bees confiscated in illinois

[journey11]

I came across two different articles for this and after reading them and chewing on it for a bit, I'm on the same page as you, Jared. Something is fishy.... This one was the better of the two articles. I also thought it sounded like he was trying to go "thru the backdoor" by passing off the frame to the inspector while at a picnic. Sounds like they must have had some degree of acquaintance and perhaps he was hoping for a favor?

15 out of his 19 hives were infected with the foulbrood. Doesn't sound to me like he had it under control.

If you follow the money, Ingram is the one who comes under suspicion in my opinion. Selling queens and nucs is a very lucrative business and is really where the money is to be made in beekeeping anyway. Hygenic queens go for $25 each around here and if he was onto something with these Roundup resistant bees, he could probably command more than that for them. 100's of queens can be raised off of a single hive.

This is all my own speculation, based on what I know about bees, but what I suspect is that he did indeed have a bad foulbrood outbreak, but was not willing to part with his bees due to the amount of time and effort he had in his line of genetics, not to mention their value for the Roundup resistant genetics. Aside from what he might have done with the woodenware, which is beside the point--he would have had to destroy most of his colonies in order to control the spread of foulbrood. He would have been wise to have not put all of his "eggs" in one basket. Dividing his stock into 2 or more apiaries (separated by at least several miles) would have been smart. Then he wouldn't have had as great a risk of the majority being infected.

If he were my neighbor and I heard tell of this, I would be quite aggravated with him for knowingly endangering my bees and my investment as well. You've got to look at it from the Illinois ag department's point of veiw. This is a very agricultural area of the country. There would likely be a lot of beeks in the area as well as migratory pollinating operations moving bees in and out. They had to take action to protect everyone else's bees and also consider the economic impact that huge honey bee losses would have on pollinator-dependent crops that area. We already lose enough bees to CCD and drastic weather changes...a foulbrood outbreak here would NOT be a good thing. Even if his own hives were limping along with the disease, he'd likely lose most of them over a harsh winter anyway.

For his years of experience, foulbrood would not be difficult for him to identify himself. Yes, bees have their way of dealing with some things, but this is not one of them. That's like saying "well, I'll just hold my breath so I won't catch the flu." If you want to know more about how other beekeepers on the web feel about this situation, you can gain some insight by reading this thread here: Beesource Forum.

While I am not a big fan of Monsanto and their doings, I believe the "M"-word has been thrown around just to get the public riled up and to rally favor for Mr. Ingram's position. They have nothing to do with it...only a conspiracy theory at best. Now in the way the seizure of his property was carried out, I cannot say but what his rights may have been violated. We will have to wait and see what the court thinks about it.

 

[Jared77]

Thank you Journey it just doesn't add up. He even mentions having significant losses that HE attributed to Round Up. If I had significant losses I'd contact the county and see about having my hives tested. Then you go from there. You don't just let it go and say "well its gotta be ___ fault because I've been doing this for ___ years."

He had just painted over the numbers and talked to an inspector at a picnic and that's pretty shady. Its like he was trying to get someone to back his opinion and call it good.

The Ag Dept acted in the best interest of ALL bees not just in a vengeful maneuver because he was about to uncover some big conspiracy between Illinois Ag Dept and Monsanto. This is one of those situations while its not good for the individual its in the best interest of everybody to act swiftly. And we're only getting the facts that are presented. Who knows he may have called them and said "" and forced their hand.

The whole Round Up resistant strain I really wonder about. As I asked before with the whole world aware of colony collapse disorder, I can't believe that a veteran beek was the only individual working to get a Round Up resistant strain IF in fact Round Up was the issue. How many people spray round up around their hives and don't have the same losses as the accused? Maybe he thought he was onto something that wasn't an issue? No idea.

Who knows too, there may have been rumblings that he was going to move his hives all together since he was coming up against the injunction. In order to prevent that they came in and took care of business. Maybe he was going to make splits and try to keep the genetics he'd worked with? Something triggered the Dept of Ag to act they way they did. They had to have had a reason and simple noncompliance is not it. Something made them mobilize and act.

Im sorry with all the issues that colony collapse disorder have presented I think the Illinois Dept of Ag did what had to be done. They found 15 hives that were infected. They had a serious issue and it was dealt with accordingly. Its a sad thing to have to do, but imagine how many more hives would have been infected and lost?

Imagine how many people would be up in arms that he was allowed to split or relocate his hives and other healthy hives got infected? People would be up in arms clamoring for the State Ag dept to have taken stronger actions. How could they let this happen?! Its really a no win situation for them. They did what was best and that was to stop the outbreak of foul mouth disease. Simple as that.

 

[ducks4you]

The bee owner was breeding queens that had developed resistance to RoundUp. Other queens have been dying when exposed to it. Monsanto is behind the hiring practices of personnel (N.A.I.S.) that invaded his place and stole his property (bees.) Our freedoms are eroding, and you should pay attention. Seems like you are the frog in the pot getting boiled.

 

[Jared77]

The bee owner was breeding queens that had developed resistance to RoundUp. Other queens have been dying when exposed to it.

Who's queens? His queens? From hives that more than likely had foulbrood? 79% of his hives that were infected. They would have already been sick and weakened so anything could have killed them. So how do you know Round Up had anything to do with it? Because he said so? Queens across the globe are dying because of Round Up? Why is there not some study proof of this?

And how was he treating his hives to test this theory? Where are his controls? Was he saturating his hives with Round Up? Too much of anything is not good for you and in extreme cases will kill. Even still he wasn't working with healthy specimens anyway. The only fact in the whole story was that he had foulbrood in 15 of 19 hives. Again 79% of his hives were sick. Regardless if they were supposedly resistant to RoundUp or not you can't have those hives risk exposing other bees in the area. Action had to be taken.

I'm not a fan of Monsanto however I don't think they fit into the equation here other than on his claim that the bees that were proven to have foulbrood were supposedly resistant to RoundUp (which they already should be as was pointed out by others posting previously).

Monsanto is behind the hiring practices of personnel (N.A.I.S.) that invaded his place and stole his property (bees.)

And the proof of that is where exactly?

 

[seedcorn]

Again, in article sited, where is Monsanto even mentioned? Spraying glysophate on bees is breaking every health code in USA. But let us continue to defend someone who had a virulent disease and put others at risk. All he wanted to was sell diseased queens and honey equipment to unsuspecting beginners. Salt of earth.

 

[journey11]

Ok, the NAIS has nothing to do with this either. They don't track bees. You can't tag a bee. And nobody's tagging hives. The registries are not maintained on a national level. They are state run and the laws will vary by state. My state doesn't even require hives to be marked, but any good beekeeper with multiple hives who is keeping good records of his/her own inspections and maintenance will label their hive for their own identification. The idea of registering the bees came about because beekeepers wanted it done to help prevent the spreading of diseases. Exactly why the IL dept of ag had to get involved. They were simply doing their job. He's the one who refused to comply with standard procedure.

HE was the one who contacted the dept. of ag in the first place. Nobody came looking for him or probing to get into his business. They tested the comb he gave them and found reason to pursue further inspections. They'd usually have very little interest in small scale beekeepers anyway and don't come unless you call them. Here packages and nucs have to pass inspection before they can be sold...probably there too. This is in everyone's best interest to know that you are purchasing healthy bees.

Watch the video and listen to it in his own words....he wasn't doing real scientific study here. The resistance to Roundup was his assumption. What roundup does to bees and whether or not it plays a significant role in CCD isn't even confirmed at this point. He was selecting for vigor in his bees the same way any other beek might do...in the same way recommended by the pres. of my beek club: use minimal to no medications, don't coddle weak hives, breed from strong colonies. You can read in the article from the results returned from the samples sent off to the USDA that the strain of American Foulbrood his hives had was the kind that was NOT resistant to Terramycin and Tylan (as some foulbrood is). He could have even treated them with meds if he wanted to and could have tried to control it that way. But he didn't. Instead he chose not to do anything and let it spread to most of his other hives. Many of the beeks in the Beesource thread I linked here stated that they would promptly and pragmatically just go ahead and destroy those bees rather than risk spreading the disease.

Foulbrood is a bacterial disease and spreads by spores throughout the entire colony. It contaminates the honey and the combs. He could spread the disease by selling packages and nucs, selling or reusing contaminated equipment, by moving frames of comb between his different hives, by his weak or dead-out hives being robbed out or by feeding the contaminated honey to other hives. There is no ability of the bees to seal it off. They spread the spores by their movements throughout the hive. He wasn't taking appropriate measures to stop the spread of the disease. He was liable to spread it to other people's bees. The dept of ag did what they had to to in dealing with a stubborn and irresponsible individual. I don't care how many years of experience he had--I'd say his ego got the best of him. Foulbrood is easily identified by field inspection. It is confirmed by lab tests. But even the lab tests wouldn't convince him of the problem at hand. He had prior notification. He knew what needed to be done and refused to do it. No pot, no frogs, no conspiracy, no smoking gun.

Both articles I read came from biased sources. Both were written from his point of view, with no statement by the IL dept of ag defending their position other than the test results he referred to himself. Even from these biased articles it is evident what happened here. I'm sorry for the loss of his bees and the time he had into selecting for them and the Ross rounds he was looking forward to harvesting (assuming the bees would have been strong enough to fill them), but if you ask me I think he was being selfish and I'm glad he's not my neighbor, out there spreading disease to my bees.

 

[Jared77]

Amen!