A Novice Teaches Beekeeping (285)

Episode 285 – A Novice Teaches Beekeeping

Honey Bee Obscura – Episode 285
Novice Teacher
(Cleaned Podpage Transcript)

Approximate cleaned transcript word count: ~3100 words

Jim Tew

Hey, good morning, podcast listeners. It's Jim here again, so it must be Thursday morning. This is a treat. I got my grandson here with me, who's boy, well, a novice beekeeper.

Will Laditka

That'd be putting it nicely for me, . I'm still young. It's gonna be back though, still still dealing with struggles, but .

Jim Tew

Still dealing with struggles. Well, that's just life.

Will Laditka

Yep. But there's always gonna be ups and downs of beekeeping. And so, I am just excited that I've gotten the experience early. last episode that I was on, we'd talked about one of my second colonies struggling with potentially American Foulbrood and things of that nature just Really detrimental you to your colonies and also to your psyche in a sense because your colonies keep dying. Like is it your fault? What whatever, but

Jim Tew

I wanna talk about that. I want to talk about that. Listen, we're gonna talk about all of this. We're gonna catch you up. I'm Jim Tew. I come to you here at Honey Bee Obscura once a week where I try to talk about something to do with plain talk beekeeping.

Will Laditka

I'm Will Laditka and it's good to be back.

Introduction

Welcome to Honey Be Obscura, brought to you by Growing Planet Media, the producers of the Beekeeping Today podcast. Join Jew Tew, your guide. Through the complexities, the beauty, the fun, and the challenges of managing honey bees. Jim hosts fun and interesting guests who take a deep dive into the intricate world of honey bees. Whether your seasoned beekeeper, are just getting started. Get ready for some plain talk that'll delve into all things honey bees.

Jim Tew

Will that you bring up a good point. I I was panicked all those months ago. It was back before Thanksgiving, wasn't it? Yeah It was a really peculiar looking situation and I thought it might be American Foulbrood. That just did not seem to make sense. And after I thought about it and looked at it again It seemed to pretty much be a a mild var varroa bomb, where they had a heavy varroa mite load, but it wasn't enough to kill them right away. Of course I think they died during the winter. So Well, it that's just beekeeping. It starts over again. What was sh what was your take on it?

Will Laditka

I'm always glad it happened in a sense. Obviously not for the bees, but I think for the experience to be able to see such a confusing hive in a sense to where you we thought it was potentially American Foulbrood, but even you with all your experience had to take a second look at it. So I think the ability to be able just to watch you were just to soak in the all this information and the experiences I think is much more important to me now than anything else. So I guess I'm just really looking at it as a building experience because I've I'm still so young into the beekeeping experience that I I really think It's something beneficial that will be helpful to me down the line and I'm sure I'll encounter a situation similar to it at some point and I'll be better prepared for it because of this. So I guess I always just try and think of it with glass half full and not glass half empty. Try always try and take the the good side of things.

Jim Tew

Alright. Well so far so good, but it 's a good idea. That was an experience. Well, that was not that wasn't easy going. I'm sorry we got off on a difficult foot right away, but It is beekeeping.

Will Laditka

So I guess I'll just talk a little bit about me since the last episode. I I decided to change my major and I transferred schools just at community college because here in the state of Michigan, community college is completely free. So might as well, right? Yep. It saves a lot of money.

Jim Tew

Do you have any interest in in biology? Have you taken a Bee class or bee biology or anything along that line or is this still too soon?

Will Laditka

it's still too soon, but ironically B snuck my way into a communication class and I actually wrote a speech. and presented that about bees. Just talked about various things, just an overview. I brought you up multiple times in it. Because it you you were supposed to use references and I feel like you're the ultimate reference for the field of beekeeping. So yeah, just talked about that and I talked about just some dangers of beekeeping just because a lot of people are just unaware of the Varroa issues and whatnot and how s how scary the future of bees looks, especially with how big their impact is on our planet and just things like that. Just kept it very general because Honestly, like I'm pretty general in my knowledge as well, still young. So I can't get too deep into it just because I'm I'm still trying to learn figure it out myself. But things like that, just being able to include beekeeping in a communications class. It's just something you would never expect. Just a s two combinations of things. But I feel like that's almost a good thing. Like this beekeeping ha is able to be applied so far outside of beekeeping, I'm able to use it in a beneficial way.

Jim Tew

How long was the f how long was the presentation?

Will Laditka

So it was supposed to be four to six minutes, and I talked for a solid seven minutes and fifteen seconds.

Jim Tew

Four to six minutes, and you talk seven minutes and sixteen seconds. Was there a penalty for that?

Will Laditka

Yeah, but it was only ten points. And I feel like I was and there was only ten points I got off. So I was thorough enough that, I didn't get anything else off. So I guess

Jim Tew

Better too long than too short, I guess. Well off just quickly I want to get off the subject and then get rubb back on it. But I remember my first talk that I gave as a graduate student at the University of Maryland. I had all these notes worked out. It was pre-PowerPoint. We used photographic slides. And so I was deep into it. And I began to get the notice from my professor that my time was up. Well, I was hardly halfway through. It'd be like s sitting down with half a sandwich made. So I kept going because I thought I had to keep going. You can't leave the audience wanting more. Well, if yes you can, because there's speakers coming up behind that I'm Trashing the schedule, so I finally stopped after I went seriously over. And I've got a verbal reprimand, so my first talk was two times too much talk Well you beat me. It's interesting that you went over. I went over fifteen, twenty minutes or so. It it really threw things off. Going over by fifteen minutes. How how long you said it was four to six minutes. How many people were in your audience

Will Laditka

It was just my small class. I think there were about eighteen to twenty of us in there. I'm not sure how many were present that day, but probably somewhere around that route.

Jim Tew

Did they go did they go glassy-eyed while you were doing this?

Will Laditka

I sure hope not. I I tried my best to keep it funny. I tried to write some jokes in there, just to try and keep people engaged. I tried to I used the PowerPoint to my advantage. I tried to make it as interesting as possible. That way they're looking at something. what I mean? They're not just glassy eyed, like you said. So I really hope they enjoyed it. It seemed like they did, because I was the only speaker that got follow-up questions. So I I'll take that as a good sign.

Jim Tew

What were some of your major points?

Will Laditka

like I said, just the dangers of beekeeping. And then I just talked about what

Jim Tew

what are what's dangerous about beekeeping?

Will Laditka

just like we had touched on, like the Varroa American Foulbrood, like yeah. and then another main point I just talked about was very basic beekeeping equipment, just veils, smokers, boxes, the Deeps versus supers, whatever, eight frames, ten frames, just those kinds of things. And I mean it was really surface level just because It's not like I was giving it in a like a biology course or something like that where they were well versed in insects or bees in general. So I really just kept it surface level. I'm sure a lot of the things I talked about w a lot of people already knew, but Just kept it simple, broad, and just tried to include as much as I could in a basic sense, just because I did only have that four to six minutes, so I couldn't really go fifteen minutes over like you did. Yep. It's a lot to pack in to just a few minutes. I had to keep it pretty surface level.

Jim Tew

What were some of the other talk titles?

Will Laditka

What was your competition Some someone was a history professor, someone was an electrician. Like it was like this profession thing, and I just talked about entomology. So a lot of them were really boring, like people talking about electrician work in specific, that's not a a very gravitating speech. So I definitely think that my approach and trying to keep it fun and creative and the bees in general, I think, are interesting enough That it was able to keep it interesting.

Jim Tew

Because I have lit myself up several times by not knowing how to wire as a shock person. But I I didn't realize it was occupationally driven. It's a clever thing. And your professor had positive comments, positive responses.

Will Laditka

Yeah, nothing but good things to say. I also talked about just sorts of the forms of communication of these. Yep. Just because that's I mean, still even to us now, we still really are not fully aware of everything. But just talked about very basic again, like the pheromones, h like how large the radius of the colonies search.

Jim Tew

Just very basic facts. Hold hold that hold that thought for just a minute. Well, we need to hear from our sponsor and just take a break and we'll collect our thoughts.

Betterbee

Looking to re-queen a hive, make a split, or build your own nucs this season? Betterbee has Mated queens available for shipment or pickup in Greenwich, New York. Choose from Kutik K9 Queens, bred for hygienic mite resistance and strong honey production, gentle carniolan queens, known for making Managing hive populations with the flow, or Betterbee's locally raised northern queens, selected for winter hardiness, disease resistance, temperament, and honey production. Order your queens today at betterbee. com.

Vita Bee Health

We'd like to thank Vita B Health for supporting this podcast. Vita provides proven tools for controlling Varroa, Apistan, and Apiguard to the new Varroxsan. Extended release oxilic acid strips. Helping beekeepers keep stronger, healthier colonies.

Jim Tew

You were talking about pheromones. Go back to that and pick that up again.

Will Laditka

So I feel like I'm not well versed enough to be talking about pheromone communication on a beekeeping podcast, but I I talked about keeping it funny, so I guess I'll just touch on this example. So I just as I'm walking around and giving my speech, I'm using pheromones and I just like pretend I'm a bee and I fart at somebody. Oh god. Just as a joke. what I mean? So I like that was and then there were a couple things throughout this speech and that's what I'm talking about. Just trying to keep it light and fun. But just things like that, just a very basic sense because the communication of bees is so drastically different than the way we would communicate. Like they're not just sitting there chatting hump having conversations. And I also touched on the things like the little whittle dances they do and washboarding as well. They're such interesting little creatures and there's just the hive mind is such an interesting concept.

Jim Tew

The hive mind is an interesting concept that is a super organism, essentially. Everybody doing what's best for them apparently and it ends up being beneficial to the whole unit. So it went well. I'm glad it went well for you. You have anything else planned like this, but nothing else has come up that's opportunistic so far, I guess. Yeah, I mean

Will Laditka

that's what's nice though, I can always keep it in my back pocket. It's something I'm well versed in compared to the average person. So it's something interesting and somewhat unique about me, especially at my age in particular. So I r I I I really enjoy it. I earlier we were talking about my struggles with being an early beekeeper and I just I guess I have a question for you. I just want to compare my early beekeeping versus your early beekeeping and how much things have changed and what

Jim Tew

Well, you mentioned early on that not in the podcast, but we were talking that beekeeping was an expensive hobby and that and that's unfortunately true in many cases, but that that's one of the things that's changed. There was a type of apiculture When I was just starting this at 21 and 22 years old, there was just box hive beekeepers. And I'm late in my life, I'm really intrigued by that because I transitioned At a time when beekeepers were moving from box hives to Langstroth equipment. So if you wanted to keep bees, you'd just tie four boards together, thirty-six inches high or so, and put an X brace in the middle and put a Top and a bottom on it, and a few slips in the bottom, and you picked up swarms because they were everywhere in the spring before Varroa and Africanized bees and boom You were a beekeeper. So you wore some old painter coveralls and you got some gardening gloves on and you probably had to buy a veil and a smoker, and that was it. And I have slowly watched as beekeeping became, has become more and more modern, cleaner, more professional, and more expensive. And I was part and parcel to tearing those old Bee-boxes apart, and I made precious few pictures because to me they were junk. And I was helping the bees improve their lives. And in retrospect, the bees liked that box hive a lot better. They had a natural nest, and I made them live on straight cones. That was then, this is now. Do I want to go back to early beekeeping and homemade protective gear? No, I'm happy where I am. What was your beginning like?

Will Laditka

I feel like it's almost ingrained in the podcast at this point. Just those two hives. I lost that one early and then obviously the American Foulbrood, what we thought was, and then ended up being a varroa with that second hive. So I mean it's been a I guess a rough go of it, but not really. It's all been learning experiences, but I almost feel like it's especially as a young person nowadays, I I really feel like if I didn't have access to you and equipment, I wouldn't have ever been able to get into this, even if I really wanted to. I feel like you almost need to have your life set up, you need to have some income because this is it's it's really is expensive, especially if you're purchasing your own s queens or whatever. It can it can quickly get expensive. D especially depending on like what quality of equipment you want to use. Like if you could go s buy some big company equipment, I'm sure it's it gets more expensive. But I think that's the biggest notice for me is that it it's really feels like a a hobby in a sense where you really need to just like invest the money and the time into it and enjoy it. You can't really just throw a box together and go pick up a swarm anymore, I guess, in that sense. Like you really gotta commit hard to it 'cause it really is a big commitment now.

Jim Tew

Yeah, and it's you're going to take a spanking almost every time. this you first two colonies out are gone. I thought I had three or four colonies die this one or so bees die all the time. Will I always enjoy talking with you. I'll check back in probably sometime later this summer and get another update And see what you're doing and how your life's going. You keep saying you're you're youth, you're young. How old are you? Nineteen. I'll be twenty the end of August. Torn at the end of August. That is young. So I got a beekeeper in training I named your session a novice teaches beekeeping so don't be offended when you see the cartoon work on that this in production right now. Listeners I always enjoy talking to you. Well tell them bye.

Will Laditka

Thanks for having me on again. I always appreciate it. Listeners I appreciate your support and I hope to see you guys again soon.

Jim Tew

Thanks a lot, Will. Until next week, this is Jim telling you bye.