13 Lucky Tips for Activists

Since much of my concern about honeybees is motivated by environmental concerns and the need for activism in this regard, I thought I'd provide an interesting link (click on title) I found on the IWW website.

Bees and the Enduring Conflict I

Schnaiberg and Gould argue that the conflict between the ecological environment and human society has always existed. Environmentally oriented individuals often romanticize pre-industrial societies and their "oneness" with nature. Schnaiberg and Gould state that pre-industrial societies simply didn't have the technological capacity to overcome the short term ecological limits the environment placed on them. (p24)These societies simply collapsed and disappeared (see the Mayans). Industrialism's technological capacities have allowed our growth economies to survive beyond the ecological limits in the short-term and there are many still who argue that it will be science/technology that will allow modern economies to grow still further without environmental degradation. Anyone who questions the desirably of growth economies is labelled as unrealistic or worse.

Now let's consider how bees fair on this growth treadmill, and whether much of the bees problems today might be the result of expecting bees to live beyond the ecological limits placed on them by the natural environment. Are we expecting the science/technology of present day entomology and apiculture to save this creature that is being pushed beyond its environmental parameters? Are we forgetting that our environmental problems are not simply scientific/technical problems with scientific/technical solutions but problems with a social structural, political, economic, and cultural foundation (p 146) as well.

Social Apiculture: An Example

Is the BBKA too close to Bayer? from Gord Campbell on Vimeo


A few weeks ago I wrote an entry about what I've called, Social Apiculture. I said, "beekeeping can no longer be an activity strictly focused on hive management techniques and our bees' immediate foraging environment but demands we also stay alert to the larger global environment and the impacts of the political economy." After reading this entry a week later, it seemed a bit arrogant, as if I was proposing something new and original when there are countless beekeepers around the globe who are already practicing this. For this reason, I am sharing this video from a beekeeper, Phil Chandler, who has had a great influence on the way I am seeing the world of apiculture.

Article from the European Parliament Website

Future Plans

I am beginning to lay out my plans for next season. However, as I continue to consider these things, in light of my growing background in environmental sociology, I have started to recognize how inadequate my plans for the expansion of Beelandia are for the sustainability of bees. Unless sustainable apicultural plans are coupled with activism for structural change, the future of bees looks bleak. The bees are caught on a human-created political-economic "treadmill" that threatens their existence, no matter how many natural, and organic techniques I use. This gives me a great deal to consider this winter.

As far as Beelandia, here are a few definite plans:

1. If all goes well, I will add 4 more hives. Two will be added through walk-away splits of Metpropolis and Bee Glad.... The two others will come from starting colonies with new packages. Of course, all this depends on how Metropolis and Bee Glad... fair through the winter.

2. Monta plans on constructing two new Kenyan top bar hives and a Warre. The other new hive will simply be a Langstroth.

3. Two of the new hives will be located outside of Beelandia. I think that there is really only enough room for 4 hives in Beelandia proper, so the two others will be set in some other areas. My friend, Chris, who already keeps some bees on his farm himself, has given me permission to put a top bar hive on his property. I have some other leads for placing the Warre. (My State Senator said she'd like a hive in her yard but I don't know whether she was serious or just trying to get my vote.)

4. I will be ready with nucs, just in case some of the hives thrive enough in the summer so that I can make other splits.

An E-mail to Kwik Trip

It's been an unseasonably warm day today and my bees have out. It seems they have created some inconvenience at a local convenience store down the block. This store has resorted to setting out traps that now are filled with dozens of drowned bees. I have just sent this message to the Kwik Trip Corporation.

As you surely know, honeybees are beneficial insects that not only produce honey but also pollinate plants and vegetables that feed us and those animals we depend on for meat. As you might also know from various media stories, there are many environmental threats that have led to a drastic decline in the honeybee population. We all must be doing something to stop this decline and this is the reason I am writing to you. I went to a local Kwik Trip tonight on Broadway and Baker in Winona MN and discovered that insect traps had been set out near the waste baskets at this Kwik Trip. In these traps were dozens of honeybees (I am a beekeeper, I can distinguish honeybees from other species of insects). While I do appreciate the fact that Kwik Trip was using a technique that doesn't spread pesticides, I still am concerned about the killing of a truly beneficial insect that, when away from its hive, is very unlikely to sting anyone. Is it possible that we might discover some other way to make your customers and employees feel protected without killing these insects?

One Small Step

I received the following on our campus-wide mailing list this morning:

>>Good Morning, Everyone,>If you had a chance to attend the Community Picnic last night, I hope you enjoyed yourself despite the rain (but no bees!). Attached is a very short simple feedback form if you have any ideas for improving the picnic. Please feel free to offer any opinions or thoughts. >>Best wishes for a great start to the year!

Here is my response:

I hate to be technical, but those insects that disrupt picnics are rarely if ever bees. They are most likely yellow jackets which are small aggressive wasps. One very small step in helping honeybees survive is recognizing how non-aggressive they are outside the hive and not to confuse them with other insects.

Sociologists of Minnesota Conference

I sent this email today to the conference coordinator of the Sociologists of Minnesota.


I am interested in participating in the October conference but am a bit at a loss on how I might fit in.

I am a sociologist who teaches at Saint Mary's University of Minnesota. Over the last two years I've taken an interest, professionally, personally and politically, in the environmental issues surrounding the "disappearance" of honey bees. I think, as social ecologists might argue, this environmental issue has its roots in deep seated social problems, rather than simply just being a technical/scientific issue with a technical/scientific solution. The application of "Tayloristic" management practices to apiculture, the "grow or die" economic model of global capitalism, agribusiness practices like monoculture of crops, and aspects of global trade are all factors that interact and impact the survival of the honey bee.

These concerns have affected my sociological practice in two ways. In my interdisciplinary global issues course, the sociological story of the honey bees plight is used to illustrated the larger global forces that impact my students' daily lives in their own local environment. On the activist side, I have become involved in a global movement of sustainable beekeepers who not only "handle" their bees in a "greener" way but actively protest against those social forces and practices threatening the bees survival. (see http://biobees.com/ ) To be honest, I've only started this whole project but I'd like feedback and wonder if this might fit into the conference somewhere?

Top Bars in The News

An article was about top bar hives at Inside the Bay Area. Maybe we are on to something important in our Bee Activism!

Bee Activism

Suppose you had the revolution you are talking and dreaming about. Suppose your side had won, and you had the kind of society that you wanted. How would you live, you personally, in that society? Start living that way now!-- Paul Goodman, sociologist.

I've been monitoring various beekeeping lists and forums over the last few months as CCD continues to ravage bees all over the country. Recently, on one of these lists, some individuals called for "bee activists" to rise up out of the midst of the beekeeping community and lobby and fight for more public awareness, government funding and scientific research to find answers to the current "bee" crisis. It might seem presumptuous for a person like me to weigh in on this issue. I've read much about bees, spoken with beekeepers, monitored all these internet forums but, as of yet, have not practiced beekeeping myself. But I am also a student of social/political movements and the sociology of science and these areas are as much involved in the question of how to approach "bee activism" as the actual husbandry of bees is.

Recently on Bee-l, a poster mocked the users of small cell foundation for ignoring current scientific research that finds small cells as having no significant effect on controlling varroa mites and/or the resulting virus that weakens and kills bees. The poster compared small cell supporters to followers of a "religious cult" who continue to hold on to their beliefs even in the face of scientific evidence. I won't go into the difficulty methodologically of using one or two experiments for drawing definite conclusions or the whole question of how scientific change actually occurs. (I'll leave the reader to read the works of Geiryn, Kuhn, or Feierabend.) My issue here is with the total inconsistency of such a poster, for "small cell" beekeepers are not the only people in the beekeeping world who tend to ignore scientific research. Large-scale commercial beekeepers do this all the time but in the name of short-term profit, labor saving efficiencies, and the "realities of the market". When a commercial firm says, "I know my use of chemicals is creating a stronger, resistant mite, but I won't survive unless I use chemicals", they are also ignoring, in a very pragmatic fashion, scientific research as well. And if I was a commercial beekeeper, who must support a family and pay debts, I suppose I would argue the very same thing!

It seems to me that Phil Chandler is correct. Given the above "reality" for commercial beekeepers, the survival of honey bees as a species cannot simply depend on commercial beekeepers, and government funding for scientific research focused on keeping "factory" beekeeping afloat. Bee survival may also depend on getting more and more individuals to approach beekeeping as a "cottage industry" where labor-intensive, "inefficient", sustainable husbandry is possible. It is modeling and "evangelizing" this idea that might sustain the honey bee.

A "bee" social movement approached this way doesn't need the resources of the full-time professional lobbyist but of sideline and hobby beekeepers maintaining colonies, and having their activities visible enough so that other potential backyard beekeepers might join this "crusade" to save the bee. You do not need (or want) everyone in a community to beekeep, just a small critical mass of individuals who provide bees with an environment where these insects have a better chance of surviving and adapting. Perhaps these local beekeepers could even form a "Queen Rearing Cooperative" to lessen the ill effects of any inbreeding as well.

A colleague and friend of mine recently attended Dr. Marla Spivak's beekeeping extension course at the University of Minnesota. Spivak has 30 or so hives right there on the St. Paul campus where they are legal, but across the river in Minneapolis, these hives would be in violation of city ordinances. According to my friend, the illegality of beekeeping in Minneapolis didn't keep Spivak from urging that city's residents to keep hives there as well. It seems to Spivak that the keeping of even a few hives is a small but important step toward honey bee survival, and if this means violating the law, so be it. This type of apicultural, civil disobedience intrigues and inspires me.