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Thread: Pesticide combination affects bees' ability to learn - comments anyone?

  1. #41

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    We have but little OSR here. I am aware that swarming at the rape or soon afterwards is common and can understand why that most likely occurs. What puzzles me is why supercedure is also common at this time?
    If the hives are located well into the OSR field, the yield will be higher than if the hives are some distance outside the field. I wonder if this is because bees go elsewhere in preference to the OSR, I know that being in a rape field can be a distinctly unpleasant experience; pollen and dust everywhere and an unpleasant smell.

  2. #42
    Administrator gavin's Avatar
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    Bees will fly long distances for rape when they have to which tends to suggest that they really like it. I've seen bees exiting a field in Aberdeenshire as a dark cloud approached (was doing some research at the time) in the direction of a large apiary about 10km away. We had mapped the local apiaries as best we could using local knowledge. It was spring rape and there wasn't much else around at that time of year for them. They don't get much of a crop at that distance of course - honey yield falls off over a few km. In May they mostly had an overabundance of rape nearby.

    As far as I can tell supercedure can happen at any time, and the recent poor springs here seem to have caused much early supercedure, whether in a rape area or not.

  3. #43

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    Plenty of supercedure with mine last year. No rape for many miles.

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