Central State University to Host Bee Keeping Summer Webinar Series

Have you ever wanted to know what you can do to help save the declining bee population? If so, Central State University, Ohio’s only 1890 Land-Grant institution, invites you to attend the “Beekeeping Happy Hour Webinar Series,” beginning Wednesday, June 3, 2020, at 6 p.m.

The Beekeeping Summer Webinar Series is hosted by Central State University Assistant Professor of Entomology Hongmei Li-Byarlay, Ph.D.  The series of one hour webinars will focus on bee management and research with several nationally known bee experts.

Dr. Li-Byarlay, an expert in bee genetics, social behavior, and physiology, is committed to helping save bees through dynamic and innovative research and community presentations. Her research at CSU centers around honeybee genetics, behavior, breeding, and physiology.
 
“Beekeeping is where science meets agriculture, and there is an art to raising bees,” said Dr. Li-Byarlay.  “We need bees for our agriculture and environment because they are important pollinators for fruits, vegetables, and crops. One third of our food are pollinated by bees. Honeybee colonies provide lots of products for human including honey, beeswax, propolis, pollen (bee bread), royal jelly and bee venom.” she added.  “So learning how to keep bees in a sustainable way is important for our environment.  We have to protect them.  These seminars will help participants learn about sustainable beekeeping, new information about bee pathogens, parasites, and bee hives.”

Cindy Folck, Ph.D., and CSU Extension Program Leader of Agriculture and Natural Sciences, and co-seminar presenter added, “With so much of the ecosystem relying on the hard work of bees it’s hard to find a reason not to attend this workshop.  Natural beehives face a lot of challenges. Through beekeeping, humans can play a role in preserving populations, and in doing so help sustain the environment.”

Series dates and topics are:
Wednesday, June 3, 2020- “How to Use Swarm Traps to Capture Feral Bees?”
This presentation will focus on the swarm behavior and biology of honeybees, how bees vote for swarming, and how to set up swarm traps to catch bees. Additional information about feral bees will also be presented.
 
Wednesday June 17, 2020- “What Is Deformed Wing Virus Really Doing To Your Bees?”
Mr. Ian Traniello, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Crop pollination by the western honey bee Apis mellifera is vital to agriculture but threatened by alarmingly high levels of colony mortality. These massive, ongoing losses are due, in part, to high levels of infection with Deformed wing virus (DWV), transmitted by Varroa destructor mites, which can wreak havoc on honey bee foraging patterns and contribute to the breakdown of a colony. This is complicated by the fact that DWV can present covertly, meaning no outward signs of infection are present and bees appear healthy based on most common assessments. How can the science of genomics help us understand and prevent this situation? This seminar will cover all of the basics and is specifically intended for beekeepers who are interested in a deeper understanding of how common viruses might be affecting their bees.
 
Wednesday July 1, 2020- “Honey Bee Queen And Virus Infections: Transmission Routes And Consequences”
Dr. Esmaeil Amiri, University of North Carolina at Greensboro
The honey bee queen is the central hub of a colony to produce eggs and release pheromones to maintain social cohesion. Among many environmental stresses, viruses are a major concern to compromise the queen’s health and reproductive vigor. Over 30 viruses have been discovered from honey bees, which have evolved numerous strategies to infect queens either via vertical transmission from the queens’ parents or horizontally through the worker and drones with which she is in contact during development, while mating, and in the reproductive period in the colony. Dr. Amiri will discuss multiple transmission routes that viruses use to infect the queen and also the pathogenicity and direct impact of viruses on the queen’s phenotype.
 
Wednesday, July 15, 2020- “Stay Cool: How We Can Use Honey Bee Thermoregulation To Keep Better Bees”
Dr. Chelsea Cook, Arizona State University / Marquette University
European honey bees have evolved to manage colony temperatures across a broad ambient temperature range. This temperature management, or thermoregulation, is always performed by groups of bees coordinating to either cool or warm the colony. When it is hot, worker honey bees will spread water across their comb, then fan to circulate air and evaporatively cool their colony. In the winter, workers will shiver their flight muscles and press their bodies against brood comb to keep the brood at the ideal temperature for development, as well as form a circulating cluster around the queen to keep her safe and warm. This talk will focus on how honey bees work collectively to regulate colony temperature in the summer, and how cold winters provide necessary “down time” from foraging that may support colony health.
All webinars are free and open to the public. No pre-registration is required.

To register or for more information, contact Dr. Cindy Folck at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..