BBKA holds old dears to ransom!

[Bo66y]

Whats all the fuss you get all this for a meer £30
The fridge magnet alone is worth the money

A jar of British honey or honey mustard
A honey dipper
Three newsletters a year
An adoption certificate
A window sticker
A honey bee fact sheet
Six colour postcards
A fridge magnet
A welcome letter from the president of the BBKA

Better on bees than Cats, Donkeys, you get the drift
their all at it today
So called charities

 

[taff..]

I have never been a member of the BBKA, nor of the BNP, the TonTon Macoute the Brownies or the provisional wing of the WI..........
As for "time" - how long precisely would YOU deem necessary to read up and investigate an organisation that is asking for your support/money?
(I've deliberately sidestepped the transparently silly question that is designed to belittle my ability/reasoning to decide not to be 100% in support of an organisation that has behaved in a scurrilous manner)
As for studying/keeping bees, around 3 years, sufficient time to have taken a degree in the subject, and around 35 months longer than anyone with a modicum of intelligence needs to smell a rat! (I also learn VERY fast!)

"honey bee research" - all depends what you mean by that - if it's totally unbiased research into the problems of bees, I have no problems, sadly much research in recent years that has anything to do with a certain association has deliberately and markedly avoided even the possibility that pesticides could have the slightest thing to do with it............... (obviously no connection with any sponsorship deals........)

so to answer my own question, you are in your second year of keeping bees.

did you do that degree in keeping bee's? where did you do it? I might be interested after the one I'm doing right now

 

[birchdale]

Does that mean I could have got a MSc after 4 years of beekeeping and a PhD after 7 years of beekeeping?
Do they have special bee gowns and hoods at the degree presentation? Do tell.

Missed out again.

 

[victor meldrew]

Does that mean I could have got a MSc after 4 years of beekeeping and a PhD after 7 years of beekeeping?
Do they have special bee gowns and hoods at the degree presentation? Do tell.

Missed out again.

Brian Sheriff makes them I believe

John Wilkinson

 

[taff..]

so to answer my own question, you are in your second year of keeping bees.

did you do that degree in keeping bee's? where did you do it? I might be interested after the one I'm doing right now

I should have said that the reasoning behind asking these questions was to see exactly how honest and up-front Bros is, and by his failing to answer the simple questions I can draw my own conclusions about many things.



Pot calling Kettle, radio check...over......

 

[Adam]

"I'm struggling to work out what everybody is so upset about"

let me explain gently, and I hope, succinctly..... any "independent" organisation which accepts funding from a commercial body of any sort has to be incredibly careful lest they lay themselves open to accusations of favouritism, or that their independence has been "bought" in some way.

What on earth has that got to do with the critisicm of the BBKA for trying to raise money by sponsorship of hives. (For record, I strongly argued against, and indeed we had a unanimous club vote against pesticide support to the BBKA.). I understand the pesticides issue/politics within the BBKA completely.
That has absolutely nothing to do with my point which is that what on earth is the point of berating the BBKA so strongly and continously, when surely most people can see they are doing positive things for beekeeping, even if you don't accept every aspect of their manifesto?

(i.e. you may not support the government but why fight them on minor details when you actually disagree with some other policy?)

Well done on your postive moves, but I wonder why it can't be reflected more generally in this forum. Let's be honest, I see loads of posters on here that also post on the BBKA forum. To criticise the BBKA so strongly is in fact to criticise your own membership.

To be clear, I'm not suggesting that all critical posts stop, I'm quite happy to wade in with my own critisisms - my point is that exhausting such energy, in a thread about sponsorship seems so pointless. It's seems looking in, that if any initiative by the BBKA is mentioned, the forum feels it has to pour scorn on it. Why not accept that somethings they do are beneficial, and save your energies to fight them on the important topics. If members of the public wish to support bees, why shouldn't they sponsor them. "Value for money" in this context is meaningless. It wouldn't be a sponsorship if the value of goods approached the value of the donation. It seems a nonsensical argument to discuss the value of the goods provided.

Adam

 

[Rosti]

What he said .....

Well said that man!

 

[keithgrimes]

 

[m100]

It must be raining all over the uk today

Not this morning, managed to get in a hive and find an elusive queen. Marked her and was convinced they were going to ball her (water based blue posca marker again!) Hopefully this dodgy weather will be enough to keep them from building queen cells but I wouldn't bet on it.

Peeped into another hive where I left a load of honey stuffed apidea frames on the crownboard for them to rob out so I can reuse them The bees aren't taking it down, they are building comb in the roofspace instead. Looks like I'll have to build them into some wooden frames and let the bees use them for now.

If the 'adopt-a-hive' money gets used in a positive manner to improve bee health and not get lost on 'overheads' then I'm all for it. But this is one off windfall and hopefully it will be spent wisely, letting all BBKA members know what they are doing with it and demonstrating the transparency of that decision process.

On the subject of bee research, what I do find very puzzling is what is happening at at Sussex University where there is very significant funding of around 750k, not just from the BBKA, as much comes from elsewhere, to support amongst other thing 'decoding the waggle dance' (yet again)

They they are also funding research on hygienic traits where a vigilant, highly trained bee will presumably uncap a cell infected with varroa ...killing the larvae and letting all the varroa out to infect other cells

http://www.sussex.ac.uk/newsandevents/?id=4539

 

[Nellie]

Research? Whatever for? Has Brosville taught you nothing? All you have to do is build a top bar hive, preferably from bits of old table and beer mats. If you buy one from Thornes though, Brosville will stamp on a kitten. Nasty human created parasite that it is.

Once built, just say "BBKA are evil and varroa is a myth" three times and the inner secrets of the bee world will be revealed and nothing will ever trouble your bees again.

Or something.

 

[Roy S]

It does get a bit tiresome when anything and everything they do is pulled apart, often for some totally absurd personal pettiness. I joined this forum because I found the BBKA forum admin totally unreasonable and incapable of moderating a forum in a fair, lighthanded and unbiased way.
I find that this forum allows much greater freedom and a more balanced view....however that doesnt mean that I'm against the BBKA, At the last meeting of the Lancashire and northwest beekeepers, Martin Smith talked at length about the Adopt a beehive scheme, I think a figure of around £5.50 was mentioned for the cost of the package or thereabouts the rest would contributed to research.

I've always found Martin to be quite an approachable pleasant person, more than willing to talk about the pesticide issues at length. a far cry from the alleged cloak and dagger operations going on behind closed doors at BBKA headquarters.

There are some things that at the end of the day some people arent happy with, but to suggest that they are underhanded just because they arent your choices is a bit OTT

 

[Nellie]

Well said.

I do find Brosville entertaining though, it's like having a beekeeping Daily Mail around to froth bizarre, hate filled headlines and opinion that might once have contained a nugget of truth now spun so far into fantasy land that it just becomes amusing.

Seriously mate, let it go. There's so much useful and interesting to say about "natural" beekeeping that losing it under a deluge of ranting and spittle about the BBKA and whatever injustice it's done to you this time does you no favours whatsoever.

Look on the bright side, if the rich old grannies are sponsoring beehives then there's going to be a whole load of people relieved that they aren't going to be left a huge china puppy or commemorative plate collection in the will.

 

[Brosville]

Should anyone care to go back over the last posts in this thread, it's not me spitting venom.....I used an admittedly "tabloid" title and took a very cynical approach to what was "news" way back in March as much in jest as anything else, but of late the thread had been revived, and somehow I seem to be being painted as Beelzebub himself for daring to point out some utterly disgraceful behaviour in the recent past.....
Just to clarify - I've nothing whatsoever against the BBKA per se, and get on absolutely fine with probably 95% of the people who are members - from personal experience they are mostly friendly, helpful and good-natured people, and we desperately need a national association for ALL beekeepers that is completely and transparently democratic, and most of all, completely independent of any commercial taints (real or implied), that acts for bees and beekeepers first - when that day arrives I shall loudly applaud and stump up the fees for membership.
I think that there is every possibility that the answers to what ails bees may well be found in changes in husbandry, hive design, and a "nearer to nature"
approach all round - only time will tell, in the meantime I see many signs that there will be no support from the "mainstream" for such tactics - I'll leave you to wonder "why?"

 

[Poly Hive]

Having kept bees more years than most on here and probably in greater numbers than most Brosville I can only say this.

The only change I am aware of for the worse is Varroa.

Lots will point the finger at sprays of various ilks, though not every spraying operation one sees in the fields is a "poison" as some are fertilisers.

Sprays in general are not as nasty as they were 20 years ago and much more limited in their effect or should that be more specific?

I agree that in the perfect world (having had bio-dynamic contact as long ago as 1966) there would be no sprays, but there are and we have to live with them until something better and gentler is produced. Plus there is the not so minor matter of feeding ourselves.

So the major issue is Varroa and until that is dealt with on a complete and total basis we are stuck where we are.

PH

 

[Nellie]

Should anyone care to go back over the last posts in this thread, it's not me spitting venom.....I used an admittedly "tabloid" title and took a very cynical approach to what was "news" way back in March as much in jest as anything else, but of late the thread had been revived, and somehow I seem to be being painted as Beelzebub himself for daring to point out some utterly disgraceful behaviour in the recent past.....
Just to clarify - I've nothing whatsoever against the BBKA per se, and get on absolutely fine with probably 95% of the people who are members - from personal experience they are mostly friendly, helpful and good-natured people, and we desperately need a national association for ALL beekeepers that is completely and transparently democratic, and most of all, completely independent of any commercial taints (real or implied), that acts for bees and beekeepers first - when that day arrives I shall loudly applaud and stump up the fees for membership.
I think that there is every possibility that the answers to what ails bees may well be found in changes in husbandry, hive design, and a "nearer to nature"
approach all round - only time will tell, in the meantime I see many signs that there will be no support from the "mainstream" for such tactics - I'll leave you to wonder "why?"

See, when you write stuff like this it's much harder to take the mickey out of you. I don't think you're beelzebub at all but I do find you very hard to take seriously when every point you try and make has to be accompanied by some cheap snipe at an organisation that even the most ardent fan of will acknowledge has problems. Your ability to assign devious intent when simple incompetence will suffice doesn't help either.

I guess as a committee member of our local association I probably count as part of the "mainstream" and, you'd better sit down for this bit, I actually agree with much of what you say in your last paragraph.

And as it's something that I'm dealing with locally at the moment, if BBKA membership is what's stopping you engaging with your local association, here's what I suggest. Go along, join it, get the bloody insurance if nothing else then send your BBKA membership card back to the BBKA with a covering letter telling them why you're doing it, tell your local association too if you want to. I guarantee you that people will take notice of complaints from within their membership far more than petty sniping from those outside of it (though in the BBKA's case I wouldn't be too sure in the short term).

 

[Brosville]

I will cheerfully confess to a bias towards the "natural" end of things, and down the years have become aware of the colossal power wielded by commercial interests, and it's a sad fact of life that if there's no money to be made by a multinational or two, there'll be little encouragement for anything in agriculture or horticulture that doesn't result in "products" being sold - there's no money in muck heaps, or organic pig-keeping (the money is made from the chemicals used to keep them alive in factory farms), so there's no encouragement for organics, permaculture or Biodynamics in the mainstream - add in to that the power of the multinationals reaching into the heart of government and many other organisations, ANY natural means of food production faces a colossal uphill battle..........

If we are to find answers to the problems facing bees, and mankind in general we need to look in ALL directions, not only those dictated by the "status quo"- much of the research being done is hampered by those who fund it ("look everywhere you like, but not at pesticides - couldn't possibly be them" - Syngenta)

As for varroa - it's certainly a problem for many - as had already been shown, poisoning them tends to work for a short time until they become immune, so we need to find more imaginative ways to deal with them - there is good strong anecdotal evidence that there are methods which show promise from the husbandry angle, but there's no money to be made from patentable products, so..........

 

[Nellie]

Don't disagree with you either which is why we need organisations like the BBKA and why many of us were deeply disappointed when they did the deal with the pesticide companies. Of course Bayer or Vita or any other company selling stuff that you care to mention isn't going to be interested in researching ways to reduce dependence on their products.

believe me, I've no desire whatsoever to see an organisation supposedly representing my interests and those of bees and beekeeping generally apparently selling out to the organisations that many feel are partly responsible for many of the problems being experienced. It's going to take the BBKA a long time for people to forget this and it is a real shame that in many quarters it completely overshadows the good work they do manage to do in other areas. I'll point you to some of the comments that have been made in posts by people asking about the education programmes. I'm biased because education is my thing but their programme is excellent and continues to evolve as beekeeping practices does and putting people off becoming better beekeepers to score "political points" is just stupid.

From the beekeeping community though I don't doubt for a second that the day someone comes up with a cheap mechanism to control varroa that it'll be snapped up in a second. The "mainstream" round this neck of the woods are trying everything from hive types, frame spacing, natural cell size, treating, not treating, you name it. Look at how quickly Open Mesh floors were adopted once it was demonstrable that they assist in controlling varroa.

 

[m100]

As for varroa - it's certainly a problem for many - as had already been shown, poisoning them tends to work for a short time until they become immune, so we need to find more imaginative ways to deal with them - there is good strong anecdotal evidence that there are methods which show promise from the husbandry angle,

what methods?

 

[Poly Hive]

Small cell regression has been shown not to work so what methods are you hinting at?

PH

 

[Brosville]

oh lord, here goes for several pages.........

Firstly I don't accept the "small cell has been proven not to work" claim - as I said in another thread, what they have proved is that if you just slap bees into small cells over a part of a season that it doesn't work (totally ignoring the methodology of those that pioneered it), so I think it reasonable that full tests should be done (by definition over several seasons), and adhering to the methodology of the pioneers before such claims are made.......
(I don't actually think that small cell regression is in itself "the answer", but suspect it is more to do with allowing bees to build what comb they want, of whatever size, which would as part of that probably mean a smaller average cell size after some years of natural unforced "regression")- whichever, an avenue worthy of proper research - there are many people particularly in the States claiming "no varroa problems following regression" - needs looking at!
Then there's the work being done with Warré hives - virtually completely "hands off" beekeeping, whereby they are left to their own devices so as not to disturb the "Nestduftwarmebindung" (essential nest heat and atmosphere), which it is claimed makes life very difficult for varroa mites due to the preservation of high temperatures and maintaining the balance of the hives natural systems- again, claims are being made that varroa is no great problem with them...... worth looking at.....
A new kid on the block is the amiable Argentinian, Oscar Perone, who advocates simply massive hives with a vast undisturbed brood area and honey stores (in a way similar to the Warre) -he claims that we've been building hives too small, and if we allow colonies to grow to their natural size (vast) that the colony can cope with literally anything in the way of disease/mites (another pretty much "hands off") system - worth investigation
Lastly, the much-maligned dusting with icing sugar- those that use it claim that IF it's used wisely (and sometimes repeatedly) along with mite counts, it can be a very effective means (time-consuming, but effective IF done properly)

All of the above at least merit further investigation, as there's "no money in it", the only work is being done by enthusiastic amateurs, often who cannot afford to "prove it scientifically" because they're backyard beekeepers....

What I've noticed in many of these alternative ways is a common thread - "minimum interference", and people in different parts of the world coming to similar conclusions about bees being best left to maintain their own atmosphere (often for different given reasons)......

I'm sure there's loads of other avenues worth exploring - questions that need asking, gospels that need querying as to their veracity, NOT just as a deeply disingenuous ex-head honcho of the BBKA was heard coyly uttering on the radio the other day "we need medicine for bees" (sic)