Ever Met a Bee Veterinarian? You Have Now.

The post Ever Met a Bee Veterinarian? You Have Now. appeared first on A-Z Animals.

When most people think of veterinarians, they picture stethoscopes, wagging tails, and perhaps the occasional disgruntled cat. But Dr. Elizabeth Hilborn’s patients come in swarms. A veterinarian specializing in bee health, she is part scientist, part detective, and part diplomat — mediating between the needs of pollinators and the pressures of modern agriculture. 

With years of experience in veterinary science and public health, Elizabeth brings a rare combination of curiosity, expertise, and grit to her work with some of the planet’s most essential (and misunderstood) creatures. Whether she’s diagnosing disease in a hive or decoding the complex behaviors of a queen bee and her counterparts, she reminds us that the tiniest patients can have the biggest impact.

How were you inspired to specialize as a bee veterinarian?

I’ve been growing fruit all of my adult life. Wherever I go, wherever we live, I plant fruit trees and bushes if I can get away with it. So, I always realized the importance of pollinators. But it was kind of an abstract thought, like, I plant the tree, it grows up, and then I get fruit. Yay! That’s the way it should work, right? 

Then, in 2017, there was this ironic confluence of events. I had seen a rule change — the Food and Drug Administration was trying to tighten controls on antibiotics also used in human medicine. Well, beekeepers use antibiotics for diseases of the brood or the young bees. The FDA said, “Veterinarians need to be prescribing those drugs now. We don’t want beekeepers just buying as much as they want over the counter.” So, I was like, “Wow, what a great side job that would be!” I could have my first veterinary practice. 

I’d been working as a veterinary scientist, but this seemed like a marriage made in heaven. I could support pollinators and help beekeepers. A few months after I started my business, my farm (where I grow my fruit for my family) was contaminated. We lost all our pollinators. For three years, I had no fruit at all. That experience made me gear up and write a book to report the experience and the phenomenon of what’s happening to our bees. It shifted a lot of my bee business from treating hives one by one for beekeepers to educating people about pollinators.

Can you tell us about the book?

It’s a commercial book through Chicago Review Press, called Restoring Eden. It was my personal story — my way of talking about how fragile things are. I took the bees for granted. When I planted a tree, I expected it to bloom; I expected to get fruit. When it all went away, it brought it home so dramatically. 

I wanted to share it with others, because we take things for granted when they happen all the time. We’re used to them. That’s our routine, our reality, and we don’t always realize how fragile that reality can be. There are so many factors that have to support the insect pollinators for them to be able to thrive and give us food.

What are some of the most common health issues you see in honey bee colonies? How do you typically treat or manage them? 

I’d say the number one affliction is a parasitic pest called the Varroa mite. This is a mite that was accidentally imported into the United States, and it has spread throughout the country and the world. It originated in East Asia, and the Asian bees had some tolerance to it. They were able to clean the mites off themselves and their babies, so they were manageable. But when the mites spread to European bees, they had no experience with it, and they were decimated. It reduces the survival of the young when they’re heavily parasitized. 

These mites also transmit viruses that can cause the bees to be deformed, to have short lives, and die. It interferes with reproduction and survival. 

Each specific species may have different tolerances or sensitivities to a particular insecticide, but in general, these are chemicals meant to kill insects. And bees are insects. Over the course of my practice, I’ve seen increasing problems from insecticide use meant for other kinds of insects. 

Dr. Elizabeth Hilborn, DVM

A lot of overwintering losses can be due to Varroa mite damage. The colonies can’t build themselves back up in the spring, and they dwindle and die out. 

So, I’d say that’s far and above any other affliction for honey bees themselves. 

Let me back up a little, because this is an important point. Bees are a huge category. We have European honey bees that we imported into North America when European colonists came over, and they’re the ones that produce honey for us. And then we have 3,600 species of native bees in the United States and Canada. Most of these bees are pollinators. 

Before colonists came with European honey bees, the native bees pollinated all the crops here, all the flowering plants that needed insects to pollinate them. My orchard is pollinated by native bees; I don’t keep honey bees.

As a veterinarian, I treat one particular bacterial disease of bees called European Foulbrood. It can be controlled with antibiotics, and because they’re also used in human medicine, that’s how veterinarians got involved. 

Beekeepers typically do their own treatment and management of all bee diseases, pests, and parasites. I consult, and when the European Foulbrood is present, I can help with a prescription so the beekeepers can access the antibiotics they need.

How does your work as a bee veterinarian differ from the veterinary work of treating traditional livestock or pets?

I’d say treating bees is more similar to livestock in that it’s a population or herd-type approach, versus a single dog coming into a clinic, one that lives with a family and might be the only animal of that species in the house. 

Working with a population, you have the interaction of many individuals. With population medicine, the management of those individuals really matters, because you need the population as a whole to be healthy. You focus on things like clean water, access to healthy food, and disease control, so the animals aren’t passing diseases amongst each other. 

We’d better pay attention, because if we want to keep these animals that we love, that give us so much joy and honey and pollination, we need to be careful how we treat the environment.

Dr. Elizabeth Hilborn, DVM

Have you ever formed a bond with a hive or a queen bee? Do bees recognize people?

I don’t know if bees recognize individuals. What I do know is that bees recognize behavioral routines. If you have a routine with your bees where you approach them quietly during a certain time of day when they’re active, so they’re not shocked when you open the hive up and smoke a little bit, they get used to seeing a figure working around them who’s being slow and deliberate — not shocking them with temperature, movement, dropping a frame, or being rough with the animals. 

So, would the bees think differently if someone else came in and mimicked that same routine and behavior? I don’t know. Like anything, animals become accustomed to certain routines. You see that with wildlife living alongside humans. If you have a routine, they’re not shocked or wary; they’ve seen it before. It’s that way with bees. 

Is there a hive where you’ve experienced an issue that was uncommon and intriguing?

Over the time I’ve been practicing, I’ve seen the increased effect of how the immediate vicinity impacts the health of bees. I have clients who were expert beekeepers — I learned a lot from working with them — and they just gave up beekeeping at their house because their neighbors were spraying their yards for mosquitoes. Bees travel miles away from their colony to gather nectar and pollen, and pesticides are a huge issue.

People think about insecticides in terms of spraying for mosquitoes. But what they don’t realize is that many kinds of insecticides are general for almost all insects. Each specific species may have different tolerances or sensitivities to a particular insecticide, but in general, these are chemicals meant to kill insects. And bees are insects. Over the course of my practice, I’ve seen increasing problems from insecticide use meant for other kinds of insects. 

Unfortunately, it’s not just the bees. A report came out this year about the decline in butterflies. If the wind blows a little bit, it can blow spray into neighboring yards. Directly treated plants (sprayed plants) or plants contaminated from airborne spray become toxic to insects if they land on them, including the ones we love, like butterflies and bees. And since bees and butterflies travel from my yard to my neighbors’ yards, even if I support them, they may be harmed in other places nearby.

That’s probably my biggest takeaway or warning. We’d better pay attention, because if we want to keep these animals that we love, that give us so much joy and honey and pollination, we need to be careful how we treat the environment. I work in public health (that’s my day job), and mosquitoes are a real threat. But there are ways to manage and control mosquitoes that don’t involve spraying insecticide over an area.

What are a few simple actions we can take, aside from avoiding insecticides, to help protect pollinators in our backyards or communities?

The best way for people to support bees and butterflies, and other helpful, beneficial pollinating insects, is to plant pollinator-safe flowers. But what are pollinator-safe flowers? Well, it turns out that there’s this broad class of insecticides called systemic insecticides, and when they’re applied to soil or a growing plant, they get inside the plant. And then every part of that plant becomes infused with the insecticide — the fruit, the flower, the nectar, the pollen, the leaves. 

The reason they’re used is to avoid insect damage. They’re used to grow those perfect apples we see in the grocery store. They’re used in the nurseries that are producing flowering plants for many of the big commercial outlets — most of those flowers can be assumed to be treated with an insecticide, and frequently it’s a systemic insecticide. 

Unfortunately, they’re so persistent in the plant, when they produce the flower, nectar, and pollen, they’re still toxic. So a bee or butterfly comes to feed on that flower, and it becomes sickened. With enough exposure, it can kill them. That’s contributing to honey bee, native bee, and butterfly loss — putting out flowering plants that are not safe for pollinators. 

So, how do you find a pollinator-safe plant? You have to talk with the salesperson, and they may not know at this point; we’re still in the early days of trying to get the word out. This is the way plants are grown in the United States. But you talk with the salesperson or nursery and say, “Hey, do you use systemic insecticides? I’m trying to find flowers that are safe for pollinators.”

If you talk with the grower and tell them your concern, I think they need to understand the reason why you’re asking, because it’s still an unusual question. One of my educational goals is to help people learn how to be comfortable with asking so that when someone plants a pollinator garden, they know it’s helping the animals rather than hurting them.

What would people be most surprised to find out about your work?

Unlike a cat and dog veterinarian, being a bee veterinarian is very seasonal. I’m very busy this time of year, in the spring, because this is when the colonies are growing and those bacterial diseases of the bee babies are really ramping up. As the weather warms up, the animals are at risk for those bacterial brood diseases. 

Then, throughout the year, I’m checking in with clients and available for them to call. The Varroa mite control that the beekeeper performs is required throughout the warm months of the year. Here in North Carolina, that’s from March through October or November.

Do you have any memorable stories about treating a hive that you enjoy telling?

One of the most interesting things I see is when the bees get creative. We provide them frames in their colony, where they’re supposed to just line that frame with beeswax in a honeycomb pattern and fill it with babies or honey or pollen or nectar. Whatever they’re collecting or doing, that’s their framework — the honeycomb pattern on those frames. 

Well, bees make wax, and they secrete it from their abdomen. That’s where the beeswax comes from. And they can really get creative. If they don’t like the way the frame is, they might bridge them and build the wax structure between the frames. They may make free-form honeycomb wax structures. It makes it harder to get in there because all of a sudden, you have two frames stuck together, or a group of frames stuck together. But they’re enterprising animals.

If you could magically communicate with the bees for one hour, what would be the biggest question on your mind?

The biggest question would be, “What plants do you need to be healthy?” The reason I ask that is because we know bees don’t just get nectar from flowers. They collect resins and saps from trees. They self-medicate by collecting different materials from very specific plants. 

We know that wildlife, in general, uses the plant kingdom to self-medicate and stay healthy the way we do. If you have a little stomach upset or nausea, you might take some ginger or drink peppermint tea. Well, bees and other wildlife do that, too. It’s incredible. So, it would be nice if I had that superpower to say, “Hey, what plants do you really want nearby?”

Learn more about Dr. Elizabeth Hilborn and her book, Restoring Eden, at elizabethhilborn.com.

The post Ever Met a Bee Veterinarian? You Have Now. appeared first on A-Z Animals.