And what did he say?Originally Posted by Jon
And what did he say?
Hi Pete. Don't know. I haven't heard back from the PRO yet.
Trouble with Ireland is the two jurisdictions as an import ban would be worthless without it applying to both.
GB got varroa in 1992 and Ireland got its first case in 1998 in the Sligo/Leitrim area when someone brought a couple of colonies in from England.
It is possible to keep new pathogens off the island if people behave responsibly.
Connemara was varroa free until relatively recently until a beginner brought a colony in from Dublin without talking to any of the locals first.
Ask Ger about it.
Hi Jon. Seems ridiculous not to have an immediate ban on imports for UK and Ireland, under the circumstances, there was very soon a ban when SHB was found in Hawaii.
What is the general beefarmer view Pete? Are most of them pro or anti an immediate import ban.
Both of us sell a few UK reared queens within the UK so any restriction on imports would hardly be the end of the world.
The main victims of any restriction on bee movement would be those who specialise in queens and packages who ship to multiple European destinations.
I guess these people could be compensated for loss of trade.
Split views really, there are many who don't import any bees or queens at all, one of the biggest is here in the south west... then there are obviously some that import new queens every spring, like a kind of standing order. Would not be the end of the world for me as i produce enough of my own queens, anything between 700 to 1200 a season, and over winter plenty for use in early spring, this over wintering of queens is what i believe a lot more beekeepers should be doing, it is so easy to do, and even over wintering just a few would be beneficial if a lot more beekeepers were doing it.
Companies like Paynes and Bickerstaffe must make a good margin on a high volume of imported queens.
Not sure what they would be paying per queen for bulk orders but it is likely less than £10 and they are sold on at about £40.
Can you produce 1000 queens on your own or is that a team/family effort.
I have been trying to work out how many queens a sole trader could produce in the UK over an average summer but 1000 is way above my estimate.
Could produce a lot more, and no i don't do it on my own, have three of my sons working with me full time, but that is not just on the queen rearing obviously... Michael Collier produces a lot of queens, runs well over a thousand mating nucs, maybe two now, and he works mostly on his own, and has a full time job elsewhere... or did last time i was at his place a couple of years ago.
Pop an imported queen with a couple of frames of brood and the profit jumps up dramatically. I'd guess most "UK" produced nucs are made up like this, nice little earner if you don't worry about the environmental pollution aspect of importing queens.
Hi jon,
Many many years ago, as I'm sure I told you when I was more active, I got breeder queens for the buckfast bee and had the intention of supplying the country with buckfast bees. UBKA at the time wanted in on the act (incorporating it into phase 3 of leader) and attempted to recruit me for that purpose but it just was not feasible given travel and time plus I was not going to do it free of charge and UBKA pocket the profits.
The operation came to an end after a year and a half simply due to the amount of work involved in filling apideas, grafting feeding etc plus holding down a full time job and playing my part in raising 2 young children. I had about 20 hives then so plenty of bees to play with and it was just too much work for one person
I quickly learnt that this queen breeding lark for profit was for those with plenty of time on their hands and an understanding wife so that ended it.
In a way you are lucky as you do have lots of spare time and can work bees 24/7 and I am sure rely on many of the club members to give you support and a helping hand when needed. I could be wrong, but the limit for one person reasonable well organized I'd estimate to be around 150 apidas , more than this then things start to get on top of you and you dont have time to turn around. Apideas are very time consuming when you have a need to examine the or find a queen which is one reason why I am keen on my system that I showed you. The bottom line is that to raise 1000 queens you would need another full time person to help
good luck
Phil
The NZ queen raisers must be rubbing their hands. I can't see any bee health reason for denying NZ imports given that the EU has already agreed their standards are good enough for imports, and that Canterbury is 18,500 km from Gioia Tauro.
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