beekeeping

[Finman]

I bet your hair has different colour now Finman, .

The pic is about 35 years ago. Hair color is almost same.
I colored my hair a while ago with Loreal Casting Nro 24. No problem.
Those bees are German Black mongrels. They have extincted.

 

[grizzly]

Hows about this Finman

Nutter

 

[Finman]

That is too bad...

 

[Hivemaker.]

I don't think you were fond of those german bee's,were they bad tempered.Did they work well.

 

[Finman]

I don't think you were fond of those german bee's,were they bad tempered.Did they work well.

They were bad unselected gangs, like ferals in human made hives.

They spoiled their work with swarming. They were sensitive to many diseases like EFB.

 

[Hivemaker.]

And were most bee's in finland at this time german blacks,or did some buy queens from other countries.

 

[Widdershins]

Ive always loved bees - used to play with them when I was a child, my Grandmother used to go mad at me!
Id go round her garden, pick the bees up, and make tiny assault courses for them.
Sometimes id just watch them working, collecting pollen.

Natural progression i guess!

Reading Sweetums reply, I reckon there a quite a few young-uns on here - if I knew how, id do a poll!

 

[Hivemaker.]

That is really good that there are young people interested in bee's,its just exactly what is needed more of. Once you start, to most it is an addiction,they call it the bee fever.Some never get over it.

 

[Widdershins]

Well, I hope NOT to get over it!!!

 

[Hivemaker.]

Then you may have hundreds of hives,and thats good as well.

 

[Widdershins]

...well, am only a beginner, and this is my first year. Had 6 colonies, now, sadly, only 5.
Want more!

 

[Polyanwood]

So Widdershins, how many hives and how much honey do you hope to get by the end of the 2009?


dreams create ambition

 

[Widdershins]

...well, Im sure one of the colonies could be split next year, but, that depends on how well they all do through the winter.
Theres so much to learn, and hope Im doing it correctly....only time will tell I guess

 

[Finman]

And were most bee's in finland at this time german blacks,or did some buy queens from other countries.

We had beekeepers which has contacts to different countries. One had to Canada where he got well breeded Caucasians. They were popular but wanished away.
One famous beekeeper could speak Russia and he had contacts to Russia, Poland, and so on. Lots of queens imported from Italy. Carniolan imported 20 years ago.

Our basic hives were too small to good layers. Only small cluster cross breeded lived in those small bee houses. Now they are all rotten and Langstrots are every where.

What ever queens you raised, German Blacks were first to mate with them. Varroa destroyed them 20 years ago.

 

[Hivemaker.]

What were the best and bad points regarding the caucasian from russia,i think you said one bad point was they suffered bad with nosema.Is this the main reason they dissapeared.

 

[Finman]

What were the best and bad points regarding the caucasian from russia,i think you said one bad point was they suffered bad with nosema.Is this the main reason they dissapeared.

They were big hives. I think that main reason was that when Caucasian got 40 kg per hive, Italian got 50-60 kg per hive. At least my average yiled rised when I took Italians.

But it was so long ago that where is breeding now? No one use here Caucasian. At least I have not met. And no one want them back.

 

[Hivemaker.]

And your experiance of the carniolan,bad swarming,anything else?

 

[Finman]

And your experiance of the carniolan,bad swarming,anything else?

Bad swarming was too much. I had them 10 years. 3 of 10 were really bad. One year I had larvae at all in mid June when all hives should be full of larvae for main yield.

I had 15 hives and one day I had 7 swarms in trees same time.

Difficult to keep strain if you have Italians around.

Some strains were not good at all. Difficult to get good strains.
Some were really angry. They are not all nice to handle.

Our summer cycle is so that when Italian become mature to swarm, main yield begins. It stops mostly swarming intensions.

.

 

[Hivemaker.]

Do you mean they were not good to handle when they have crossed with the Italian strain, or even the pure carniolan was not good to handle.

 

[Finman]

...or even the pure carniolan was not good to handle.

I byed queens in Spring from Slovakia. They were really bad strain.

Finnish researchers compared different strains to Estonian Carniolas and from other sources. Estonians got only 50% yield that of Italians.

They are so many as Italians. The race quanrantees nothing.

.