July06

RESERVATIONS FOR TH£ ANNUAL MEETING AT MIDLAND MUST Be Made BY September 25, 2006 TO Insure THE SPECIAL ROOM RATES.

For reservations call 1-800-825-2700 and mention the MBA for special room rates. See inside cover for more information.

Please mark requested room type. If room type is not available, next available room type and rate will be continued. Your request for reservations is a request until you receive a continuation from our reservations department.

Package Rates (please select from the following All-Inclusive options):

Conference 2-Night Package (Thursday-Friday): CIRCLE ONE

Two-night Single ................................................................................ $ 173.08

Full Breakfast Buffet and Dinner

Two-night Double ............................................................................... $ 220.88

2 Full Breakfast Buffet's and 2 Dinners

Two-night Stay - Lodging Only Single ................................... $ 146.88 Single

Double .................................. $ 168.48 Double

Conference I-Night Package (Friday):

One-night Single w/Friday Dinner ........................................................ $ 99.64

One-night Double w/2 Friday Dinners ................................................. $ 136.64

One-night Stay-.lodging only! Single ...................................... $ .. 73.44 Double ..... ............................... $84.24

(All rates quoted are inclusive, no additional tax for service fees will be applied)

Preference (based on availability): __ Non-Smoking __ Smoking

Special Request: ___________ Rollaway Bed (add'l cost $10 per night) _________________ Crib (no add'l charge)

Include a $75.00 deposit OR or use your American Express, MasterCard, Visa, Discover, or Diners Club credit card to confirm your reservation. Please make check or money order payable to VALLEY PLAZA RESORT. Any changes or cancellations of reservations must be made at least 24 hours prior to arrival to avoid forfeit of deposit or cancellation charge. Reservations are on a first come, first serve basis as long as rooms are available.

Please mail or fax this form to: V ALLEY PLAZA RESORT

Attn: Reservations 5221 Bay City Road Midland, MI 48642

Phone 1-800-825-2700 FAX (989) 496-9233

Reservations must be received by Monday, September 25, 2006 to qualify for your package rates.

Bill Hathaway at the T.c. Farm Market

Our guest speaker talked about apiatherapy

Time out to visit with fellow beekeepers.

The Summer Meeting was held at TLC Tomatoes, Suttons Bay, Mi. on June 17, 2006 and hosted by Jim & Tony Beaton.

After lunch, a short meeting was called to order by President Anthony at 2: 1 0 PM. He read the list of candidates for the upcoming Fall election. They are:

Secretary: Jane Wracan - Kay Barber Treasurer: Judy Schmaltz - Roger Hoopingarner

Member-at-Large: Roger Sutherland District 2: Ron Noble - Ruth Dunlap District 4: Open

Ed Wracan gave a report on the Fall Convention. It will be held at Valley Plaza Resort, Midland, Mi., October 27-28,2006. A great program is being planned.

Roger Hoopingarner introduced James Higgins who spoke on Apothecary with products from the bee hive. They are honey, pollen, propolis, royal jelly, wax, and venom.

He also will be there both days sharing his expertise on rearing queens for northern climates.

America Bee Journal- April, 2005 "Commercial Beekeeping Without Treatments of any Kind

Rob is a past board member of The Indiana State Beekeepers Association and a frequent and popular speaker at garden clubs and conventions. He also is the founder of the Indiana Beekeepers School (see "American Bee Journal" - January, 2006).

He will be in Midland both days talking on Back Yard Beekeeping.

Rob is sure to be both informative and entertaining.

A representative from Blackmore Rowe Ins. will discuss insuring your bee equipment.

a professional looking Christmas Basket you will be proud to give away or even sell ..

Bring your own honey products plus anything you would like to put in the basket.

Home-made granola - honey -recipe Muffin mix - honey- recipe- hot pad Tea Basket

Did you read the Bee newsletter from Roger Hoopingarner? His cover article about Oxalic Acid was excellent. Especially his viewpoint that a silver bullet is unlikely to come out and solve all beekeeping concerns in one quick swoop. The research community is providing tools, and like any set of tools, we need to utilize products for the intended purpose, at the intended time, with the intended expectations.

In fact, Roger's article caused me to take a few minutes to send him a note. I highly recommend that beekeepers provide feedback when they read articles in newsletters. There is a tremendous amount of time and effort that goes into putting out a newsletter that often goes unrecognized. More importantly, when a writer takes time to put out information that he's going to stand behind, it's really an invitation for dialogue. Remember to thank Roger, Zachary, the Klein's, the Sutherland's and those others that are working hard to provide good information to the Michigan Beekeepers.

The rules for importing honeybees from Canada came to light for one Michigan beekeeper recently. The federal honeybee laws allow for the importation on queens from Canada. Butthey do make for provisions to import queen cells. A SE Michigan beekeeper made calls to the USDA office in Romulus to learn if queens could be brought in from Canada. Since that land across the river from Detroit is a foreign country this question fell into USDA's jurisdiction. In this case the beekeeper did a lot of work to get his hives ready to accept new queens and headed off to Canada. It's then that he learned that queens and queen cells are not looked at in the same way. In an attempt to find out what thwarted this effort, I contacted Wayne Wehling of USDA in Riverdale. Wayne's office oversees the permit process for importing bees from other countries. Wayne explained that in the rewrite of the Federal Bee Act the only provision for allowing queen cells is for a research or university facility to obtain a permit. There is no provision for a beekeeper to import queen cells for putting into a nuc, and there really is no leeway on the issue. The beekeeper had to wait a few extra days for the queens to hatch so he could legally bring in adult queens. It pays to do your homework, but it's also important to be precise with your terminologywhen discussing what your plans are.

So, why isn't Tylan working in my colonies this spring? My first response was "why are you using Tylan this spring?" Just because Tylan received a beekeeping label doesn't mean it's always the best product of choice.

* Timing: Tylan must be used when there is no excess honey. Residues can exist in honey for 75-225 days depending on whether you fed the product in powdered sugar or syrup. (Powdered sugar has shown to provide the lower residue levels.)

* Tylan is meant to cure AFB! Tylan works on the vegetative or growing bacteria. It would be great if we could count on all of the spores in the colony to grow at the same time, then the Tylan could get in and do it's job. But they don't. When the Tylan is removed, the colony will be vulnerable. What does this mean? Simply - don't expect that Tylan will cure every colony with AFB!! If you have serious AFB, recognize that Tylan is a tool, not a cure-all. You'll need to manage your AFB levels through good management: use a burn barrel; get rid of badly infected frames, frames with scale, and frames that repeatedly break down with AFB. Then get the AFB under control in the rest of the colony. If the Tylan doesn't do the job- reevaluate the value of the colony. Not the dollar value, but the risk you have keeping a colony in your bee yard when you cannot get the AFB under control.

* Tylan won't prevent AFB. It's not meant for that, the company {loesn't claim that. Question:

Why did FDA take sulfa drugs away from beekeepers? Because honey contaminated with sulfa was providing the nations children with a continuous dose of drugs. When doctors went to use sulfa, many of the illnesses children get were already resistant.

* Did the Tylan ever have a chance? Was there already too much AFB in the colony?

This is a new product to most of us. I don't want to pretend to know why the Tylan didn't work in a case where I never saw the bees. But before you decide to use any product make sure you follow the label, and make sure your expectations are realistic.

When can we use Tylan? Pretty soon you'll be taking honey off of your colonies. When the honey supers are off, dig down into the brood and determine whether you have an AFB problem

or not. If not - there's no reason to treat with Tylan, use your Terramycin in the fall. If there is AFB, then consider treating, but only on colonies that you don't plan to use for a late summer or fall goldenrod crop. If the hive has a few cells of AFB, you might be able to use Tylan to knock out the infestation, but you're going to need to find ways to keep that colony healthy so that the remaining spores in the colony don't create a new problem after the Tylan treatment is done.

You can use Tylan on a non-producing colony. I'd think of these as weak colonies in a hospital yard because they have AFB.

So, where are the next round of pesticides and remedies going to come from? We hear a lot about the promise of new products in the research chain, when will they be out? (Read Roger's article about expecting a silver bullet.) Then adopt a management strategy that uses all of the tools available according to their label directions.

California bound this fall? The MDA can inspect your shipment of honeybees and provide a certificate to help you comply with California's Imported Red Fire Ant rules. All bees entering California are subject to inspection requirements for ants. Through California's IRFA program, we can do the inspection and this end, and probably save you a stop at the border. This inspection has to be done just before your bees go on the truck, but if you want MDA to assist you, you'll want to coordinate this effort well in advance. I believe that you can still ship your bees without a certificate, but you will be inspected at the border.

Want to take bees to Florida for the first time? In discussions with Jerry Hayes this past winter I learned that Florida's inspectors have destroyed thousands of Michigan honeybees in the last 4-5 years from a handful of Michigan beekeepers that are not paying attention to American Foulbrood. Michigan is getting a bad reputation. If you're planning to go to Florida for the first time, plan to get your colonies inspected in October here in Michigan. Don't wait till the snow flies; neither of us wants to open your colonies then. Once you are a registered Florida beekeeper, then you don't need annual inspections from MDA, but the first time down we can probably save you some headaches.

Sec 9.4. In emergency cases carnivorous animals may be killed or taken by the owner of property or his authorized agent, without a permit,. when his property is being damaged by any such animal; but such killing or capture shall be considered unlawful unless all animals killed or taken under this provision and disposed of only as directed by the director. This section shall not be construed as authorizing the taking or attempted taking of bear by traps except under permit issued by the director.

We are looking for volunteers to help with all the classes. needed to make ANR Week a success. If you have any special information you could offer, or would like to have a special topic taught, please contact me or Terry Klein, our numbers are listed on the administrative body list. Thank. you so much to everyone who attended the Summer Meeting, a special thank. you to Jim and Toni Beaton for their hospitality.

The website is up and hopefully running in good shape. If you have any information to contribute please contact me for help. There will also be an open web site for buying and selling beekeeping supplies.

Thank you for joining us at ANR Week in Lansing. We are sending you a complementary copy of our newsletter. It is issued monthly and will give you upcoming meetings and other information important to the Michigan Beekeeper. There is information in this newsletter on our Fall Meeting in Midland, MI. We would like to invite you to join us and join in the NEW Michigan Beekeepers Association. Please check out our web site also.

The Board of the MBA