Natural or Unmanaged?

[o.stjohn]

[not enough posts to include a link so swap the vees for double ewes]

 

[MuswellMetro]

Admin...this nmight be better in media not the general forum

ok reposted the link

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/gardenin...ping-could-save-our-honey-making-friends.html

i make no further commment

 

[drumgerry]

Oh god here we go again!

 

[domino]

Is there any evidence around the deleterious effects of swarm management? Would be an interesting read to see if their was a better way of doing it.

 

[ultreen1]

That lady was on countryfile and the presenter got stung on the nose when she went into the bee gazebo!

 

[mbc]

Overall a nice article Heidi.
Did you get a chance to proof read it ?
It sort of lost credibility a bit with the first sentence claiming honey bees are an endangered species and seemed a bit "holier than thou" towards conventional beekeepers, but congrats are in order for getting more in the national press about bee friendly planting.

 

[sunhivebee]

natural or not

Overall a nice article Heidi.
Did you get a chance to proof read it ?
It sort of lost credibility a bit with the first sentence claiming honey bees are an endangered species and seemed a bit "holier than thou" towards conventional beekeepers, but congrats are in order for getting more in the national press about bee friendly planting.

Thank you! No. no chance to proofread. I fact, no control, apart from direct quotes. Brave of the Torygraph to mention pesticides. And yes, I rather like the sun hives.

 

[MuswellMetro]

what ever happened to Caroline Van Issum, she used to expound unmanaged beekeeping around the London cicuit , but not heard or seen anything of her recently

 

[sunhivebee]

"Unmanaged beekeeping"? Please define.

 

[For want of a better word]

what ever happened to Caroline Van Issum, she used to expound unmanaged beekeeping around the London cicuit , but not heard or seen anything of her recently

Londonsbuzzing.... or so we are lead to believe.....
did attend a lecture in Battersea? by this group... it was that or a Leonard Cohen concert..... interesting , but not for me.

 

[Dishmop]

When it comes to natural beekeeping, it is the way that the bees are looked after that makes the critical difference.

Is "looking after" natural?

there’s a bee room where natural beekeeping classes are held

“When you open a sun hive you confront the archetypal form of a bee colony.

Heidi has adapted her bee care to suit the bees rather than her own needs.

I dont think anything is wrong in what Heidi is doing but none of the above is "natural"

Surely "natural" is leaving them alone to thier own resources.

 

[Sir Quej]

I think theres a lot to be said for both methods tbh. I dont see anything wrong with natural beekeeping as Heidi defines it, but with the every decreasing number of bee colonies in the uk, I just dont see that there are enough people interested in keeping bees "just for the sake of keeping them"

Whats wrong with people keeping bees and getting something back for it? As the article says, wild bees are few and far between in the uk now so where would the species be in this country without beekeepers who keep bees to get honey?

There just arent enough people like Heidi to keep them gong I dont think.

 

[Mellifera397]

I personally got into it because I always fancied the idea, I dont think that not taking honey from the hive would be possible for me because the honey is what convinced my family to allow me to keep bees.

I have a limited experience of bees but from what i've seen 'personality' is not the term for colony characteristics. The word implies that bees are as complex as humans or dogs in terms of emotion, I've yet to see a bee play a game or dance for the sake of dancing so I don't think much goes on in terms of emotion, however as I have said I am a new beekeeper and I have lots to learn.

 

[sunhivebee]

Gavin: Must be where I've been going wrong all these years. All that swarm control. And Varroa treatment. Still, each to their own. Just as long as fringe ideas aren't promoted in the mainstream media as 'the answer' unless the facts back them up, eh?

Gavin, what do you mean, you going wrong? Never!
As for fringe ideas, I once asked Martin Smith, erstwhile BBKA chair (?) whether he practised swarm suppression and he assured me that this was the preserve of a certain fringe of die-hards etc, and that he did not practise it as it did not work.
I think that the fringes are shifting, whether you like it or not. But if you give me your contact details I will make sure that future journalists get referred to you; I have passed a few enquiries to others already but more suggestions are welcome.
By the way, the comments section of the DT article has an excellent swarm supression related comment by Dr David Heaf which I commend to you.
Very good wishes
Heidi

 

[Anduril]

A fair amount of the article was practised more than 70 years ago using a double brood National. Similarities with Common Sense beekeeping by M M Hooper another name for it would have been the Glamorgan Method of Beekeeping.

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

As for fringe ideas, I once asked Martin Smith, erstwhile BBKA chair (?) whether he practised swarm suppression and he assured me that this was the preserve of a certain fringe of die-hards

Strange statement - unless he was alluding to queen clipping (still not a preserve of a fringe of die-hards) or removing all QC's which only works short term
I think there is a difference between swarm supression and swarm control. An artificial swarm is just that - you end up with two colonies at the end of it, thus they have multiplied, what you do with them after the new queen has mated is another matter.
Maybe you should also ask Mr Smith what his opinion of Neonicotinoids is (or what Bayer has told him his opinion is!)

 

[Brosville]

"just for the sake of keeping them" is not how I view natural beekeeping - I think the best description I heard was from David Heaf, who described it as "apicentric beekeeping" - putting the bees before the beekeepers' needs - in a good year I'll take what honey they can spare, in a bad year they can keep it all.... We keep "pets" with no thought of them giving us a crop of something or another - we keep them for the pleasure of having them around - some people rear rare breeds, or have conservation areas in their gardens/farms for threatened species - seems eminently sensible to me
I've always been aware of the difficulty some people have with the term "natural" beekeeping, so it may help to refer to "more" natural beekeeping - as the pedants amongst us will point out, no beekeeping is entirely "natural".

 

[sunhivebee]

Yes, I think he was referring to queen clipping (20 mins instruction in "Course in a case") and breaking out cells - but it must be said that he was not in the best of states as I had just asked him before a distnguished gathering of leading environmentalists and lawyers about the Bayer connection, and he was flustered and keen to search for common ground with me.
I accept your comments on swarm management being a somewhat different matter. I still hold that a natural swarm is the best option, and would rather fit all my neighbours chimneys with insect screens as well as hang around in swarm time like all good farmers tend to do when their charges enter reproducing mode, than intervene in any way. Of course, this option is my choice. Unfortunately, in late summer, some of my time is taken up housing swarms from colonies whose swarming instincts have been aborted all summer by certain queen cell removing and queen clipping obsessives who, after a season of rummaging around weekly in the broodnest, finally give up and go on holiday. This is very annoying, as in late summer very few beekeepers can be found to pick up a swarm. It is at times like those I feel that one's obligations towards the general public really come in. May I suggest that people affiliated to the BBKA request better training in these sensitive matters?

 

[MuswellMetro]

"just for the sake of keeping them" is not how I view natural beekeeping - I think the best description I heard was from David Heaf, who described it as "apicentric beekeeping" - putting the bees before the beekeepers' needs - in a good year I'll take what honey they can spare, in a bad year they can keep it all.... We keep "pets" with no thought of them giving us a crop of something or another - we keep them for the pleasure of having them around - some people rear rare breeds, or have conservation areas in their gardens/farms for threatened species - seems eminently sensible to me
I've always been aware of the difficulty some people have with the term "natural" beekeeping, so it may help to refer to "more" natural beekeeping - as the pedants amongst us will point out, no beekeeping is entirely "natural".

well said bross

we all need to learn to intervene less and let the bees decide not us. and just enjoy them, i have seen and helped some beekeepers and wonder why their bees don't have lung cancer and other inspecting in October as it was warm...why!!!

 

[Into the lions den]

I still hold that a natural swarm is the best option, and would rather fit all my neighbours chimneys with insect screens as well as hang around in swarm time like all good farmers tend to do when their charges enter reproducing mode, than intervene in any way.

Wow......you must be a seriously wealthy lady.

I am in a rural location, have had to screen and seal a couple of chimneys once so know how much it costs.Have also had to seal the eaves of a building. JUST to do the buildings within swarming range of the home location ONLY means sealing off the access cavities in over 1000 homes plus assorted other buildings. The chimney sealing alone would come to about 300,000 pounds, the eaves sealing about twice that much, could be in the region of a million pounds between the two. (I wonder how much bee watching you could do whilst up on the rooftops of 1000 or more buildings. Could take YEARS to complete) Add in 119 other locations, many with overlapping ranges admittedly, and you could be looking at 20 to 30 million quid for me???. Suspect it actually might be a lot higher than that too.........as it would be within swarming range would have to do half of Hereford!

Sorry, but let alone beekeeping, which is effectively what you are advocating, is not really beekeeping at all, its what the USA practitioners call 'bee having', and is a real nuisance to your neighbours. What you define as swarm suppression, was NEVER a proper option. This is irrrespective of your opinions on queen clipping, which seem to have little relevance to the bees inclinations to swarm (note..inclinations rather than capability as I suspect I am going to regret my input here as it is likely to be misused). Proper swarm control is way different from your apparent opinion.

queen cell removing and queen clipping obsessives who, after a season of rummaging around weekly in the broodnest.

Negativity or what? I think you need to spend a spell out with a real beekeeper to see that this is not what goes on in most places, and calling those who clip queens 'obsessives' sounds more like the output of vegans or animal rights people than beekeepers. Its a real management option that delays the actual departure of the prime swarm only. To each his own on that, but practicing it does not make one an obsessive...............and as for 'rummaging'.. shakes head in dismay at a normal 3 to 6 min hive inspection being called rummaging. It is actually very orderly and calmly and gently conducted. You seem to have a very low opinion indeed of beekeepers in general. Most I ever see, amateur and professional alike, nowhere near fit your pen portrait. Their level of competence is normally surprisingly high, even if experience is minimal. There are plainly loads of good mentors out there with proper ways of working, not the old codgers doing the 'cut out the queen cells' long obsolete method.


Do you do ANY swarm control at all? If not what do you do about cast(e)s (offers both old and new spellings to avoid a previous disagreement about ranking swarms)? Secondary swarms with virgin queens can travel long distances and turn up many miles away, often to the great surprise and consternation of the lucky recipients.

The complications of operating a free swarming system yet claiming to protect the neighbours from unwanted (or at least in most cases unwanted) bees arriving in their property are very large. Most let alone practitioners dispense with the precautions and just make good the relations with the neighbours until ther patience runs out (some it never does as they are fascinated). How many neighbours chimneys have you actually screened and eaves proofed against swarms?

Its a whole lot easier to just practice proper swarm control (which on our scale is largely rather than invariably effective)................and it isn't cruel.