The Ohio Queen Projects was started by the Ohio State Beekeepers Association in 2007 with two goals in mind.  First, to teach beekeepers to raise queens and second,  to develop a stock improvement program (ie. a breeding program).  To quote directly from the Ohio Queen Project's Mission Statement from their website:

The Ohio State Queen Project was begun in the spring of 2007. A need to improve the quality of queens used by Ohio beekeepers was recognized by the OSBA board and a committee was established to set up a state wide program to help beekeeper to raise their own queens from outstanding queen stock. OSBA decided to develop a stock improvement program in conjunction with the classes being taught…….

……A need exist within Ohio for queens which will carry desirable characteristics for our climate and will provide an enjoyable experience for beekeepers to keep bees.

Both parts of the program are critical.  Without beekeepers to raise queens, stock that does better in our area wouldn't benefit anyone.  Without improved stock, we just have less desirable stock that happens to be raised in Ohio.

OSBA supported the program from 2007-2009 while coordinators give queen rearing classes and OSBA even held a queen symposium which I hoped would be repeated but never really happened.  Minimal work was done on the stock improvement portion of the project, in part due to the difficulty of running a distributed breeding program and due to a lack of funding and guidance.  In 2010 a member of the Ohio Queen Project stepped up to lead the the breeding program and the project had an opportunity for a significant grant to fund the breeding portion of the project to really get it off the ground.

However, after meetings, work preparing the grant and shortly before submitting the grant, the powers that be decided:

"…it is not appropriate nor would it be effective for OSBA to play a primary and direct role in achieving those goals."

"…the goals  … for an Ohio queen project would best be accomplished by a separate group."

In short, since OSBA is not interested in supporting the Ohio Queen Project per their mission statement the Ohio Queen Project is DEAD.  All they apparently want are some random queen rearing classes given by volunteers.  While I can't speak for those that have lead the Ohio Queen Project and the other coordinators, I feel disappointed, used, mislead and have little interest supporting OSBA's volunteer teacher program and I believe many of the others involved in the program feel the same.

As for me, I will continue my breeding efforts, and while not a breeding program yet, I'm working towards that goal.  I also hope to enlist others in the effort much in the spirit of the Ohio Queen Project, but it will not be associated in any way with OSBA.

The 2008 Farm Bill (June 18, 2008) created a new Emergency Assistance program for Livestock, Honey Bees and Farm-Rased Fish (ELAP).   According the the limited documentation on www.fsa.usda.gov you would need to buy in by September 16, 2008.  Most of us would not be requried to pay any "buy-in" fees as we would fall in the "Limited Resource Producer" classification (Less than $100,000 in gross farm sales), though it’s unclear what needs to be done if you fall in such classification…

However…..  there is no additional information at all on what the program covers, what documentation is required nor what the benifits may be.

So I wrote the USDA…. their official response after 3 months….

Until the regulations are published in the Federal Register for ELAP, all types of losses for which honey bee producers may be compensated for under ELAP will not be known.  However, some of the possible losses that may be compensated for under ELAP are:

1.  purchased or harvested feed that was intended as feed for honey bees that was destroyed or lost because of an eligible adverse weather event;

2.  physical losses of honey bees/honey bee hives because of colony collapse disorder or eligible adverse weather events.

Remember, these are just examples of losses that may or may not be compensated under ELAP.  A forthcoming regulation in the Federal Register will provide final determinaitons.

So, in short.. nearly a year after the program was created, and long after any losses and required paperwork should have been submitted….  The USDA still does not know what the program covers, what is required to obtain coverage or make a claim, nor when they might actually have this information.  I guess this shouldn’t be a surprise coming from a government agency.

The sad thing is, any producer who really needed the money to stay in business due to losses over the 2008-2009 winter will be out of business by the time they receive any money that could have helped them rebuild their apiaries this spring.

I have periodically given talks and even classes last year on raising your own queens. Inevitably someone will come up and ask questions and seek advice beginning with ‘I don’t want to compete with you, but I’d like to know how you do x’.  My response is always the same, ‘Please compete with me.  Raise a few queens for yourself, then for your neighbor, and sell as many as you care to produce. The industry needs it.’  It may be just the view I see, but the demand seems to only increase each year with few new producers entering the market, large or small.  In fact two large companies with a combined production of 75,000 queens retired this year according to Kim Flottum.   At the same time the number of hobbyist does seem to be growing.

I’ve also heard plenty of complaints about supercedure, queen size and other problems from those who have purchased mass produced queens.  I’m not saying all mass produced queens are bad, nor are all operations at fault.  I just hear the complaints and know the pressure of getting queens out on time, disease, stress, financial concerns, and residue from mite treatments can affect the queens in a real operation.   Many beekeepers want a queen at the lowest price possible, and they want it now.  Quality and cheap just don’t play well together . But this is a topic for another post.

So there is a good market out there, and there are beekeepers not happy with the queens they are getting.  They are looking for quality queens, the kind YOU can raise in small number at home.  It really isn’t that difficult to do, even on a very small scale. So I’d encourage you, if you have even the slightest interest, and even if you only intend to raise queens for yourself, to take advantage of the queen rearing classes given though the Ohio State Beekeepers Association or your own local or state association.

[I'm happy to see both the American Bee Journal and Bee Culture have several articles on queen rearing and breeding in the latest issues (March 2008).  Of particular interest to the beekeeper who hopes to make profit at it one day is Larry Connor's article 'Raising and Managing Your Own Queens and Drones' in ABJ where he outlines a plan to start a small scale operation, and 'Small-scale Queen Rearing' by Roy Hendrickson that is a practical article on a small Ohio operation.']