New Brunswick beekeepers should be aware of the contents of the Apiary Inspection Act and are strongly encouraged to read the full text of Act and Regulation 97-98, both of which are available online at the website for the Attorney General of the province (http://www.gnb.ca/0062/acts/).
The following overview is not to be regarded as a legal interpretation of the legislation, nor as any form of legal advice: it is provided here simply as a convenience to New Brunswick beekeepers and interested others.
New Brunswick’s Apiary Inspection Act is mainly concerned with safeguarding hive health. Registration (required of all beekeepers) has no fee attached; it costs nothing. However, registration is a legal requirement for anyone who keeps bees in the province.
(Note: You can download the Application to Keep Bees form from the NB Agriculture department website.)
3(1) No person shall be a bee-keeper unless he and the apiary are registered for the current year.
3(2) Every bee-keeper shall, before the thirty-first day of May in each year, make such return as the Provincial Apiarist requires.
3(3) A person procuring or coming into possession of bees after the month of May in any year shall within ten days thereafter make application to the Provincial Apiarist for a registration form which he shall complete and return forthwith.
3.1 Every bee-keeper shall maintain in a conspicuous location at the site of each of his apiaries a sign no smaller than fifteen centimetres by ten centimetres in size clearly stating his name and residential address.
3.2 No person shall have in his possession any used beekeeping equipment that is accessible to bees other than bees in the possession, care or control of a bee-keeper.
4 All bees imported into the Province in hives or in combs, and all bees amongst which a contagious or infectious disease exists, shall be in quarantine on the premises of the owner, who shall within three days after coming into possession of the bees, or of the outbreak of the disease, as the case may be, notify the Provincial Apiarist and shall not allow the removal from his premises of any such bees, or of any used apiary appliances or apparatus, until he has been granted a certificate from the Provincial Apiarist that those bees, used apiary appliances or apparatus have been properly disinfected or are free from disease.
5(1) No person shall keep bees infected with the disease known as American Foulbrood, European Foulbrood, Sacbrood, Nosema, Honey Bee Mite, Varroa Mite, Chalkbrood or any other infectious or contagious disease harmful to honey bees in the egg, larval, pupal or adult stage, except as provided by section 8, and every bee-keeper, when he becomes aware of the existence of such disease among his bees, shall at once notify an inspector of the existence of the disease.
5(2) No person shall, knowing that a contagious or infectious disease exists among his bees, sell, barter, give away, move or in any other way dispose of the same in whole or in part, or any product of the same other than honey, or any beekeeping equipment in such a manner as to cause the spread of the disease.
The Act also describes the role of the Provincial Apiarist and apiary inspector(s), and notes that, for the purpose of administering the Act, “an inspector has access to all places where bees, bee products, supplies or appliances used in apiaries are kept, and he shall on entering upon the premises produce, if required, a certificate of his appointment.”
Note that any person (beekeeper or other) “who is aware of the existence of foul brood, or other infectious or contagious disease, either in the bee-keepers own apiary or elsewhere shall immediately notify the Provincial Apiarist of the existence of the disease,” according to section 10 of the Act.
The Act gives an inspector the necessary authority to make inspections, determine the presence of disease, and disinfect or destroy (or to require the beekeeper to do so) any contaminated bees or equipment. It also deals with issues related to importation of honeybees into the province, and with queen-rearing and sales or transfer of bees and equipment.
As a reminder: this summary is no substitute for knowing the law. Beekeepers may the full text of the Apiary Inspection Act and Regulation 97-98 at the website for the Attorney General of New Brunswick (http://www.gnb.ca/0062/acts/).
