Scottish "beekeeper" "Eric McArthur" threatens to burn hives.

Into the lions den said:

For many year South African products were almost unknown in these countries. The colonial ties to the UK meant most came here, though some may have been re-exported. The European states almost all had protectionist regimes in place too, as does the EU in general, which is why Spanish oranges for example have priority in the market over non EU origins.

Then there were the apartheid years, when almost all of the EU, bar the UK, refused South African produce.

They just had nothing like our exposure to the trade. I remember reading somewhere that up to the end of apartheid the UK had taken 80% of South African fruit and veg exports (other than to their immediate neighbours) and much of the rest went to Japan.

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Interesting. What about other countries which export to Europe and have SHB. Are there any? Does Japan have SHB?

farbee said:

What about other countries which export to Europe and have SHB. Are there any? Does Japan have SHB?

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SHB doesn't survive too well in cheap digital watches and plasma TV's so no real worries for us there

jenkinsbrynmair said:

SHB doesn't survive too well in cheap digital watches and plasma TV's so no real worries for us there

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God your funny!

If SA exports to Japan then they could have aquired SHB from there.

farbee said:

If SA exports to Japan then they could have aquired SHB from there.

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Yes of course, but with a far lower risk than here due to lower volumes.

For those who do not know, in earlier life I was a ships officer and was engaged heavily in the fruit trade. Japanese cargoes were loaded almost to full in South African ports, then we sailed up to Maputo and loaded a handful of pallets trucked up to there, and collected the documents for the whole cargo, all officially product of Mozambique.

Bar some pallets of asian pears in the past I am not aware of any long standing trade in fruit, veg, or even hive products headed our way from Japan.

Into the lions den said:

Its a South African pest. It has been known about for a VERY long time. It travels on fruit, bundled herbs, and other things.

Your question is a relevant one I have asked several times before but from a rather different angle. It is almost inevitable, given that over the last 150 years the UK has been the importer of the vast majority of South African fruit and veg, that SHB has been here before, possibly several times. It has not been found up to now ...

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If so, could it be that the danger of the beetles spreading to bees via fruit imports is minimal compared to the danger of SHB imported with bees where they arrive with their hosts and can then easily find new hosts nearby?
Kitta

Madge said:

If so, could it be that the danger of the beetles spreading to bees via fruit imports is minimal compared to the danger of SHB imported with bees where they arrive with their hosts and can then easily find new hosts nearby?
Kitta

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It does not really matter how they arrive. They have wings and can sniff out what they are looking for at great distances.

ps...came back to add this.....

I know of precisely ZERO bee imports, through regular or irregular channels, to the UK from known SHB areas, and I know of no-one who is either planning or even considering doing so.

Into the lions den said:

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I know of precisely ZERO bee imports, through regular or irregular channels, to the UK from known SHB areas, and I know of no-one who is either planning or even considering doing so.

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Since it was precisely those "irregular channels" that FERA thought the most likely to bring SHB to the UK, I would hope that senior figures in the Bee Farming industry would, at the very least, be having "a quiet word" with anyone they thought might even possibly be involved with "irregular channels".

While the beetle threatens my enjoyment of my hobby, it is the livelihood of Bee Farmers that would be threatened by imports bypassing any possibility of those inspections that FERA assure us could keep the pest out of this country.
The self-interest of all responsible Bee Farmers at this time must surely be to close off any suspicion of use of "irregular channels" - wherever they might believe that the stock originated from..

A swarm of honeybees gets in to a vent in a container and a SHB follow them in...easy.

container gets put on a ship for the UK.

low probability but possible

derekm said:

A swarm of honeybees gets in to a vent in a container and a SHB follow them in...easy.

container gets put on a ship for the UK.

low probability but possible

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Even lower than you think as the majority of contaiers don't have vents

But maybe the answer is to ban the import of everything (just in case )

Lol!

Into the lions den said:

I know of precisely ZERO bee imports, through regular or irregular channels, to the UK from known SHB areas, and I know of no-one who is either planning or even considering doing so.

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Wasn't there a tv programme sometime this year following a beekeeper who was importing bees from Italy last year? I don't know which area the bees were from, but if from the area of the current outbreak, the little b.....s could be already here????

bontbee said:

Wasn't there a tv programme sometime this year following a beekeeper who was importing bees from Italy last year? I don't know which area the bees were from, but if from the area of the current outbreak, the little b.....s could be already here????

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lol....I think most of the forum will know the guy was me. NONE of them were from anywhere near the infested area. Nearest was 420km away, but most 1000Km away. That part of Calabria is not a major package bee producing area.

Full lists of provenance and destination, for both the bees and the queens were, and always are, provided to the NBU, and inspections have been done. Nothing found at the producers or the destinations.

Folk look at the maps and think it is a vast invasion but, the Sicilian incursion apart (which was in colonies migrated away from the infested area), the whole outbreak is only in a small area. Thinking locally, the whole thing is contained within an area smaller than the distance between Perth and Dundee......a little over 20 miles across.

Errr, apologies if I have been somewhat tactless,

Thanks for putting me right, and for the reassurance.

Errr, apologies if I have been somewhat tactless,-

Not tactless at all. You simply quoted facts. Some could quote the old saying of 'there, but for the grace of God...'. 420km is a mere 260 miles - not far in terms of the next port or two up the coast.

I have not read the context of this infamous posting (threats posted like that are drivel), but my earlier thread could easily have referred to those packages (packages of bees can be with or without queens in the consignment), or equally to previous imports of NZ queens. So many queens are imported from so many places, every year that the number of beekeepers threatened by this fellow could run into thousands.
Some can argue that the arrival, on British shores, of these exotic pests and diseases is no big deal but ask those that suffered varroa as it spread across the country in the 1990s and one may get a different response.

I recall the case of Scottish keepers suffering an odd strain of EFB in recent years, with many colonies destroyed. I wonder how those colonies wer replaced? Foreign bees and foreign queens? The whole thread would be a bit of a joke about some clown making some 'off the cuff' remark, if it were not for the continuing underlying risks of importing pests and diseases with livestock.

Think rabies, blue tongue, foot and mouth, swine fever, dutch elm disease, current ash tree bother, etc, etc. People have short memories when it is convenient.

Blue tongue (virus) wasn't imported to the UK. It arrived here on its own in midges blown from the continent.

However, the accidental (or deliberate … e.g. myxoma and rabbit haemorrhagic disease in Australia) importation and introduction by man of new pests or diseases into a naive population often has devastating consequences.

Madge said:

It's obvious he did not mean it literally!

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Exactly
I don't think for a second Eric or anyone else would actually burn somebody elses hives