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The Latest Buzz: September, 2023

You can now find information from the USDA’s ‘Latest Buzz’ on the Bee Health Collective website! New jobs and funding opportunities are posted on the bulletin board and pollinator events and news can be found below! To submit items for The Latest Buzz contact pollinator@usda.gov. To receive an email when The Latest Buzz is updated use the sign up button below. Please note that your information will not be shared or used for any other purpose other than receiving The Latest Buzz.

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Information presented should not be construed to represent any official USDA or U.S Government determination or policy. Reference herein to any specific commercial products, process, or service by trade name, trademark, manufacturer, or otherwise, does not necessarily constitute or imply its endorsement, recommendation, or favoring by the United States Government. The views and opinions of authors expressed herein do not necessarily state or reflect those of the United States Government, and shall not be used for advertising or product endorsement purposes.


New Recordings from the ABF January Conference are available now!

Olivia Schaefer

If you missed out on the January American Beekeeping Federation conference, don’t worry! Many of the talks were recorded and are now available to view on Project Apis m.’s youtube page. Below are some of the main talks with information about the speaker and topic.

General Session Day 1:

Dr. Diana Cox-Foster of USDA-ARS Pollinating Insect Research Unit in Logan, UT, gave a talk entitled “Ensuring Healthy Pollinators for Crop Production: Defining Forage Needs of Bees Through Examination of Interactions of Bee Species and Pollen Use.

Dr. Scott McArt of Dyce Lab for Honey Bee Studies, Cornell University, gave a talk entitled “Disease Transmission and Spillover in Plant-Pollinator Networks.

General Session Day 2:

Dr. Diana Cox-Foster of USDA-ARS Pollinating Insect Research Unit in Logan, UT, gave a talk entitled “Bee Health: Untangling the Impacts of Agrochemicals and Pathogens.”

Dr. Garrett Slater of USDA-ARS Baton Rouge Bee Lab, gave a talk entitled “What Causes ‘Dud’ Drones?

Dr. Samuel Ramsey of Colorado University, Boulder, gave a talk entitled “Pollinator Pandemic.”

General Session Day 3:

Danielle Downey of Project Apis m. gave a talk entitled “Project Apis m. Research and Programs Update.”

Dr. Jay Evans of USDA-ARS Beltsville Bee Research Lab, gave a talk entitled “Understanding and Managing Honey Bee Diseases.”

Megan MaHoney of MaHoney Queens and Bees, gave a talk entitled “Commercial Beekeeping as a Platform for Selection.”

Randy Oliver of Scientific Beekeeping, gave a talk entitled “Scientific Beekeeping: Beekeeper Funded, Applied Research.”

A “Bee-g” Question: How do Honey Bees and Native Bees Interact?

A honey bee and a native bee forage on the same floral resource in the captionCache Valley, Utah. Utah is home to about 900 species of native bees, and 28,000 commercial honey bee colonies.

Access to clean, nutritious forage is essential for all bees, and as bee forage is declining each year in the USA, the number of native bees and managed bees are also declining. 75 years ago there were nearly twice as many honey bee colonies in the US, and more than half the native bee species assessed seem to be in decline.   

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