme of 90 per cent. This year, what we’re seeing is Alberta to Ontario; it’s very widespread,” he said.

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A difficult 2021 season has led to what some local beekeepers are calling the “perfect storm” for hive losses.

According to Nixon, this spring’s cold snap caused queen bees to stop laying eggs and paused brood development, the larvae and pupae that develop from eggs before becoming adult bees. As well, he says last year’s drought heat left a longer brooding season for the bees, which inadvertently means a longer mite season.

Varroa destructor bee parasite – microscope photo. (Photo 85848684 © Verastuchelova | Dreamstime.com)

He explains mites have always been around and can never be fully eradicated but can be managed through various miticides made out of formic and other acids. Hives are treated in the spring and fall outside of production season to avoid residue in the honey.

Jeremy Olthof, President of the Alberta Beekeepers Commission and Manager of Tees Bees Inc, a honey producer and pollination company in Lacombe County, says he lost 70 per cent of his hives this year.

He says treatment supply could not meet the demand last year for the increasing mite crisis.

Olthof hypotheses as to why the threat is growing, including a building resistance to treatments by the mites or an evolution of the viruses being produced. While more research is needed, he says the industry doesn’t have the time and funds required and need results fast.

The beekeeper treats the bees of the varroa mite. (Photo 227749666 © Vasyl Kosolovskyy | Dreamstime.com)

As a temporary solution, Olthof says beekeepers have been transporting bees from other countries. However, the Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA) only allows imports from select countries like Australia, New Zealand, Chile, Ukraine and Italy and not the United States which he says could have solved their problems in days.

The CFIA confirmed that only honey bee queens can be imported from the U.S., not honey bee packages which consist of thousands of bees shipped in wooden boxes. They say due to a risk assessment conducted in 2014 by Health Canada, following an approach recommended by the World Organization of Animal Health, packages from the U.S. present higher disease and pest risk than queens because they are shipped with contents of their hive which may include mites and bacteria.

“Import restrictions on honey bee packages are in place to protect Canada’s honey bee stock given their importance to all Canadians,” the CFIA said in a statement.

Olthof says the science is outdated and a disconnect exists between the industry and the CFIA.

“There’s a solution right next to us in the U.S. and they’re fighting us on it. They’re telling us they’re protecting the industry but where are you? The U.S. had one of their biggest years ever in terms of package production,” he said.

The CFIA states that a call for new scientific data has been made to all Provincial Apiculturists, the Canadian Honey Council, the Canadian Association of Professional Apiculturists (CAPA), United States Department of Agriculture- Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service, and the Apiary Inspectors of America (AIA). Until then, they also reference business risk management programs with Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada to financially help beekeepers such as AgriInsurance, AgriStability and AgriInvest.

Nixon says the economic impacts from large hive loss affect beekeepers and their families, increase honey prices for consumers and threaten the Canadian industry as commercial businesses may turn to other markets for cheaper honey.

Environmentally, food production is affected as many fruits and vegetables like squashes, cucumbers, and apples, including canola, require pollination.

“Often honey bees, or pollinators, are not thought of. [They’re] kind of in the background and you don’t really pay attention to them but they play an important role in Canada’s agriculture,” he said.

Nixon says citizens can help by creating a diverse pollinating plant system in their yards for bees to have a healthy diet.

While he has tried more organic miticides as an alternative, Nixon states he is finding them less effective.

Olthof says beekeepers are testing heat levels as a way to reduce mites. This fall, he says his farm plans to acquire a robot beehive, a new technology that would control and monitor mites.