Finding a sticky solution to a buzzing puzzle
July 14, 2010
By Dan Catchpole
Beekeeper relishes solving the problems beehives throw at him
Bob Combs has been having problems with bees this spring and summer. He doesn’t have enough of them.
Bob Combs, of North Bend, inspects a few of the thousands of bees living in one of his hives at Meadowbrook Farm. By Dan Catchpole
Most people instinctually draw away from bees, fearing their sting. But the quiet, introspective Combs cultivates them.
The North Bend resident keeps several beehives at Meadowbrook Farm, where he also teaches introductory classes for would-be beekeepers.
Beekeeping is almost a way of life. It combines his passion for problem solving with a touch of being a social misfit, said Combs, who has a sharp edged goatee and looks like he belongs on a motorcycle.
“Swarms are always entertaining,” Combs said as he lifted the cover off of a hive box after pumping smoke into it to calm them. “They always throw some curves at you. They’re not quite what you expect.”
It’s that challenge that pulled Combs back into beekeeping a couple of years ago after a 15-year break. He started raising bees as a child in Gig Harbor with his grandfather, and continued beekeeping while studying physics at Reed University.
Over the years, his bees have thrown him a wide range of curveballs. This spring, it was a dud queen — a queen bee that wasn’t producing enough new bees. Typically, a queen bee lays about 2,000 eggs each day in the spring to support a hive of between 20,000 and 30,000 bees.
Combs had some grassroots help from the bees in solving the dud queen problem, though. The bees essentially staged a coup d’etat. They killed off the dud queen and replaced her with a new queen.
The bees are just acting in the hive’s best interests, he said.
Making a queen bee is just an issue of what a bee in the pupa stage is fed. So, if a queen bee isn’t producing, worker bees can make a new one. Worker bees hedge their bets, too, Combs said. They make several potential new queens, and whichever one hatches first knocks off the others before knocking off the old queen.
Solving a problem often means just taking cues from the hive and letting it sort the issue out, such as with a dud queen.
“I’m their servant, and they’re my masters really,” Combs said, leaning over a hive box.
He keeps his swarms in a clearing a few minutes walk from the road at Meadowbrook. The area is roped off with electrical fencing.
“It’s the whole Winnie-the-Pooh thing,” he explained — bears really do love honey, and once they find a source they will keep returning.
Meadowbrook lets him keep his hives there in return for teaching beekeeping classes, the only ones on the Eastside, according to Combs. This year’s spring classes had several dozen students.
Beginners tend to read too much into day-to-day changes and crack open beekeeping books to find some explanation for something that is usually trivial, he said.
“All the books are telling what to expect, and the bees don’t read the books,” he said.
Combs shares his wonder of bees with his students.
“I tell my students, ‘Bees know calculus,’” he said, referring to their “waggle” dance.
The waggle dance, an actual term used by beekeepers, is how a honeybee that has found a food source gives directions to the rest of the hives. It’s movements tell other bees how far to fly and in what direction.
Bees use the sun as a reference point for direction. Since the sun moves in the sky, a bee will calculate the change into its waggle dance, which requires calculus. Of course, the bees don’t know they’re using calculus.
As a physics major in college and a current software engineer, Combs said he appreciates their use of mathematics.
His science background also makes him skeptical of the more extreme claims that have been made of colony collapse disorder — when honeybees suddenly desert a hive for good.
The U.S. honeybee industry is vital to pollinating the country’s food crops.
So, while the problem is disconcerting, the data, Combs said, is not conclusive.
Experts agree.
There has been a “significant increase” in honeybee mortality in recent years, but commercial beekeepers in the Pacific Northwest have been able to increase their number of bees, said Michael Burgett, a professor at Oregon State University.
“I’m not worried about if there’s going to be food on my table tomorrow because bees are going to be dead,” he said.
Colony collapse disorder first appeared in 2007, “and we still have a beekeeping industry,” said Washington State University’s Steve Sheppard. But “certainly we’re at a critical point.”
Why it happens is not clear, Sheppard said. One recent paper identified 61 factors associated with the disorder, including the presence of toxic pesticides in the brood combs, where young bees are raised.
“If you’re fed as a youngster semitoxic materials, then you’re not going to be as healthy when you grow up,” he said.
For the time being, though, Combs bees are returning.
Dan Catchpole: 392-6434, ext. 246, or editor@snovalleystar.com. Comment at www.snovalleystar.com.
Comments
Got something to say?
Before you comment, please note:
- These comments are moderated.
- Comments should be relevant to the topic at hand and contribute to its discussion.
- Personal attacks and/or excessive profanity will not be tolerated and such comments will not be approved.
- This is not your personal chat room or forum, so please stay on topic.
