To Whom It May Concern,
On behalf of the Jefferson County Beekeeper Association, representing beekeepers across Jefferson County Colorado, we are writing in strong opposition to the closure of the Beltsville Agricultural Research Center (BARC) in Beltsville, MD.
Amid the multitude of challenges we as beekeepers face including, but not limited to, varroa mites and the diseases these parasites vector and spread to honey bees, nutritional challenges, and pesticide exposure, BARC research is working tirelessly to address these issues, and it is committed to working on science based solutions to combat colony losses. Beekeepers from the commercial level to the hobbyist rely on BARC’s research to guide management practices and keep our honey bee colonies healthy and thriving. Due to BARC’s location in Maryland where there are four distinct seasons, BARC can conduct research in all climates, and this is essential for beekeepers in colder climates like Colorado that experience higher colony losses over the winter months. We as beekeepers and our honey bees face so many challenges and closing or relocating the BARC would only exacerbate the problems. We support fully the continued operation of BARC and respectfully request that the Center continue its research in Maryland. Thank you for taking the time to consider our concerns.
Sincerely,
Jefferson County Beekeeper Association
Jefferson County Colorado
To Whom It May Concern,
On behalf of the Mile Hive Bee Club, representing urban and suburban beekeepers across Denver, Colorado, we are writing to express our strongest opposition to the proposed closure of the Beltsville Agricultural Research Center (BARC).
As urban beekeepers, we depend on the research from the Beltsville Bee Lab to manage our colonies successfully against unique local pressures. At a time when colony losses are a critical concern, BARC’s work is essential for the sustainability of beekeeping and the pollination required for our nation’s food supply.
Closing this facility would dismantle a vital team of experts and leave a devastating gap in the science that beekeepers across the country rely on. BARC’s current, unique setup ensures vital overlapping expertise, stability, and intact working groups. We give our full support for the continued operation of BARC and urge you to maintain this irreplaceable resource for our nation’s agricultural and scientific interests.
Sincerely,
The Mile Hive Bee Club Denver, Colorado
To whom it may concern,
As a group of primarily rural beekeepers, we are writing in strong opposition of closing the Beltsville Agricultural Research Center (BARC). Besides breaking up functioning working groups, disrupting scientific work, and losing a facility that has grown into its role with the Beltsville Bee Research Laboratory for 90 years, closing BARC will remove an agricultural institution from a populated area. We spend a lot of effort and energy educating urban populations about agriculture, and removing a facility as important as BARC will further remove agriculture from the sight & minds of the area populus. Further, sustaining the beekeeping community is aligned with protecting the country’s food security, since 75% of our food requires pollination from bees.
As an industry, beekeeping has faced significant challenges in recent years – leading to a critical concern about sustainability – and it is the researchers at the Beltsville Bee Research Lab at BARC that have been responsive and helpful as we look for data to lead our management decisions. That essential service is a product of the collective expertise, collaboration, and unique research environment allowed at BARC.
We are in complete support of the continued operation of BARC to continue to serve the scientific & agricultural interests of Americans, at its current location.
Sincerely,
Eastern Colorado Beekeepers
To whom it may concern
The Brighton Bee Club of Colorado strongly opposes the closure of the Beltsville Agricultural Research Center (BARC). For over a century, BARC has provided beekeepers with essential research on honey bee health, nutrition, genetics, and disease management. Its scientists have led the fight against pests like Varroa mites and pathogens such as American foulbrood—threats that, if left unchecked, can devastate colonies and the livelihoods of beekeepers nationwide.
BARC’s honey bee lab is the only USDA facility dedicated to comprehensive pollinator research at this scale, serving both commercial and hobbyist beekeepers with science-based solutions. The closure would dismantle decades of expertise and disrupt the testing services, diagnostics, and extension resources relied upon by beekeepers in every state.
Pollinators contribute billions to U.S. agriculture annually, underpinning crops from almonds to alfalfa. Losing BARC would weaken the nation’s ability to respond to pollinator health crises, directly threatening food production and agricultural stability.
Rather than close this irreplaceable resource, the USDA should invest in modernizing BARC’s facilities to continue its mission. The Brighton Bee Club urges decision-makers to recognize the critical role BARC plays in sustaining pollinators, agriculture, and the nation’s food security. Closing BARC would be a short-term decision with long-term costs—to science, to farmers, and to the nation’s food security.
Sincerely,
Brighton Bee Club
Support Request for the USDA-ARS Bee Research Laboratory in Beltsville, MD
We are reaching out to request your support in safeguarding the future of the USDA-ARS Bee Research Laboratory (BRL), which is part of the Beltsville Agricultural Research Center (BARC), one of the largest agricultural research campuses in the world, located in Beltsville, Maryland. Recently, however, the USDA announced the potential closure of BARC as part of a broader agency reorganization plan.
The BRL is an internationally recognized leader in honey bee health research and diagnostics. It plays a pivotal role in identifying and addressing the diseases and stressors that threaten U.S. bee populations, while leading national efforts to combat severe colony losses. These efforts are not only scientifically critical but also economically essential: honey bees contribute over $20 billion annually to the U.S. economy by pollinating nearly one-third of the food we eat—including fruits, vegetables, nuts, and seeds. This year, honey bee colony losses have reached the highest levels on record, with disease continuing to be a major factor. The closure or relocation of BRL would severely disrupt ongoing research and undermine its vital Bee Disease Diagnostic Service, which provides essential support to beekeepers across the nation.
Why Beltsville is uniquely essential to this work:
Critical Seasonal Research Conditions: Beltsville’s four distinct seasons—unlike the milder climates of other USDA-ARS bee research locations—provide critical conditions for studying overwintering losses, seasonal disease dynamics, and the broader impacts of climate on colony health. Overwinter mortality remains the primary driver of annual colony losses, and the Mid-Atlantic climate is broadly representative of the environmental conditions faced by most U.S. beekeepers.
Strategic Isolation and Biosecurity: Situated away from major commercial beekeeping centers, Beltsville offers a low-risk environment for disease spillover, enabling controlled study of high-risk pathogens. Relocating the lab to a high-density beekeeping state would jeopardize containment measures and increase the risk of introducing harmful agents into the nation’s bee populations.
Diverse Agricultural and Ecological Setting: Maryland’s rich biodiversity and varied crop systems allow for real-world testing of nutrition, pesticide exposure, and pollination services, with easy access to major pollination regions in the Mid-Atlantic and Northeast.
A strong show of support from stakeholders like you can make a meaningful impact on the future of pollinator research and protection. We would greatly appreciate it if you could share your concerns and highlight the strategic importance of keeping the USDA Bee Research Laboratory in Beltsville. Its location, infrastructure, and Mid-Atlantic climate make it uniquely suited to address the most pressing challenges in honey bee health. Your voice is important in helping decision-makers understand the irreplaceable role this laboratory plays in ensuring national food security and pollinator sustainability.
As part of USDA’s broader reorganization plan, a public comment period is currently open (see message below). We encourage you to share your input by emailing your comments to reorganization@usda.gov
Thank you.
Judy / Jay
Judy Chen judy.chen@usda.gov
Jay Evans jay.evans@usda.gov
How to Submit Comments
All stakeholders, including USDA employees, members of Congress, and agricultural and nutrition partners, are encouraged to provide feedback by emailing reorganization@usda.gov. The comment period is open through August 26, 2025
Above published by Bee Culture online:
To Whom it May Concern,
We are writing in strong opposition to the closing of the Beltsville Agricultural Research Center (BARC).
This facility provides an unique combination of geographical isolation ideal for research on pesticides and diseases, collaborative research teams and climate which would be virtually impossible to replicate elsewhere.
As beekeepers, we are dependent on the research being done in the Beltsville bee lab in order to successfully manage our honey bee colonies. At a time when colony losses exceed 60% annually, research is critical to stem further losses and provide adequate pollination for our nations food supply.
We are giving our full and enthusiastic support for the continued operation of BARC that serves our nation’s scientific and agricultural interests.
Sincerely,
High Land Beekeeping Club
Highlands Ranch, Colorado
To whom it may concern,
The Colorado State Beekeepers Association represents over 3,000 beekeepers and we are in strong opposition to the closing of the Beltsville Agricultural Research Center (BARC). BARC has served a wide variety of Americans with research and testing services that are directly applicable to our success in Agriculture. Fragmenting the lab and research teams that deliver essential services that advise us as we work to try to keep the beekeeping industry functional and regain a sense of sustainability would be incredibly detrimental – especially in the face of unprecedented issues in the last year and uncertainty as another winter looms.
We urge you to maintain the function and services of BARC – we have particular interest in the apicultural research and services, but BARC offers a unique location for our USDA experts and other employees to complete their work and perform controlled experiments with limited confounding variables. All of this is a function of the complete research center and all of the work done there, as well as the property’s unique usage as BARC.
Sincerely,
The Board of the Colorado State Beekeepers’ Association
Background Information about BARC From Dr. Lamas
BARC stands for the Beltsville Agricultural Research Center. BARC is made up of numerous labs, representing all industries across agriculture. It is not just the bee lab. It is the largest agricultural research center in the country. We are highly collaborative, which is why we are so productive and successful. There are specialists in every part of ag you can imagine: genetics, plant pathogens, dairy, human nutrition, etc etc. We have amazing core facilities, such as the Scanning electron microscopy lab. We use these facilities without charge. At a university this would cost us hundreds of dollars an hour. The model for BARC is to have all labs in one space, so that high impact work through collaboration, and creativity will be fostered.
That is the model of our bee lab. BRL is comprised of six independent, but cooperative bee labs. If I have a question I don’t send someone an email and then wait a couple days for a response. I walk to someone’s office, ask a question, and then go right back to working. That is why projects move so quickly. They want to break us up, and send us across the country. Splitting up the labs so that we are next to farmers to serve farmers is not accurate. The new model will be smaller, independent units. Our stakeholders will ultimately receive fewer services from us. Just ask any small university or extension agency. It is really hard to do a lot of work with a small unit. However, we get a lot done and are able to rise to national challenges when we have overlapping skills and many hands. For example, this year within a few weeks we collected, processed and analyzed critical samples for the historic bee losses. We are asking public support to foster more collaborations, not less.
Next, Beltsville has the Goldilocks effect. For bee research, it is nearly perfect. Most importantly we have a long season to work our bees. I have access to brood from late-February until November. This allows us to do A LOT of research. But we still have a winter! This is so important. It makes Beltsville reflective of a lot of the country, and allows our colonies to shed viruses. Next, we are not surrounded by commercial beekeepers nor are we inundated with row crop agriculture. This means we can actually test the pesticides and pathogens we want to study without confounders affecting our experiments. In short, we go to beekeepers, collect pathogens from them, and then bring them back to us. Our diverse greenspace also means we have an ideal site to rear bees we need to study. Finally, we are right next to policy makers. We love this. We want staffers and policy makers who may be out of touch with farmers to see what we are doing. We do tons of tours, and when people visit, we get that one-on-one face time to tell them what is happening to beekeepers, and what our stakeholders need help with. We do not want to lose this voice.
Finally, BARC is an incredible greenspace. It is over 6,000 acres of fields, and woods. I consider BARC a national treasure, and an oasis of green amidst a sprawl of metropolis. Once it is decommissioned the space will be ripe for development, either by other federal agencies or private developers. I come from a state that paved its farmland and put single family homes everywhere. Do we really want our largest research center to go the way of townhouses and parking lots? Check out this YouTube I made, showing just a very small section of this massive greenspace. https://youtu.be/Tq2RENYCpZo?
The Colorado Beekeepers Association shall be composed of Beekeepers of the State of Colorado and those interested in allied industries for the purpose of producing better beekeeping methods, better beekeepers, and a more unified system of apicultural work in Colorado.