Beekeeping Today Podcast

In this Season One wrap-up, Jeff and Kim talk about how the show got started, talk about some of the guests on the show. Kim also interviews Jeff during the show. Who is Jeff and why is HE on the podcast? They also discuss some of the history behind some of the podcasts including the sale of the A.I. Root beekeeping equipment business. This is a casual review of the year and a look forward to some of the guests lined up for the coming year.

Adam Allington is the producer and host of the Bloomberg Environment podcast, The Business of Bees.  Adam joins Jeff and Kim on this final podcast of the 2019 Pollinator Week series. Business of Bees is a six-part podcast series that introduces the listener to the business though in voices of those in the industry, including several you've heard here (John Miller, BTP #002 and Dr. Samuel Ramsey, BTP #015). Adam's series is a high quality podcast that represents the pros and cons of the bee business.

Gene Brandi is a West Coast beekeeper, based out of Los Banos, California. Gene is is a great spokesman for the beekeeping industry having spent over 40 years in the business. Gene is Past President of American Beekeeping Federation, has served as the Chair of The National Honey Board, Chair of the Almond Board of California, and served in committees of both organizations... along with other responsibilities including serving on the Project Apis m Board and Carl Hayden Bee Research Center.

Dr. Jennifer Tsuruda is an Assistant Professor at the University of Tennessee, where she focuses her time on honey bee health, pollination and as the Extension Service apiculturist. Previously, she was the apiculturist for Clemson University. Her research includes honey bee foraging behavior, behavioral resistance to mites, genomic imprinting and pesticide exposure. Jennifer joins the episode to discuss her work at the UoT, pollination gardens, honey bee photography and pollination in general.

Davey Hackenberg is a second-generation of beekeeper following in the steps of his father, Dave Hackenberg, in the honey and pollination business. Davey lives in Lewisberg, PA where he and his family run Hackenberg Honey, home of Buffy Bee Honey! In this candid interview, Davey talks openly about the year-round challenges he and other commercial pollinators face as they travel the country pollinating crops and orchards. If you want to become a pollinator, you just might want to listen to this episode!

Pollinator Partnership is responsible for bringing us Pollinator Week, so it is only fitting "P2" leads off our week of podcasts! in 2007, Congress declared a week of June as National Pollinator Week. Pollinator Week is now a international celebration of the ecosystem services provided by bees, birds, butterflies, bats and beetles. In this 2019 Pollinator Week kickoff podcast, we've invited Kelly and Vicki on the show to discuss four of their 30+ programs to pollinators and pollinator habitats.

Dr. Jerry Bromenshenk and Dr. David Firth from the Univerisity of Montana are working together on a new application for beekeepers called Bee Health Guru.  The application uses artificial intelligence (AI) to listen to the colony's sound and then provide a diagnosis of the colony's health. Simply amazing. Jerry and David join Jeff & Kim on this episode to talk discuss the technology and the ongoing research that is in this cell phone app. Additionally, they discuss the UoM Master Beekeeper Program

Dr. Geoff Williams is an assistant professor at Auburn University. He is in charge of the Bee Lab and is on the Board of the Bee Informed Partnership. Selina Bruckner is a PhD student in entomology at Auburn and working on the Annual Colony Loss and Management Survey. The Bee Informed Partnership Colony Loss and National Management Survey is now in its 7th year and BIP is able to use the wealth of data to start to understand how management practices are impacting colony mortality across the country. 

Meredith May is a beekeeper and journalist who grew up in the Big Sur area, along the central California coast. Her mother withdrew from Meredith's and her brother's lives following the breakup of her marriage. The Honey Bus is Meredith's memoir of growing up in her grandparent's home and helping her grandpa with the beekeeping chores. Helped her find structure, rhythm and stability during a place and time when home life with her mother was anything but. Her's is a heartwarming story for everyone.

Dr. Jonathan Lundgren is a former USDA-ARS soil scientist, having received his PhD in Entomology from the University of Illinois in 2004. Today he is Director of ECDYSIS Foundation and CEO of Blue Dasher Farm. In this episode, Jeff and Kim talk with Jon about his work and how the solution to honey bee health problems is literally under our feet!  He talks about how the neglect of the soils, the tilling and the tons of the chemicals applied has stripped the soil of its self-healing abilities.

Peter Nelson, Director & Beekeeper: The Pollinators Movie - (022)

Eric Wenger is the Chairman of True Source Honey, LLC - an organization created through the efforts of multiple honey companies and honey industry participants who collectively working to provide a way consumers and customers from the problems associated with unlawfully sourced honey 'dumped' on the USA market - specifically Chinese honey. The efforts are designed to help maintain honey's reputation as a high-quality, highly valued food. Eric is also a member of the National Honey Board.

In this episode, Jeff and Kim talk with Dr. Reed Johnson. Reed got his start in research beekeeping in his hometown,  Missoula, MT. Reed received his Ph.D. in Entomology from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign where he was involved in the honey bee genome project, then moved on to and a post-doc position at the University of Nebraska where he explored drug interactions between miticides in bees. He is currently an Associate Professor in the Dept. of Entomology at The Ohio State University.

Dr. Tom D. Seeley is a Horace White Professor in Biology at Cornell University where he teaches courses on animal behavior, specializing in understanding the social life of honey bees. His scientific research focuses on the phenomenon of swarm intelligence, which is defined as the solving of cognitive problems by a group of individuals who pool their knowledge and process it through social interactions. Tom joins BTP to discuss this and his article in the Jan 2019 Bee Culture on Darwinian Beekeeping.

Well, to kick off the year, Kim is off enjoying the sights and sounds of the AHPA annual meeting in Phoenix.  Late in the evening, Kim gave Jeff and call and provided this report. Join them as they discuss the new and the old on the vendor floor and the hottest. Beekeeping is changing and the best place to see that is at a national beekeeping convention. This is the first of several reports from the AHPA meeting.