Probiotics and Natural Beekeeping
A little help for our friends?
I'd been following the research conducted on the recent spat of colony collapse disorder(CCD). Some of it includes looking at the composition of symbiotic micro organisms inside the bee's digestive system. When a saw a Beesource discussion, concerning the possibility of probiotics enabling bees to resist disease, it knocked me off my chair! And here's why.
My Probiotic Experience
A few years back, I decided to brew some mead. I find the fermenting process fascinating, but really don't enjoy alcohol. While discussing mead making with Ben Brewcat, the mead forum moderator at Beesource, the subject of kombucha came up. I'd never heard of it. But it was a fast, tasty, low alcohol ferment. So, I gave it a try while waiting for my mead to age and mellow out. Then, I began drinking about a cup a day. Here's what happened:
I'd been afflicted with a skin aliment since my youth. There's no know cure. Modern medicine can relieve the symptoms. But the drugs used have more long term side effects that are worse than any benefits. Well, within 24 hours, the itching associated with the irritated skin disappeared. Within three days, the slight swelling associated with the irritated skin also disappeared. Within a month, 99% of the irritated areas disappeared.
During that time, I lost joint pain that had plagued me for a decade, commercial beekeeping is rough on the back and joints. I regained full movement in my right shoulder. And a sense of wellness replaced what ever biologically stressed out condition I thought was normal.
Once you're over 50, some of the things lost along the way become more apparent. Hair texture, intestinal fortitude, urinary function, energy level, and sexual prowess all decrease. And weight increases. Using kombucha, a probiotic, has reversed my losses to that of a man 10 to 15 years younger. And I've lost some weight. Before using it, I felt old. After using it, I feel alive. Using kombucha has been the most phenomenal physiological experience of my life.
My wife, a nurse, was more than skeptical, she thought I'd poison myself with that ugly looking concoction. But when she saw my results, she tried it. Within a month, her joint paint completely disappeared, allowing her to get up off her knees without help or pain. And her hair has returned to the luster and thickness it had when she was 30.
This is the first time I've shared the actual benefits I've experienced in detail. Before now, I'd refused to get into any details, knowing that it would sound too good to be true and would be branded as snake oil :>) If the situation would arise, I'd simply say take a little kombucha, a half cup each day, for a month and see what happens. Everyone who tried it, came back enthusiastic and with their own list much like mine.
Is there some magic compound in the kombucha? I think not. It's just many little things working together that enable one's body to get back on track. I think there's something endemic in the environment that messes up the delicate balances and relationships necessary for good health.
Maybe, our agricultural and food processing methods interfere with natural processes that maintain and replenish those symbiotic microbial relationships. Maybe that's what makes the use of probiotics so profoundly effective on humans.
Probiotics and Bees?
If my health can get so far out of wack by lacking what probiotics re-establishes, I suspect a similar process could impact the honeybee's health. Honeybees are self-propelled, electrically charged, environmental samplers. They get into lots of places I don't. They have very simple immune systems. And their broodnest is a chemical sink. I suspect that they might be more at risk from some kind of probiotic imbalance than I am.
Is it natural?
Natural beekeeping is much more than just leaving the bees to themselves. It's a pro active way to intelligently keep bees, knowing when to intercede and when to stay out. In a natural environment, bees would be exposed to all of the probiotic critters. And they could establish, maintain or replenish those they need. But that might not be the case today. Something in our environment could interrupt of defeat that process, even if we keep chemicals and drugs out of our hives. Using probiotics might restore something man might have inadvertently taken out. Could that be important?
Looking at Michael Bush's post #12, at the Beesource link above, the symbiotic microbial relationships that exist in a honeybee, aren't as simple as they seem. In fact, they may be even more important to a simple creature like a honeybee, than they are for a more complex creature like myself. Exposing bees to probiotics wouldn't introduce anything new into the honeybee's natural environment. Would it be benefitial? I don't know. It has the potential. But it shouldn't do any harm.
Tim Hall, another Beesource contributor, suggests that protecting a hive environment, so symbiotic microbial relations can exist, could be important. I agree. When feeding bees, some beekeepers add bleach to the sugar syrup extending it's shelf life. Some also use bleach as a hive disenfectant. Although it doesn't kill the bees, I suspect in might have some long term negative effects.
After my experience with small cell and then natural comb, I know how seemly insignificantly small changes can greatly effect honeybee health. Inoculating a hive with probiotics would be very easy. It's a must do test for me. And after giving the bees some probiotics, I could imbibe a little for myself. If it doesn't do much for them, I know it will benefit me ;>) I'll let you know how things go.
And I must thank Baithe for starting the probiotic thread on Beesource. As important as probiotics have been to my own health, I would never have thought about their possible benefit to the bees.