THE SUNDAY SCOOP 03/21/21: Sunny Weather Fun

The weather today was bee-autiful: partly sunny and warm temperatures! Organized in shifts, many Bee Club members came to the headquarters to help with the painting of four new hives on the driveway. We successfully finished painting the first layer of base coat on all the hives, and the white paint thoroughly dried underneath the sun - all thanks to the nice weather!

The Bee Club researchers had a very productive first meeting by working with Alix and Dr. Bill, Alix's scientist friend. Dr. Bill reviewed basic beekeeping information with them and did a quick introduction on the varroa mite trap project. The researchers also created post mortem kits on some deadouts (dead bee colonies), which were eventually packaged and sent to the Department of Agriculture Bee Lab at Beltsville, Maryland for analysis.

The completion of the post mortem kits was an interesting and fun process: researchers had to scoop out a sample of dead bees from the deadouts, mix the bees with isopropyl alcohol in a bag, and count the number of varroa mites in the sample to determine a conclusion of the cause of the deadouts (varroa mites were the cause). The kit was completed by packaging up the bee remnants in a bag, which were to be mailed off to the Maryland lab.

Keep up with our weekly postings of the Sunday Scoop and come back soon!

Written by: Marina Chen