Treatment Free

[Erichalfbee]

Yes. I was.

 

[For want of a better word]

Are you talking about full time commercial beekeepers that make their entire income from their beefarming business?

That cuts out most of us then... Willie with his cosmetics... and a bloke up on the hills who makes ( Very good wrc Beehives)... another one who owns a couple of cornershops... and another who keeps pigs... one that supplements his income from growing Christmsas trees ( nice trees too .. I get one every year!!)

Come to think of it I think most Beefarmers have a second string ... or several to their bow..... can I interest anyone in a nice Norton 750, recently restored for £23000???

Yeghes da

 

[iann41]

can I interest anyone in a nice Norton 750, recently restored for £23000???

got any pics?

 

[beebopper]

That cuts out most of us then... Willie with his cosmetics... and a bloke up on the hills who makes ( Very good wrc Beehives)... another one who owns a couple of cornershops... and another who keeps pigs... one that supplements his income from growing Christmsas trees ( nice trees too .. I get one every year!!)

Come to think of it I think most Beefarmers have a second string ... or several to their bow..... can I interest anyone in a nice Norton 750, recently restored for £23000???

Yeghes da

Sorry but it looks to me that your original post are a little misleading (well they mislead me anyway). It appears to me that your are including in beefarmers category people who only derive a relatively small part of their income from bees.

 

[For want of a better word]

got any pics?

Bit off topic but similar to this restoration from 2014
https://www.bonhams.com/auctions/21897/lot/226/

I put a few hours of winter downtime into rebuilding the 750 motors.. mostly with Norvill parts... my college is a panel beater and he does most of the cycle parts and tinware, Hagon does the wheelbuilding ( Highly Recommended)
Bonhams take a chunk of the profit in commission... but can put machines out to a world market.

Chons da

 

[For want of a better word]

Sorry but it looks to me that your original post are a little misleading (well they mislead me anyway). It appears to me that your are including in beefarmers category people who only derive a relatively small part of their income from bees.

Probably variable.... I was just looking at Beefarmers Association members that I know.... and I do not know all of them... as as SWMBO says... you are probably wrong!

Chons da

 

[beebopper]

Probably variable.... I was just looking at Beefarmers Association members that I know.... and I do not know all of them... as as SWMBO says... you are probably wrong!

Chons da

Well what about the person who has a couple of corner shops? Are they running those and several hundred colonies?

If somebody tells me they are a beefarmer it gives me the impression they are making a living mainly from that income. If I say I am a teacher then people assume that is my main job - I may make a few quid from exam marking, tutoring and selling a few jars of honey but my main income is my teaching salary

Anyway I cannot be wrong that I was mislead by your post - may be my fault but it certainly mislead me.

 

[beebopper]

.... can I interest anyone in a nice Norton 750, recently restored for £23000???

Yeghes da

Your are selling it for at a massive loss .

Ed. Sorry just re read it - that is not yours for £6-7000. Have prices really gone up that much?
Seems that could be a better money spinner that working with bees.

 

[For want of a better word]

Well what about the person who has a couple of corner shops? Are they running those and several hundred colonies?

If somebody tells me they are a beefarmer it gives me the impression they are making a living mainly from that income. If I say I am a teacher then people assume that is my main job - I may make a few quid from exam marking, tutoring and selling a few jars of honey but my main income is my teaching salary

Anyway I cannot be wrong that I was mislead by your post - may be my fault but it certainly mislead me.

Beefarming is by its very nature a seasonal business... and most that I know have other income streams that occupy their off season months.

I can not see the problem?

Chons da

 

[SDM]

Nicely trolled, libellous one. He never claimed to know why, he just claimed to have observed 2 mechanisms (chucking out infested brood and chewed mites on the baseboards). A couple of years ago a 3rd mechanism was observed in his hives, which you allude to.

His website still claims he selectively bred in resistance
But then its full of garbage. He started not treating because he claims his inseminated queens kept getting superseded, his reasoning was that the chemicals he used were affecting drone sperm , ignoring the influence of tbe viruses in the drone sperm. Basically his lack of any research ability meant he had no controls in place to draw his conclusions and got it totally wrong.
I'll take that libel case and spit him out.

 

[Hivemaker.]

Beefarming is by its very nature a seasonal business... and most that I know have other income streams that occupy their off season months.

It is seasonal, here the season is twelve months a year doing beefarming related work, don't own any corner shops or pig farms, wouldn't have time for that.

 

[mazzamazda]

It is seasonal, here the season is twelve months a year doing beefarming related work, don't own any corner shops or pig farms, wouldn't have time for that.

Same here.......

 

[Anduril]

Beefarming is by its very nature a seasonal business... and most that I know have other income streams that occupy their off season months.

I can not see the problem?

Chons da

I know of one like that, they are small fry in comparison (120 hives) now retired from the army. The bigger operations only have bees as their main income. It's a bit like hobby beekeeping, seasonal 12 months of the year.

 

[beebopper]

It is seasonal, here the season is twelve months a year doing beefarming related work, don't own any corner shops or pig farms, wouldn't have time for that.

Exactly.

 

[beebopper]

I know of one other (80 hives). He says he RARELY has to treat. Started using local survivor stock when his Italians were killed by varroa in 1992-3. He says these give a good consistent crop of honey and long term, slightly more than the Italians.

There is a little-talked-about fact about non treatment. Mites need brood to multiply. Intensive honey farming uses stimulative feeding to keep numbers up, so there's always brood. Non treaters are generally also leave-alone beeks with static hives and allow their bees to have brood breaks - to match local forage patterns.

Tom Seeley gave an interesting talk at the NHS about feral bees which survive in the secluded forest areas in North east of US.
They have varroa but survive obviously without treatment. This shows that it can be done - my query would be about the specifics of the honey crop they achieve.

 

[beebopper]

I know of one like that, they are small fry in comparison (120 hives) now retired from the army. :

This precisely illustrates my point.

To called the retired army guy a beefarmer I think is a little misleading as he is not reliant on the income from his bees to survive economically.

Having to get a crop/income in order to feed yourself (and your family if you have one) changes the dynamics. A few failures and it could be bread and water whereas if you have an Army pension to fall back on a few failures may simply mean no pudding.

 

[For want of a better word]

This precisely illustrates my point.

To called the retired army guy a beefarmer I think is a little misleading as he is not reliant on the income from his bees to survive economically.

Having to get a crop/income in order to feed yourself (and your family if you have one) changes the dynamics. A few failures and it could be bread and water whereas if you have an Army pension to fall back on a few failures may simply mean no pudding.

Or more tonic in the Gin!

However it would be interesting to see how many of the "Beefarmers"... ie with more than the number of colonies (BBKA say 40) actually rely solely on the income from their beefarming activities excluding the profit from sale of honey... bulk or otherwise.



Yeghes da

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

To called the retired army guy a beefarmer I think is a little misleading as he is not reliant on the income from his bees to survive economically.

Which is why the OP specified 'Commercial' rather than bee farmer, it is a fine distinction, there are quite a few bee farmers who are but bee dabblers, some who have a fair number of hives, make a moderate income from it but it is not their sole source of income, then those who see it as their main source of income.
Same as general agriculture really - there are those who keep a few rescue hens and goats in their over large gardens, have a holding number therefore could be classed as 'farmers' those who work hard in their smallholdings but still have to have another job to make ends meet or treat it as a hobby then the larger 'commercial' affairs.
With beekeeping, the dabblers and the smaller scale farmers (or large scale hobbyists) can afford to experiment with treatment free etc as it's not the end of the world if it all goes Pete Tong.

 

[roche]

Or more tonic in the Gin!

However it would be interesting to see how many of the "Beefarmers"... ie with more than the number of colonies (BBKA say 40) actually rely solely on the income from their beefarming activities excluding the profit from sale of honey... bulk or otherwise.



Yeghes da

I did a "back of an envelope business plan" about 10 years ago, and figured that the minimum number of colonies for a sustainable business was about 200. Looking back, I think now that was probably optimistic...
Interestingly, 200 colonies was the number (in 1968) that the NZ government regarded as a commercial operation.

 

[domino]

Tom Seeley gave an interesting talk at the NHS about feral bees which survive in the secluded forest areas in North east of US.
They have varroa but survive obviously without treatment. This shows that it can be done - my query would be about the specifics of the honey crop they achieve.

You can read his paper here:

https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0150362

My observation would be these bees aren't managed. I'm not sure how long the combination of traits that enable them to thrive would survive even the most basic of beekeeping practices - i.e. putting them in a yard with other hives.