05/09/08 Chasing the Bee Problem

Chasing the Bee Problem. I'm Greg Martin with today's Fruit Grower Report. Eric Olson has been trying to keep his bee business buzzing. Sorry for the pun. Olson runs the largest pollination business in the state and is currently working with WSU to develop a bee health program. He recently lost a significant part of his hives to the as yet unknown problem known as Colony Collapse Disorder or CCD. A new virus called nosema ceranae has been running rampant in hives and may be a good clue to what is happening to all the bees. Olson says they have seen the ceranae virus double and triple in hives. OLSON: We went into an emergency treatment program with an antibiotic called fumigillin. Nobody's sure if fumigillin works on ceranae but that's all we have. We have nothing else. So we're just about time to take our next round of samples and we're going to get a good look at whether this worked. There are two types of nosema. Apis is the common virus and ceranae is the newest form. OLSON: Telling the difference between nosema apis and nosema ceranae is very difficult. Not very many places in the world can do that. It takes a molecular lab and DNA analysis and WSU has mastered that. Of course ag producers depend on the bee to pollinate their crops from apples and cherries to almonds and cranberries. Even though there have been some shortages most producers have been able to get bees but according to Olson: OLSON: The places that are going to get hurt bad are in western Washington. That's where our major losses were. Over 80% of them died. All those crops that are grown in western Washington are faced with a real problem because none of us can afford to go there if we're going to lose 80%. That's today's Fruit Grower Report. I'm Greg Martin on the Northwest Ag Information Network.