CABK are delighted to be bringing one of our main meetings of the year to beekeepers in the North of the Country. Our Spring meeting will be held on 29^th of February at Arkendale Village Hall, Moor Lane, Arkendale,  Knaresborough HG5 0RE.

10:00 for a 10:30 start.

Cost is £25 and includes buffet lunch

Speakers are:-

Annely Brandt  is  from the Bee Institute in Kirchhain Germany, she will be speaking on the  “Effects of pesticides on bee health and fitness”. Annely has written numerous papers on her research work and we are pleased she has accepted our invitation to speak to us. Annely’s talk will cover some of her research work on the sublethal effects of the neonicotinoid clothianidin at the physiological level in individual larvae and nurse bees and to determine its impact on brood development of an entire colony.

Grace McCormack is a Professor in Zoology at NUI Galway and will be speaking about “Synergy between science and beekeeping” Apiculture has posed many questions of interest to science and applying the scientific method to questions raised by beekeepers has yielded many useful answers. This talk will focus on illustrating how Darwin’s evolutionary approach continues to be applied to help understand the origins and natural variability of honeybees, the relationships between the honeybees in Ireland and UK, how honeybees can adapt to the challenges of Varroa naturally, and how we can use this information to improve beekeeping.

John Chambers is an Oxfordshire beekeeper and his talk will be about “Basic Honey Bee Genetics For Beekeepers”. There is nothing “basic” about honey bee genetics but John answer three questions Firstly, is it possible or desirable to attempt the re-creation of pure Apis mellifera mellifera (AMM) strains and to entirely re-populate Great Britain and Ireland with them? Secondly, are AMM conservation areas likely to disappoint for obvious genetic reasons? Thirdly, might the simple pursuit of locally-adapted honey bees be preferable to the attempted re-creation of a subspecies? The presentation closes by explaining why further honey bee imports should be viewed as bad news and how we should be able to improve our local stock quickly, simply and optimally, using an augmented “bees know best” policy.

Professor Giles Budge from the University of Newcastle will give us a talk entitled  “Chronic Bee Paralysis – an emerging threat to honey bee health”.

Chronic bee paralysis has a long history with honey bees. Signs of chronic bee paralysis include a range of individual and colony-level symptoms.   Recent years have seen a dramatic increase in reports of chronic bee paralysis by UK beekeepers and National Bee Unit inspectors. Giles is delivering a BBSRC funded project to better understand chronic bee paralysis. The project members comprise Newcastle University, the University of St Andrews, The Bee Farmers’ Association and the National Bee Unit.  Giles will present a historic view of this interesting bee disease, and provide an update on the most recent research findings from the project.

Please come along and bring your beekeeping friends, non CABK members are very welcome.

Tickets can be booked at: https://www.cabk.org.uk/product/spring-meeting-2020/