West Virginia's honey bee industry is staging a bit of a comeback. State apiarist George Clutter says arid weather last summer, mite infestations and ill-timed cold snaps killed an estimated 30 percent of West Virginia's bee colonies last winter.

That's up from normal losses of perhaps 15 percent to 20 percent, but better than other states that Clutter says suffered near total losses. Clutter says replacement of losses and timely rain this summer have put the bee industry back in business.

Beekeepers rebounded from a poor spring to have a decent summer crop from Clay County on south and Clutter says the rest of the state had a bumper summer crop.

Meanwhile, he says the bees are better off. This year Clutter says bees have plenty of feed and disease and mite problems are of little concern.

Beekeepers earn about $640,000 a year from honey sales, but Clutter says their ranks have grown from under 200 in 1995 to over 900 today. And colonies have increased from less than 2,000 to more than 16,000.