Price of varroa treatment

[Finman]

And still getting 6-7x the yields of honey per hive as modern 21st century beekeepers.
[/QUOTE

Don't believe everything you read on t'internet ... My VIRTUAL hive yielded 400Kg of honey this summer and at one point I needed a crane to lift the supers off. My Virtual queen never swarmed and she was so prolific that I had four Langstroth brood boxes stacked to give her enough room to lay. Indeed, the hive produced 8 perfect queen cells and the resultant queens are now in virtual nucs ready for winter and I fully expect 8 tonnes of virtual honey from them in Spring when they get going ...

I also live in LaLa land .... where the sun shines 340 days a year (it gets so boring otherwise) and the rain falls gently overnight and clears up by dawn.

Your virtual brains.... From where that flash came?
Electric Collision in the head?
.

 

[Thymallus]

Don't believe everything you read on t'internet ...

I don't... which is why I have you down as a midnight thymoller

You only have to understand what Finman tries to do with his hives and then you see with right pasture 100-200kg per hive is easily possible.
I tried to do similar....nowhere near his yields, only 90kg per hive. Bad pasture or not enough forager bees?........to be continued........

 

[Finman]

I don't... which is why I have you down as a midnight thymoller

You only have to understand what Finman tries to do with his hives and then you see with right pasture 100-200kg per hive is easily possible.
I tried to do similar....nowhere near his yields, only 90kg per hive. Bad pasture or not enough forager bees?........to be continued........

This summer was exceptionally bad in Finland. Average yield was 25 kg. I got about 70-80 kg/hive. And the reason is, that I make quite much work to find good pastures.

I move alone those heavy hives to new places and I lift with bare hands 100 kg hives up to sedan carry. Just now I am returning my hives to cottage yard and I feed them in couple of days. I am badly late, but it is better than never.

I need no advice here, as you can see.

.

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

winding up for hibernation I see

 

[Finman]

winding up for hibernation I see

What is that hipernation? Something Welsh sheep things?

Have you tried to give vodka to the sheep?

Here some guys soak bread in vodka, and then they feed it to seagulls. The birds make odd curves in the air.

 

[pargyle]

I don't... which is why I have you down as a midnight thymoller

You only have to understand what Finman tries to do with his hives and then you see with right pasture 100-200kg per hive is easily possible.
I tried to do similar....nowhere near his yields, only 90kg per hive. Bad pasture or not enough forager bees?........to be continued........

No not thymol at midnight but I work shifts that finish at midnight and I will admit to midnight plus forays into the apiary with a headtorch and peering in through the clear crownboards .. the bees don't seem to mind at night and it's fascinating watching what they are up to . Sad isn't it ? Mind you ... better than the TV at that time of night !

I do actually understand how Finnie operates .. it's a way of keeping bees that I find a little too intensive for my tastes .. and he has the massive advantage of old fashioned pastures and large expanses of forage WITHOUT other beehives in the vicinity (and I accept that he manages this in order to get the maximum yield out of his bees).

His spring build up is assisted with hive heaters as the Finnish season is much shorter than ours so he needs to hit the season running ... I do wonder why his colonies are so prone to Varroa though ? You would have thought that the climate in Finland was less conducive to Varroa - when you consider where they originated ? He uses Poly hives which I absolutely agree with and insulation.

You see ... I compare what I do with what he does and apart from Varroa treatments and his desire to drag every last drop of honey out of the crop we are not that far apart - but there must be other factors. My honey crop is going to be pretty much near average for this year when I compare with other keepers in my locality but it's too much to expect anything like the yield that Finman gets. Most Beekeepers around me who treat do no better than I do and experience winter losses despite treatment.

According to Beebase there are well over 250 hives within a 10km radius of my home and that's a lot of bees to support in an urban environment. Indeed, even if you look for apiaries out in the country in my neck of the woods there is still a high density of hives ... it's a whole different ball game.

 

[Erichalfbee]

I will admit to midnight plus forays into the apiary with a headtorch and peering in through the clear crownboards ..

Are you sure it's your apiary and you're not stealing queens

 

[pargyle]

I will admit to midnight plus forays into the apiary with a headtorch and peering in through the clear crownboards ..

Are you sure it's your apiary and you're not stealing queens

Yes ... if it was anywhere other than in the back garden I'm not sure how I would explain it ... We had the Police in the close late at night the other week as one of my neighbours had reported seeing some lights in a back garden ... I didn't ask which garden and certainly didn't confess to being out there in the dark !! They let the police dog run around the close for a few minutes but didn't find anything......

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

I will admit to midnight plus forays into the apiary with a headtorch and peering in through the clear crownboards ..

Are you sure it's your apiary and you're not stealing queens

here we go - back to fantasy beekeeping

 

[Erichalfbee]

They let the police dog run around the close for a few minutes but didn't find anything

Sensible dog....like my two......they know about bees

here we go - back to fantasy beekeeping

 

[B+.]

According to Beebase there are well over 250 hives within a 10km radius of my home and that's a lot of bees to support in an urban environment.

The figure quoted is apiaries not colonies.
It would be nice if BeeBase told you how many colonies there were rather than how many apiaries. Even a rough idea would be nice

 

[Hivemaker.]

Even a rough idea would be nice

LOL... something like a daily or weekly update on what every beekeeper in the country was doing, like daily number splits, nucs made up, artificial swarms, swarms collected, mating nucs made up, etc.

 

[B+.]

LOL... something like a daily or weekly update on what every beekeeper in the country was doing, like daily number splits, nucs made up, artificial swarms, swarms collected, mating nucs made up, etc.

Nothing quite so ambitious HM. A number at the start of the season (i.e. those colonies that came out of winter alive) would be nice. I am sure the sbi's would like to know that too

 

[Into the lions den]

The figure quoted is apiaries not colonies.
It would be nice if BeeBase told you how many colonies there were rather than how many apiaries. Even a rough idea would be nice

Quite correct.........but

It is any place they have recorded as having bees on it over quite a protracted period.

Every season we submit our list of actual locations with bees, complete with hive numbers and map references, all kept on a spreadsheet I can e-mail in to the inspectors. Big list as its approx 140 sites during the OSR/fruit blossom season. When a disease discovery alert comes our way I get a blizzard of warnings, some relating to places where we have not had bees for several years as almost all our spring sites are ephemeral....there once only following the crop and next season they are in different places following the crop rotations.

Thus migratory operators can seriously skew the figures to show large numbers of apiaries in any given area, yet a majority of these place are probably vacant and no longer existent as an active apiary.

They try from time to time to tidy it up (our list anyway, no idea about other peoples), but everywhere we go there are many redundant entries on Beebase, ours and even more in aggregate from other people, so do not go thinking these numbers are anywhere near accurate.

Could be reasonably so in areas with little or no migratory beekeeping.

 

[Finman]

.
Every database has a problem, are they updated and when? ... In serious work.

If database is not usefull to members, they do not care, what is the quality of information.. And beekeeping is a hobby and average age of members is __ years.

I doubt that it works.

 

[TryingToLetThemBee]

I sometimes struggle to find the queen on five frames (one such is completely invisible to me), let alone five or six deeps. So I went the lazy way this year and still got a decent yield. Lots of chestnut and no lime though; I would like some of your fireweed, finski.

 

[mbc]

Quite correct.........but

It is any place they have recorded as having bees on it over quite a protracted period.

Every season we submit our list of actual locations with bees, complete with hive numbers and map references, all kept on a spreadsheet I can e-mail in to the inspectors. Big list as its approx 140 sites during the OSR/fruit blossom season. When a disease discovery alert comes our way I get a blizzard of warnings, some relating to places where we have not had bees for several years as almost all our spring sites are ephemeral....there once only following the crop and next season they are in different places following the crop rotations.

Thus migratory operators can seriously skew the figures to show large numbers of apiaries in any given area, yet a majority of these place are probably vacant and no longer existent as an active apiary.

They try from time to time to tidy it up (our list anyway, no idea about other peoples), but everywhere we go there are many redundant entries on Beebase, ours and even more in aggregate from other people, so do not go thinking these numbers are anywhere near accurate.

Could be reasonably so in areas with little or no migratory beekeeping.

There's probably a fair balance of duplicate/obsolete entries bumping the figures up, and off grid beekeepers not on the system. Also it will differ from area to area, a diligent sbi having been in the post for a good number of seasons will have beebase reasonably accurate for their patch, whereas large areas covered by low density of sbi's with high turnover will be hopelessly messy.
The popularity of associations also has a bearing, good ones attracting the majority of beekeepers in their catchment therefore these beekeepers being on grid, and the converse, poorly run associations making a high proportion of beekeepers in their area effectively underground.

 

[Obee1]

Quite correct.........but

It is any place they have recorded as having bees on it over quite a protracted period.

Every season we submit our list of actual locations with bees, complete with hive numbers and map references, all kept on a spreadsheet I can e-mail in to the inspectors. Big list as its approx 140 sites during the OSR/fruit blossom season. When a disease discovery alert comes our way I get a blizzard of warnings, some relating to places where we have not had bees for several years as almost all our spring sites are ephemeral....there once only following the crop and next season they are in different places following the crop rotations.

Thus migratory operators can seriously skew the figures to show large numbers of apiaries in any given area, yet a majority of these place are probably vacant and no longer existent as an active apiary.

They try from time to time to tidy it up (our list anyway, no idea about other peoples), but everywhere we go there are many redundant entries on Beebase, ours and even more in aggregate from other people, so do not go thinking these numbers are anywhere near accurate.

Could be reasonably so in areas with little or no migratory beekeeping.

When you move the hives do you have to keep finding new sites? - and do you always have permission from the landowner? Just wondering how much work goes into sourcing the sites each year.

 

[For want of a better word]

I sometimes struggle to find the queen on five frames (one such is completely invisible to me), let alone five or six deeps. So I went the lazy way this year and still got a decent yield. Lots of chestnut and no lime though; I would like some of your fireweed, finski.

Rosebay willowherb..... acres of the weed in Cornwall... but according to an ethno botanist I had the pleasure of chatting with at this years BOAD conference in West Cornwall.... lacked full nectaries this year

Mytten da

 

[Into the lions den]

When you move the hives do you have to keep finding new sites? - and do you always have permission from the landowner? Just wondering how much work goes into sourcing the sites each year.

Bit of yes, bit of no.

Most of our biggest landowners/farms just send us their crop maps each spring, and we choose for ourselves, just no putting them anywhere stupid.

Others are a lot more likely to want close involvement and that means a visit and a run round with the farmer/gamekeeper/owner or whatever.

Our winter locations are fairly stable and ditto the heather places, though we always keep a list of yields and drop any habitual underperforming spots and get new, two or three (sometimes more) each season.

Sorting out the sites in spring generally takes me about a week, and about three days before the heather (one day to each of our main areas). This can shorten or extend, according to how easy it is to catch up with the relevant people and if you need to come back another day. Appointments do not always work as we are unimportant relative to thi9ngs that can crop up all of a sudden in an agricultural operation.You have to meet the people, renew permissions, and have a chat with them, always showing an interest in THEIR world, and discuss any issues they may have had about the bees the year before, just to keep relations well cemented.

Travelling a long way (ie to Hereford and Gloucester) just on a renewal visit is a bit of a PITA, but its essential. No landowner likes to have the use of their land taken for granted.