Apimondia is like the Olympics only on a smaller scale. In the evening we were invited to a banquet given by the Chinese delegation. The purpose of this affair was to convince the other delegates, who represent all the other member countries, to vote for China to host the 2015 Apimondia Conference. They went all out. They had buses to take us to the Sheraton Hotel and convention center. Our hosts were all dressed in beautiful traditional Chinese outfits. We enjoyed watching a group of dragon dancers after a number of officials from China gave speeches as to why China would be the best choice. After a very nice buffet dinner with dessert, we returned to our little apartment by taxi. The other country vying for the honor of hosting the 2015 conference is South Korea. In 2013 it will be in Kiev, Ukraine. Earlier, over lunch we talked about the feasibility of hosting this conference in the U.S. in 2019. The discussions involve issues such as who would organize it and where would be a good location. None of us volunteered, and suggestions such as Orlando, Houston, New Orleans and Las Vegas were mentioned.

I attended a very good talk by Dr. Dennis Van Engelsdorp on “Colony Mortality and Morbidity in Migratory Beekeeping Operations in the Eastern United States”.

Here is his abstract: “Using standard epidemiological methods, this study set out to quantify the risk associated with exposure to easily diagnosed risk factors on colony mortality and morbidity in three migratory beekeeping operations. Fifty-six percent of all colonies monitored during the 10-month period died. The relative risk (RR) that a colony would die over the short term (~50 days) was appreciably increased in colonies diagnosed with a “queen event” (evidence of queen replacement or failure; RR=3.1) and with Idiopathic Brood Disease Syndrome (IBDS, the brood condition associated with parasitic mite syndrome; RR=3.2) We also found that several risk factors, were differentially expressed in different beekeeping operations, and that a diagnosis of several risk factors increased the risk that colonies would be re-diagnosed with the same or another risk factor during the next inspection. Together these results confirm the growing consensus that the causes of colony mortality are complex and interrelated.” I plan to talk about this further when I return at a future advance beekeepers class.

That’s all for now – off to more presentations.

Rich