Making a difference?

[Jon]

Best wishes John. Gavin and myself will also be away all weekend at a bee conference.

Re the marketing:

the starting point comes from the fact that customers at the door and at markets repeatedly express that the concern that bees are in trouble. Looked after properly that is not the case but it is the public's perception. If you think about it she is more likely to raise funds from the wider public so we opened with that line

I work for a charity and it is obvious that you can raise more money by using photos of malnourished children with a tear running down the cheek being comforted by a concerned (white) charity worker. The public buy into this but in the long term it is unhelpful as it promotes an image of dependency rather than something positive. The more progressive charities such as Oxfam have clear policies about the language and images they use to fundraise.

I think that as beekeepers we need to try and educate the general public rather than feeding into the daft scare stories published by the Daily Mail and others.
It becomes a self perpetuating load of nonsense - often accompanied by the 'Einstein quotation' about mankind only having 4 more years left to live once all the bees are gone.

The tail should not be wagging the dog re this issue.

[Mellifera Crofter]

... John, Luisa's mentor, is a fine fellow of the highest order. ...

Gavin, nobody questioned John's motives or criticised him in any way - nor even did anybody question Luisa's motives.

... Being new to this medium I find the way some people misunderstand and then criticise disappointing. ...

John, what had been misunderstood and then been criticised on the basis of this misunderstanding?

... With that in mind the practical minimum you need to make a simple living is about 200 hives so if you are starting from scratch you have to have at least £50,000 in the bank. ...
So what to do if you really want to make keeping bees your life but don't have that sort of reserves ...?

Yes, what do you do? Luisa's solution was to ask people to fund her own business.

... some of you are critical of her for exploiting the poor trainees ...

I never used the word 'exploiting', John, and I don't think anybody else did, either. I'm sure the trainees will benefit from the experience. My point was that she was using the training of new beekeepers (by them working for her for free) just as she used the 'declining honey bees' story as a reason for funding her. She is running a business and needs help. It's fine to ask trainees to work for free in exchange for learning a trade - but I'm not sure about asking others to fund this.

... Ps Kitta - I meant to say that I wonder if you're misunderstanding the concept of "crowd funding". As I understand it you give some money to a crowd funded project, the project then can go ahead, and you get whatever it is your level of "donation" has purchased at the end of it all. So really some way away from a straight "buying" scenario. ...

Yes, I've had another look on that website. I saw other people also asking for money to fund their own businesses. However, the best and most prominent ones are group projects benefitting a community, not a private business. As for the 'rewards' in Luisa's case - an angel's smile, recipes or how-to instructions. The highest one is a day in the apiary. The best one is two hours learning how to make candles. It remains asking for money to fund your business.

The most important points about this are, however, what Jon (and others) made and I can't add to that.
Kitta

[John M]

In response to Jon at 10.35 (I have yet to master including a quote) have a glance at this.
http://www.scottish.parliament.uk/vi...arn/73903.aspx

Even I think one of the figures is in error but if our Government thinks there is a problem it must be true. ( Before you explode, my tongue is firmly in my cheek)

Mellifera Crofter,
I am already behind schedule for getting down south so cannot respond today. I feel strongly about some of the comments so may come back to you next week.

[drumgerry]

Those Scottish Government "facts" are heavily weighted by their dealings with and the experience of the Bee Farmers Association. 75% decline in bee colonies in 2013? - oh ffs come on!

[Jon]

John. You do the quote by selecting the reply with quote button at the bottom and deleting the text you don't want.

If you want to cut and paste from elsewhere you use the speech bubble button at the top right of the window you are typing in.

Nice to see the Scottish parliament include the fictitious Einstein quote!!
Wholly extinct indeed.
>Without pollination of crops, produce etc. by honey bees scientists predict that humankind will become wholly extinct within four years

[Jon]

Those Scottish Government "facts" are heavily weighted by their dealings with and the experience of the Bee Farmers Association. 75% decline in bee colonies in 2013? - oh ffs come on!

One guy was left with 20 colonies out of about 2000 apparently.
I wonder why the beefarmers were hit the hardest.
Could it be that the boxes are filled with bees not suited to a wet northern climate?

[drumgerry]

Nail on the head there Jon! Wonder what the scale of imports is or is going to be this year by the commercial guys. Wasn't the lauded rescue package a two year deal?

And another thing - should we take the mass deaths of southern European imports in a normal Scottish winter as being evidence of the "demise of the bees" and the end of life as we know it?! I think you know my answer to that!

[Adam]

One guy was left with 20 colonies out of about 2000 apparently.
I wonder why the beefarmers were hit the hardest.
Could it be that the boxes are filled with bees not suited to a wet northern climate?

And a relatively new beekeeper wants to make a career out of keeping bees with non-natives in Scotland?

[gavin]

Those Scottish Government "facts" are heavily weighted by their dealings with and the experience of the Bee Farmers Association. 75% decline in bee colonies in 2013? - oh ffs come on!

It strikes me that these 'Facts' come from politicians in the Scottish Parliament being fed stuff from another 'Save the Bee' initiative (which itself is trying to do good, even if it is playing footloose and fancy free with the facts). So not Bee Farmers but smaller scale bee enthusiasts. The Scottish Government itself runs surveys and collects data - they would be more careful I think.

[gavin]

When the losses in 2012-13 were becoming apparent I asked Steve, the SG lead bee inspector, whether the losses were higher in any one type of bee. We also discussed it on here. Not in his view - there were high losses with some who had dark local mongrels and some who had carnie imports.

One guy was left with 20 colonies out of about 2000 apparently.
I wonder why the beefarmers were hit the hardest.
Could it be that the boxes are filled with bees not suited to a wet northern climate?

In the case you're thinking of (perhaps - the numbers aren't quite right) my impression - from hearing some things and seeing where the bees were - was that poor forage and poor bee management were to blame for such catastrophic losses. Others who I respect said that they did not think that there was an obvious cause (apart from the poor previous summer and the long hard winter I mean). All I know is that hobbyists in the same area had losses but not catastrophic losses, and generally weak colonies in spring.

There were probably factors that we don't understand. That spring my bees were of acceptable vigour and raised drones at the usual time yet those of Murray around me were very weak and late to make drones. I regard him as a better beekeeper than me, and I don't think his stocks differed much genetically from mine.

So yes, soft southern bees need more food, but high losses do not always equate with strain. Varroa control, appropriate feeding, and semi-decent forage tops everything else. Beyond that there may still be factors we do not understand. Maybe. However the SG presented data at a recent conference that shows a very strong correlation between an estimate of summer apiary Varroa count with winter losses in their random apiary survey.