Lets be a beekeeper in england. what the yanks think.

[Finman]

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Climatology is one of the best sides of Bristish beekeepers.
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[enrico]

That's because there are few people with those skills left in the general population .. and in reality it takes an enquiring mind to apply them to bees. Given that most experienced hobby beekeepers learn how to do things by following what others do - and tend to repeat the same things year after year - the hobby does not encourage original thinking and a scientific approach - i.e measure things before and after a change.

Not helped by our weather which makes analysing the effect of any changes rather difficult !

Thing that struck me about beekeeping when I took it up was it's almost total lack of numeracy. People who keep records of numbers - except pounds of honey - are the exception. Hive weights, dates of first flowering of local key crops, queen rearing success rates, stings per hive, frames of brood in spring etc are all quantifiable measurements notable by their exclusion from almost all books, record keeping and thinking.. and yet for any beekeepers they are useful measures..

If you don't measure it , you cannot control it.

But then again some of us do it for fun!!!!!

 

[Beefriendly]

But then again some of us do it for fun!!!!!

It's fun when your bees are like gentle playful kittens. The full Monty of an aggressive, we are going to try to kill you, double brood hive is not fun by any definition.

 

[Finman]

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You mean that small angry hive is better than double brood angry hive. Difference is that small does not bring honey. Is that funny?

 

[Beefriendly]

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You mean that small angry hive is better than double brood angry hive.

No, I don't mean that at all.

 

[madasafish]

That sounds like control freakery creeping out. You should be sentenced to whipping with match-sticks!

I trained as a physicist...

( I thought matchsticks were sharpened, thrust under toenails and then lit - with a blowtorch)

 

[madasafish]

But then again some of us do it for fun!!!!!

I enjoy measuring things.
I enjoy beekeeping.

Best of both worlds..

 

[user 6228]

I trained as a physicist...

( I thought matchsticks were sharpened, thrust under toenails and then lit - with a blowtorch)

Have you ever found a bee book or bee paper that ever referred to the latent heat of vaporisation of water with respect to the ripening of honey?
Everything I read ignores it or implicitly assumes it is zero compared to the reality of a stonking 2.2MJ/Kg

 

[Finman]

Have you ever found a bee book or bee paper that ever referred to the latent heat of vaporisation of water with respect to the ripening of honey?
Everything I read ignores it or implicitly assumes it is zero compared to the reality of a stonking 2.2MJ/Kg

IT is in every paper which handles heat control of colony. Is it heat or latent heat, I do not care.

 

[madasafish]

Have you ever found a bee book or bee paper that ever referred to the latent heat of vaporisation of water with respect to the ripening of honey?
Everything I read ignores it or implicitly assumes it is zero compared to the reality of a stonking 2.2MJ/Kg

No.. but I keep reading..

 

[Beagle23]

We all need to take what we want from the hobby. Some people love the science and intricacies, some love the farming element, I love the just watching the bees and learning what I can without getting too involved.

As long as the bees are healthy and we're having fun, that's all that matters

 

[TryingToLetThemBee]

It's fun when your bees are like gentle playful kittens. The full Monty of an aggressive, we are going to try to kill you, double brood hive is not fun by any definition.

I keep most of my colonies in my garden and these ones crop up. I have just broken one up, which has partly fixed things. A very strong colony and a Q I would have bred from but obviously not. The situation when it happens brings me to tears and the point of giving up every time. I am in process of emigrating to out apiaries.