At a time when California honeybee keepers are celebrating a wide range of floral bloom as sources of nectar for their bees, in Georgia a killer hornet has emerged, confirmed August 15.

The very first sighting was in early August, 2023, when a farmer in Georgia reported of seeing a yellow-legged wasp. The authorities soon confirmed it as the invasive Vespa velutina species.

The predatory species, whose invasive habits are not too dissimilar from those of locusts is in the U.S. for the first time.

The Asian giant hornet, a close relation of the latest invader preceded it into the U.S. in 2019. In 2021, authorities in the State of Washington annihilated a cache swimming with 1500 giant hornets. 

The insects easily erect nests on vegetation and each cache can contain as many as 6000 worker hornets at a time.

Owing to their ability to spread fast, Georgia’s news agency has called attention to the need to “track and eradicate” the pests at once.

This is particularly essential especially in the knowledge that in January 2023, US approved a vaccine to stem diminishing honeybee numbers due to foulbrood disease. 

Bees also add $15 billion to the national crop value from pollination, according to a Food and Drugs Administration (FDA)’s report of 2018.  In other words, 1 in 3 Americans eats food that has been pollinated by bees. Some of these foods include apples, gourds, almonds and cruciferous vegetables. 

The origin of the Vespa velutina species, a yellow-legged insect, is the south-east Asian region. They have the ability to decimate whole colonies of bees.

In 2021, authorities in the State of Washington annihilated a cache swimming with 1500 hornets. 

U.S. honey prices roundup

Details from the honey report by the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) listed the prices of honey at the end of July 2023, as follows:

In California, a pound of white or light amber honey was fetching $2.80. In Dakota, the price for all types from Canola to Clover averaged $2.61 a pound. 

Southern states, including Florida and Louisiana, had a feast day as all prices looked bullish. At $3.50 a pound, the Gallberry honey variety, which is extra light amber in tinge, was the most expensive in Miami, Fl. In New Orleans, La., the average for the Mixed Flower variety stood at $2.75.

Minnesota and Mississippi farmers sold their honey for $2.62 and $2.70 a pound  respectively. 

The current average price of honey in the United States is between $7 and $10 per kilogram, a reflection of the high quality honey that comes from nationwide beekeepers. The price is notably comparatively higher than that in Argentina and India, at $2.04 and $1.56 a pound, respectively.