Ulster County Beekeepers Advocate for Honeybee Care

The Ulster County Beekeeper’s Association has been a group for about 15 years. With members from towns all over the county including New Paltz, Dutchess and Saugerties, the beekeeper’s association is a club and community dedicated to its bees and to each other, offering help and guidance with their hives. They utilize natural and organic approaches to honeybee care, while advocating for environmental awareness and healthy pollinators.

The club meets on the second Monday of most months at the Rosendale Recreation Center. You do not need to be a member to attend, although you can join as a member.

The association covers issues seasonally, as different things arise with changing weather and the time of year. “We just try to help people so that they can be successful. And sometimes, if you’re not successful with something, then it’s a good support group to figure out why,” UCBA president Robert Rawluk said.

The club’s last meeting on April 14 brought guest speaker Thomas D. Seeley and over 20 beekeepers to the Redeemer Lutheran Church. Seeley is the Horace White Professor Emeritus in Biology at Cornell University, and conducts research on the behavior, social life and ecology of honeybees. He has written six books on his studies and gave a presentation on the current honeybee situation: swarming.

During this season, honeybees will send scouts to find nesting sites. Seeley presented on baiting, a practice in which a swarm box is set in a tree for bees to find and begin making a home in. Several Ulster County beekeepers, including Rawluk, use this method to guide the bees and give them a hive. “Putting them in a hive is much safer for them than finding a hole in a tree or in the side of a house,” Rawluk said. “Though people think of them being totally wild, they’re not indigenous to this country. They came over in the 1600s. Sometimes they need help.”

Seeley explained that through swarm baiting and catching a wild queen bee, hives have a much higher survival rate, as this adds biodiversity and keeps the hives healthy.

The current problems facing bees and their keepers today are influenced by our society and government. While pesticides and Varroa mites have been and continue to be a threat to the honeybees, a new mite from Europe poses a greater threat as they are much stronger and more resilient than what local beekeepers have had to deal with before. According to Rawluk, with the recent firings on the FDA, there has been no research done on this mite. “It’s very short sighted for these politicians to play games with things that will be our food source,” said Rawluk.

On the upside, the UCBA still achieves wins on local levels. When Pat Ryan was Ulster County executive, Rawluk spoke with him about the chemicals being sprayed on roads, and how they impacted the bees during spring, a time that is instrumental to honeybee life. “He took it to heart. They [the county] stopped spraying and started mowing,” Rawluk said.

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