What Killed My Bees??  Necropsy a Hive!

Day: Wednesday, October 10
Time: 7 - 9 PM
Place:  Brookside Nature Center (click for details)

 

If you don't know exactly what killed your honey bee colony, how can you prevent it from happening again?

That's why this is a very important MCBA Meeting...

Anita Deeley from Beverly Bees, will detail “How to Necropsy a Hive.”  "Necropsy" is what you call an autopsy performed on a non-human.  To prepare questions to ask Anita in person, at our MCBA Meeting, peruse her website.

It is information rich and will benefit beekeepers at every experience level.  For example, there is a RESOURCE page, and a very detailed CHECK LIST of Maladies to help determine the health of your colonies.

FROM ANITA:

Anita Deeley is a biologist, state bee inspector and founder of Beverly Bees, a
popular beekeeping website, business and blog with over 14,000 followers. The
evergreen content of her articles, bring in over 40,000 visitors a month to her website.
Her business Beverly Bees performs bee and wasp removals from trees and structures, rescues
honey bee swarms, provides beekeeping services and education, and sells raw local
honey and beeswax products.

Starting with only one hive on a rooftop seven years ago, Anita has grown her bee
business to over 50 hives today. She sells her artisan honey, handcrafted beeswax
candles, beeswax lip balms, lotions and salves at local farmers markets, events and
stores. Anita and her husband Brian rescue unwanted nuisance honey bee swarms and
colonies (preventing them from being exterminated) and relocate them to one of their
apiaries where Anita nurtures them back to health. Many are placed into her Host a
Hive program which helps increase the local honey bee population and educates the
community about bees. Through speaking engagements, Anita promotes awareness
of the plight of both honey bees and native pollinators. Through her website Anita
helps foster good stewardship and understanding of honey bees. She also provides
hands on mentoring, beekeeping services and classes for beekeepers.

Her website BeverlyBees.com, is full of information designed to help beekeepers
looking to perfect their skills. Anita worked as a state bee inspector for 6
years, is currently on the board of directors for the Massachusetts Beekeepers
Association and was previously the recording secretary and newsletter editor for the
Essex County Beekeepers Association. Prior to becoming a beekeeper, Anita worked
in pharmaceuticals and as a research scientist at the Marine Biological Laboratory in
Woods Hole. She later become a video editor and edited independent films,
commercials and infomercials.+

Anita is an accomplished writer with 20 years of cross industry writing experience in
business, science, television and the internet. Her educational articles on her
beekeeping website have gone viral, making her website a permanent resource for
many beekeepers and beekeeping organizations. Her articles have been reprinted with
permission in several magazines including Grit Magazine and beekeeping newsletters
across the world. Some of her most popular articles include “Planting a Bee Friendly
Garden”, “How to Autopsy a Honey Bee Colony” and “I Want Candy! So Let’s
Make A Candy Board For Winter Feeding”.

Throughout her career Anita has been responsible for both creative and technical and
scientific writing pieces, everything from screenplays to grants and research papers to
standard operating procedures and the “Varroa Management Guide” for the state of
Massachusetts. She worked for 3 years as a writer and editor for The Farm Direct
Coop and was responsible for writing both creative and newsletter pieces on farming,
gardening and organic food.

Anita worked as a honey bee inspector for the state of Massachusetts, educating
beekeepers about the health of their bees and how to better manage them. Being a
state bee inspector, made Anita an expert on honey bee health, management and
disease. She performed bee hive inspections and educated veterinarians, commercial
beekeeping operations (who do migratory pollination of the cranberries and sell
bees), sideliners and backyard hobbyists. She helped beekeepers across the state keep
their honey bee hives healthy and free from disease. She provided educational
workshops and training on bee biology, health and disease as well as native
pollinators and their habitat. She also helped develop the protocol for and performed

pesticide inspections of honey bee kills collecting samples of bees to detect pesticides

and viruses and worked with the USDA to conduct honey bee health surveys. Anita

managed a Massachusetts State Apiary location consisting of 6 hives, providing

education on honey bee health, disease and management and beekeeping demonstrations for the public there.

 

As the queen bee at Beverly Bees Anita provides education for beekeepers and
the community through presentations to gardening and beekeeping clubs, community
groups and schools as well as one on one mentoring through her host a hive
programs. Anita maintains her own stock of bees that she developed from feral
colonies she rescued and select mite resistance genetics. Anita was recently featured
in the September 2016 issue of American Beekeeping Journal.  She lives in Beverly, Massachusetts on
her small bee friendly farm with her husband Brian, three sons, Finnigan, Riley and
Cyrus, 36 chickens, two Siamese cats and millions of honey  bees.