Pollination as important as honey for beekeeping income | Local stories

After cleaning the hives, they will likely spend a few months in a "winter palace" owned by Miller Honey Farms in Gackle, North Dakota. The installation, last winter, could help improve the health of bees. moves, controlling the environment and eventually eliminating varroa mites with carbon dioxide. After a few months in the "winter palace", the bees will move to the west.

According to the US Department of Agriculture, North Dakota, with 37.83 million pounds of honey, was the country's top honey producer in 2016, nearly double its Dakota neighbors, 19.88 million and Montana, with 12,243. million, which rank second and third in honey production.

California comes in fourth with 11.16 million pounds. Many bees that produced honey in the northern plains also worked on honey production in California, as well as in other coastal and southern states.

But these days, honey production is a secondary feature of taking bees in warmer climates. Beekeepers now rely as much on the income they earn from taking their bees across the country to pollinate crops as they earn from their honey.

"One in three food bites you eat requires a bee to pollinate," says Jason Miller, vice president of Miller Honey Farms.

Miller is a fifth generation beekeeper. His great-great-grandfather founded the company in 1894, and they now have about 15,000 hives, making it a great commercial operation.

In the 1970s, Miller's father, John Miller, brought bees to North Dakota. Jason Miller was born in Bismarck and spent his childhood summers in the state. At the time, a hive would produce more than 200 pounds of honey.

"When I was a kid, bills were paid for honey production," said Jason Miller. "That's how you did a profitable beekeeping operation."

Now the average is about 40 pounds per hive, Miller said.

The difference comes down to changes in the landscape. As fields formerly in pasture moved to row crops such as corn and soybeans, the fodder needed to produce honey has disappeared.

"Honey bees and pollinators are benefiting greatly from North Dakota," Miller said.

At the same time, almond farms in California have shifted from small farms that can be pollinated by native species to "massive monocultures" requiring help to reach maturity. Farmers pay beekeepers to get bees to pollinate their crops.

"The way beekeepers survive is the pollination of crops," explained Miller.

With almonds, beekeepers also route bees to citrus groves, apple orchards and fruit and vegetable farms, among other types of farms, making beekeeping important for all aspects of agriculture.

This is Price's second year beekeeping. He learned from more experienced beekeepers, including the Millers, and operated his 3,000 hives in the Medina area.

"Of course, there are many other things," he says. "Trying to keep hives alive is the most important thing. It's a lot to learn. What works, what does not work. "

In its first two years, Price was far from ideal, with a drought in 2017 and long periods of rain this year.

Last year, Price brought his bees from North Dakota to California for the almond season, but this year, he plans to try indoor storage for several months before heading west.

Indoor storage, said Miller, is not a new concept. For many years, his family rented potatoes in Idaho to winter their bees.

But this arrangement has several disadvantages, he said, largely because the cellars "are designed to store potatoes, not bees." For example, if the potatoes are stored longer than expected, they should be kept.

According to Miller, one of the biggest problems is that hives will lose about 2% of their bees each time they move. Some bees from North Dakota would be moved up to seven times before ending up in California.

Miller Honey Farms decided to build its own Gackle facility, specifically designed for bees. The building, used for the first time last winter, allows them to move the bees three times only. Miller said their company was "at the forefront" of such projects in the United States, although Canadian companies have been doing the same thing for some time.

Miller said the best environment for bees in winter is the interior of a dead tree, where it is cold, dark, calm and safe.

"What we are able to do (with the new facility) is to replicate that natural environment," he said.

The installation is maintained between 30 and 40 degrees and there are controls to prevent it from becoming too wet.

The "Winter Palace", as Miller Honey Farms says at the building south of Gackle, could also help fight against Varroa mites, a major problem for beekeepers.

Miller explained that varroa mites are very large compared to honey bees.

"It's the equivalent of a monkey on the back, who clings to you and feeds on your blood," he said, noting that many mites can be on a single bee.

The mites develop a tolerance for chemicals, making their treatment a "constant cat-and-mouse game," said Miller.

"It's hard to kill a bug," he said.

Research on the best way to treat varroa mites includes efforts focused on the use of RNA interference and organic acids. Research conducted at Washington State University suggests that bees can survive at a higher carbon dioxide level than varroa mites, which means that a natural way to reduce or eliminate mites is to maintain the level of carbon dioxide.

The "winter palace" is equipped with carbon dioxide monitoring devices, Miller said. Thus, the installation of Gackle can improve hive health by decreasing movements and by reducing mites when bees overwinter from November to January, when they switch to pollination.