Another fact-filled, mind-bending day on the front lines of bee- and beekeeping research. Highlights from day two:

• When older bees spend more time with younger bees than older bees that don't, the first group tends to age faster. In other words, hanging out with your younger siblings and kids will make you go grey!
• As if pesticides, parasites, pathogens and monoculutre wasn't stressing the bees enough, there's a new honey bee parasite, Tropilealaps, on the horizon, and it looks really scary. So far it is only in Asia, but it's spreading to the middle east. 
• The super highlight of the day was getting to hear Marla Spivak walk her audience through her thought process about her new research, furthering her work on hygienic bees that are resistant to mites. It's not every day that a renowned scientist will share her raw thoughts with an audience of  500!

After our wild success on day one, it would be hard to match that performance, and alas, we stalked, but did not succeed in making contact. Our target today was the amazing Sammy Ramsey, a recent UMD phD student who discovered that varroa mites do not feed on bee blood, but bee tissue. We did get to catch his amazing talk on that new threat to honeybees  Tropilealaps. And, in a very nice moment, Bee Boy's hero, Marla Spivak, sat down behind us during a keynote and reached forward to tap him on the shoulder to say hi! (See, stalking isn't all bad).

Machine learning and AI have come to beekeeping! Two European Companies have developed really innovative "in-hive" sensors that will transform how bee keepers manage their hives

• Arnia, a UK company, has sensors that  measure temperature, humidity, hive weight, bee counts and apiary weather conditions remotely.  The User Interface allows hive owners to compare data from multiple sensors to keep an eye on colony health and to monitor colony development over time and year to year. The sensors also send an alert if someone is trying to steal the hive, if it's been tipped over, etc. Most impressive, the sensors monitor hive activity outside the hive, allowing users to have a more detailed understanding of when bees are finished pollinating. For commercial growers, this provides precision  information about when hives need to be removed from an orchard or field, saving keepers money.​

It was an exciting day at Apimondia! Bee scientists spent the day reporting out new findings and exciting technological breakthroughs. Among the highlights:

• Bees can now be "chipped" and monitored by their " bar codes." By placing tracking devices that can follow the bees, researchers have collected a wealth of data on bee interactions inside the hive and movements outside the hive.
• Researchers have developed a website called beescape.org that can tell you the probability of bees surviving the winter based on the pollen in the landscape.
• Noticing that some bees tend to be less social than their peers, researchers studied their genome and found these "lonely" bees had overlap with autism markers in humans.
• Mostly honeybees are truly social; when they find a good food source, they dance more to help the hive find the food rather than keep it for themselves.
• Then again, when given cocaine, bees will also dance more. Sort that one out if you can!
• While early lab studies were unable to show direct connection between neonics and colony collapse disorder, research has gotten much more sophisticated and results are clearly showing that bees colonies are being decimated by a combination of pesticides, viruses, mites, and poor nutrition. One three month study showed that most of the contaminants came from pollen--but the pollen was not from crops, rather it came from native hedgerow plants. This strongly suggests that neonics are leaking into the groundwater and being taken up by non-target plants. How's that for discouraging?

Okay, we tried really hard to be subtle, but it's not every day you find yourself alone on a staircase with the famous bee researcher Marla Spivak. After following her around for twenty minutes, we finally cornered her at the bottom of the stairs where she couldn't escape. She was really nice anyway. And she remembered Bee Boy. And his dad who had called her for advice about planting pollinator friendly gardens on state property. And Aunt Girl (who edited her work 15 years ago). And then she invited Bee Boy to get in touch with her about working in her lab next summer! (with the one caveat that he not steal a university vehicle and crash it up)

 A new app will allow beekeepers to scan the bees on their frame and identify varroa mites visually--no more sugar or alcohol tests to identify and quantify the nasty critters. The app will then give the user a treatment recommendation.

Just cuz, Canada is really fun. Convention Center has Cool Stuff!