super full of honey still?

[oliver90owner]

I'm open to correction but I thought it was 40-44 POUNDS???

No! it's me for the correction. 40kgs is about 2.2 times too high! It should have read 20kg.

Yes, mixing up imperial numbers with SI units.

Thanks.

Regards, RAB

 

[Vergilius]

I've got into bees because I find both them and their care fascinating: but I dont think that goes against making a profit from them.

Skyhook,

I did not say that making a profit is a bad thing. What I meant was that the survival of the colony comes first, profit second.

By the way I do not know why my original post says "sc'canola' (osr) every little scrap of profit" it is meant to say "sc'canola' (osr) every little scrap of profit".


Ben P

 

[Teemore]

Well, I can understand that part of your answer but dont see how the rest of the answer is relevent to the original question....or to what I posted either.

More pot stirring!!

I must have read a different post! ;p

 

[JamesB]

they might think,, "hey, look at all this food for the winter,,, we can now have a bigger family"

I don't think bees are that stupid. Certainly some strains do breed excessively for their particular locale late into the autumn, but that is the beekeeper's fault not of the bees making.

Using local queens for heading colonies is not always chosen; some replacements bought in can be appropriate and widens the gene pool but this is not a scenario thought about or even understood by many of those that follow that route. Those beekeepers are usually the ones that are only interested in a particular trait, to the exclusion of a better, balanced choice of strain for the particular environment or even specific habitat.

Well adjusted strains normally store enough for winter and are frugal with those hard-earned goodies. The size of the colony is reduced mainly by reduced lay-rate (therefore feeding) of the queen and a bit by exclusion of drones from the hive. The beekeeper only takes the excess or often rather more than that and replaces those needed supplies with sugar syrup (feeding for over-wintering).

It is a balance or compromise. Any greeedy beekeper who takes (and doesn't replace) too much honey from the hive is likely to lose that colony over the winter. They are no longer proper, responsible beekeepers if they continue in that fashion, IMO. Go back 100 years and colonies were often destroyed to gain the crop, 150 years and most were destroyed for the crop. That is not an acceptable method these days when the framed hive is available for production, or even TBHs (where only surplus comb is removed).

Humans have caused so much grief for the bees, and other fauna, by modern agricultural practices. It is about time every beekeeper started to think about their actions and not just follow the 'sales line' of the supplier, simply out to make a good living off the beekeeper's unfortunate ignorance (of the damage they may be doing to a species already stressed to the limits by actions of previous 'beekeepers' and the modern methods of agriculture - which will include monocrops and use of pesticides).

Regards, RAB

Wells said and totally agree (and quite relevant to the opening post), all these years of pesticides and other cides building up in the eco-system aint doing any good added to this are the issues of monocrops and particulary in the USA where bees are transported 1000's of miles to a new site every few days for pollenisation all means bad news for the humble hard working HoneyBee,
All i can do is provide a enviroment where the bee's get a choice of forage for the majority of the year/all year, leave them plenty of food for the winter and well basically make sure they want for nothing.

 

[Vergilius]

A poor-quality life

I found this most shocking. In NZ beekeepers make massses of money from pollination and one of the crops they make their bees pollinate is the kiwi fruit. This may seem ok but the kiwi fruit has no nectar so the bees have to be permanently fed sugar syrup and never eat their natural food.

Talk about a dull life, the same crop for miles on end and no reward for their efforts.



Ben P