By Ryan Smith

MEADVILLE TRIBUNE

Standing in a field of wildflowers with a light cloud of cedar smoke enveloping him and the hive, Charlie Vorisek gently removed one frame, pulling it out to reveal a mound of hundreds of honey bees.

“This one looks pretty busy,” he said as he looked over the sealed honey-bearing caps the bees constructed.

The owner/operator of Vorisek’s Backyard Bee Farm in Linesville, Vorisek said it’s been a good summer for commercial beekeeping. But last year at this time, the hives “were just dry — there was no surplus” honey as the bees struggled to survive.

By the time last winter rolled around, Vorisek said 54 of the total 88 hives he’d been keeping had died off. Having started out this year with only 29 surviving hives, he’s now back to keeping around 70, each filled with up to 60,000 bees.

Experts studying the colony collapse dilemma affecting bee populations around the country last year have indicated that various factors, including foreign pathogens, could be to blame for the problem.

Still, there’s no one explanation for what’s become a scientific mystery.

The Pennsylvania State University Colony Collapse Working Group is “involved in a lot of the research that’s going on,” said Vorisek, but researchers “haven’t found a smoking gun just yet.”

It’s likely a combination of factors that created the colony collapse, according to Vorisek, a member of the Pennsylvania State Beekeepers Association.

“Amongst beekeepers, we’re (also) talking about genetics, stress levels, nutrition and pesticides” as factors in the collapses, said Vorisek. “When the bees are healthy, they’re pretty strong and resilient,” but “if they’re compromised with (environmental) stress or illness,” the colonies are more susceptible to collapse.

Vorisek said sub-lethal amounts of pesticides that bees may ingest and become disoriented by, coupled with last year’s abundance of cold and rain, are factors that made for a poor beekeeping last year locally.

It’s sort of like having a bad cold and trying to work through it rather than take it easy, said Vorisek: The more a person (or in this case, a bee) pushes themselves, the greater likelihood they’ll eventually collapse.

While most professional beekeepers like himself were able to maintain the resources necessary to stay in business through the collapse and are now seeing the start of a resurgence in their bee populations, Vorisek said it spelled the end of the line for many hobbyists.

“It’s just been so stressful,” he said.