The New South Wales agriculture minister says as many queen bees as possible can be moved from a newly expanded varroa mite eradication zone to protect a national bee breeding program.
Key Points:
- Varroa destructor has been detected at 59 NSW properties
- The state government says no infections have been detected in Tocal
- A co-manager of the breeding program says the program can be rebuilt if the bees must be destroyed
The Varroa mite, which has devastated bee colonies worldwide, has been detected in Butterwick, less than 10 kilometers from Tocal Agricultural College in the NSW Hunter region.
The university, run by the NSW Department of Primary Industries, hosts the national bee breeding program, which supports beekeepers across the country.
The latest varroa mite detection brings the state’s total to 59, but Agriculture Minister Dugald Saunders has stressed the mite has not been found in Tocal itself.
“[It] has no infected hives; they’ve been monitored very regularly, but now it’s inside one of those red zones, so it’s in an eradication zone,” he said.
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Saunders said the close detection was unfortunate but not entirely unexpected, as 16,000 moths have now been inspected.
He said protocols had been developed over the past month to safeguard and possibly transfer “some very, very valuable bee genetics that are in Tocal.”
“It will be as many as possible without feeling like we’re putting anyone else at risk,” he said.
“It’s not exactly formalized yet, but essentially it would mean that there would be a process where some bees could move in a small group, as in the queen bee with some of her nurse bees.
“[This would be achieved] individually inspecting each and every one of them to make sure they are free of varroa mites and then moving them into a restricted space…somewhere else to try to maintain those genetics.
“That would also include other queen bee breeders in that area.”
The beekeeping program in Tocal plays an important role throughout the country. (ABC Upper Hunter: Bridget Murphy)
Bees in insurance hives offer hope
The goal of the national bee breeding program is to refine genetics and make bees more productive and less susceptible to disease, within Australia’s “unique environment”.
Tocal center director Robert Rein, who had a different understanding from the minister about what would happen to Tocal bees in the future, said the red zone eradication protocols were clear.
“It means it’s going to be euthanizing the hives and for our queen bee breeding research it means it’s going to be part of that as well,” he said.
But he said there were future options for the continuation of the program through program-linked queen bees living in “insurance or satellite” hives on properties elsewhere and interstate.
“As I understand it, we will cull all our hives in the red zone [queens included] – There is a discussion about all queen breeders being able to save genetics, the protocols and exceptions around that have not been finalized yet,” said Rein.
“When we’re done, we [and other queen breeders] will have a procedure and a protocol to operate and act.”
His DPI colleague Elizabeth Frost is optimistic.
“Our queens are all over Australia so there’s genetics out of that area which is very good and the industry was very supportive of getting this genetics program off the ground,” he said.
“Over the last few years of running this program we’ve developed the national database and the data we’ve generated from this population, and also the genotyping… will live beyond this population into the red zone .
“I couldn’t be more proud than that.”
Saunders issued a statement to the ABC this afternoon, further clarifying the Tocal bee program and the potential future of queen bees.
“Due to the special research purposes of Tocal’s queen bees, DPI is working behind the scenes to look at movement options to preserve their genetics.”
He said Mr. Rein would not have been privy to those discussions.