Topic: Hard Lessons Learned - Growing a Beeyard

Greg Burns, along with his wife Susan and their seven children, made the intentional decision to leave city life behind and embrace a more resilient, homesteading lifestyle on their land. Their mission centers around teaching and learning meaningful life skills as a family, continuing the tradition of passing down the old ways. Beekeeping naturally aligned with this way of life, and together they have transformed their passion into a business that supplies high-quality bees and equipment to beekeepers nationwide. Greg and Susan are dedicated to mentoring others, sharing knowledge, and preserving the time-honored practices of beekeeping. They believe that nature is the greatest teacher and that farming in harmony with nature allows them to care sustainably for the land and their family for generations to come. Through their journey, they invite others to join them in living a simple life filled with joy and happiness.

SENIOR HONEY JUDGE

Mary Cahill-Roberts is a Master Beekeeper that has been involved with beekeeping since 2008. She is the owner of Swarm Chasers Apiaries and a Senior Honey Judge. She has served at the local and state level in various positions of Secretary through President, in Georgia. She recently relocated to North Carolina and is enjoying the ‘new’ challenges of beekeeping in the new microclimate. She is a member of the state organization and local club. She has maintained her apiaries by the Certified Naturally Grown method since the beginning. She is passionate about sharing her knowledge and helping other beekeepers be better producers of hive products such as honey, wax, and comb. She speaks at the local, state and national level about bees and honey production, as well as judging honey shows. She strives to continue to improve her own knowledge of bees, hive products and Apitherapy.

BIT PROGRAM

Karen Davis is a dedicated STEM educator at Eastwood Elementary, teaching grades K–5 and inspiring curiosity for over 23 years. For eight of those years, she led educational outreach for NASA, bringing the wonders of space and science to students and communities. Since 2020, Karen has been an active beekeeper, even maintaining hives right at her school. She runs the Beekeeper in Training program with the Mon County Beekeepers Association, helping new beekeepers gain hands-on skills. Her favorite passion is creating engaging outdoor learning spaces where students can explore, discover, and connect with nature.

WVDA STATE APIARIST

Topic: Pesticides and Honey Bees: Understanding the Threat

Shanda is the State Apiarist with the West Virginia Department of Agriculture (WVDA) and is responsible for managing the WVDA Apiary Program throughout the state.  She works with beekeepers across West Virginia and is very involved in education through working with local beekeeping clubs, schools, and other organizations to increase awareness of the wonderful world of keeping honeybees.  Shanda is a graduate of West Virginia University’s Biology Department and also holds a master’s degree in biology from Missouri State University.   

Topic: The extraordinary Honey Bee and the world it lives in (Parts 1 & 2)

Fred is a honey bee educator, focusing on backyard small-scale beekeeping. He shares the intricacies of bee biology and management primarily through his YouTube Channel (Frederick Dunn) and podcast, The Way To Bee. He manages many Bee Hive configurations with his wife, Annette, on their rural Pennsylvania property, and has been observing bees and their secrets at close range since 2006.

As a Cornell University Master Beekeeper, Fred uses scientific methods to improve management practices and evaluate tools and hive configurations across a broad spectrum. He seeks validation to many questions and concerns through basic backyard experiments that most beekeepers can do themselves. Above Average Original Photos and video sequences are the core of his presentations.

Topic: Survivorship Bias: Not lucky. Not lazy. Just better bees -  In this presentation James will discuss how to breed mite-resistant queens without instrumental insemination or hundreds of colonies by concentrating genetically diverse stock in a single mating yard. He’ll cover selective pressure, reduced treatment, and multi-assay screening to identify true resistance—not just survivors by chance.

Topic: The Northern Queen Initiative: Improving Value, Availability, and Production of Mite-Resistant Honey Bee Queens in Northern Climates - For the last two years, the NQI has worked to develop a network of honey bee queen breeders and producers in the State of Michigan. Not only does the project focus on local distribution, but also regionally and nationally. Having set out to establish a network of production of mite resistance honey bee stocks the NQI has made many in roads. Learn about the methods, logistics, and protocols implemented by this program and how small scale beekeepers can have an impact on queen breeding in their own operations and abroad! 

James Lee is the President of the Sustainable Beekeepers Guild of Michigan, a virtual educational organization with over 800 local and international members. He is also the founder of the Northern Queen Initiative and owner of James Lee's Bees in Romulus, MI where he lives with his wife Rachel and their 5 children. James manages 60-100 colonies pursuing sustainability in apiculture and produces nucs and queens with a focus on hardy Northern climate survivors selected for mite-resistance. goes here

Topic: Virulence Evolution: Never Underestimate a Parasite

Topic: Honey Bee Nutrition: Understanding Nutrition by Studying Digestion

Dr. Peck is the Director of Research and Education at Betterbee in Greenwich, NY, where he assists in product development and research, and also teaches classes and develops scientifically-sound educational materials. His doctoral work in Cornell University's Department of Neurobiology and Behavior was supervised by Professor Tom Seeley. His dissertation research focused on the transmission of mites between bee colonies, as well as the mite-resistance traits of the untreated honey bees living in Cornell's Arnot Forest.

After earning his degree, he has continued to research varroa/bee interactions, including fieldwork in Newfoundland, Canada (where varroa still have not arrived) and Anosy Madagascar (where varroa arrived only in 2010 or 2011). He has served as a teaching postdoctoral fellow in Cornell's Department of Entomology, and is still affiliated with Cornell through the Honey Bee Health program in the College of Veterinary Medicine. Dr. Peck has kept bees for more than a decade, though his home apiary is often full of mite-riddled research colonies so he doesn't usually produce much honey. 

HONEY JUDGE

Topic: Honey Judging Info w/ John & Amy

John Welty holds certifications as a Master Beekeeper from the University of Montana and the WVBA, is a West Virginia Master Gardener, was named the 2024 West Virginia Beekeeper of the Year, and is a certified American Honey Show Training Council honey show judge. He began beekeeping approximately 16 years ago when he and his wife Gail, a retired Veterinarian, decided to do their part to “Save the World” and help the suffering Honey Bee population by getting a couple of bee hives...  Their passion quickly (and exponentially) increased.

John, after retiring from the Automobile Industry, now spends his time completing his “farm chores” and managing his 20+ beehives on his WV Northern Panhandle farm. He and Gail proudly sell their Windswept Farm Wildflower Honey and other bee products throughout the Ohio Valley. John is passionate about bees and is always happy to pass some of his passion and knowledge onto others.

HONEY JUDGE

Topic: Honey Judging Info w/ John & Amy

Amy Kaiser has spent the past 14 years keeping bees with her husband, Otto, learning and growing alongside their hives. Her journey in beekeeping has been guided by curiosity and a deep appreciation for the hard work and subtle lessons that bees provide. Over the years, Amy has come to value the community and camaraderie found within the world of beekeeping and honey shows.

In 2023, Amy was honored to receive the Reserve Grand Champion ribbon at the Hive Life Conference—a recognition that encouraged her to further explore the art of honey show judging. Grateful for the encouragement and support from fellow beekeepers, Amy is happy to share her experiences in preparing entries and hopes to offer practical advice to others.

SENIOR HONEY JUDGE

Mrs. Pamela Carter is a Senior Honey Judge and a Board Member for both the American Honey Show Training Council and the Illinois State Beekeeper’s Association.  She is a retired Educational Administrator and Teacher who became a beekeeper because “I like learning and one can never learn everything about honey bees”.

Pamela lives in Antioch, Illinois, with her husband of 43 years, on a farm full of honey bees, chickens, and gardens.  They have three grown children.  One fun fact about Pamela that West Virginians would enjoy is that her parents grew up Logan, West Virginian, in the Appalachian Mountains.  She just might be kin!