Grow, or die!

[Neonach]

As the only beekeeper here in this group of islands and with extremes of environment - wild flowers and heather to die for, but alas very windy! - it's all down to me. It's extremely unlikely that escaped bees will survive a winter, thus no feral honey bees, and certainly i've never seen any. So there's s no wider pool of honeybees to complicate breeding or disease/pest control, but also no help either. The only drones are my drones, and certainly only my queens. This makes beekeeping extremely precarious for a beginner starting with one or two colonies!

I've come to the conclusion that the only way to make this sustainable is to try and rapidly grow to a minimum say 15 or 16 hives at 3 or 4 apiaries, each 3 or more miles apart. (I can use my own house/garden and the croft for two of these, and I've got a few borrowed sites in mind also). Likewise, I would like to have three or four bloodlines at each apiary. Where did I get these numbers from? Umm, well, just thinking about it really, based on the admittedly very limited experience to date.

All books and reference materials I've have or have come across implicitly assume a location where there are other bees in the district: I have absolutely nothing to go on, other than comparison with Andrew Abraham in Colonsay: I was one of his first students back in 2009 and greatly inspired by what I saw and learnt, but my situation is more difficult not only because of a more severe environment, but also because since he started we've seen the onset of varroa and a huge inward migration of non-native bees.

Going back to the numbers, my idea is to get into a situation where I have sufficient numbers and diversity at each apiary to ensure good mating, and sufficient apiaries to avoid the risk of total wipe-out. Beekeeping here is expensive (transport costs for purchases, no-one to share equipment with, higher requirement for winter feeding), so I need to scale up to quite a good size to cover costs, never mind a modest return for my efforts!

Selling is not really a problem. Neonachina and I already have a wee shop in the garden where as well as the handspinning and weaving we sell fresh produce, preserves made from our own-grown fruit etc. Honey - the only honey available in the islands here - would absolutely fly off the shelf. I think almost everyone who sees the hives asks if there's honey for sale! Oh I wish!

My short term plan is to get to next spring with more healthy hives than I had this spring, and to be in a position to double the number during 2012. I also want to buy a spinner in 2012 (or possibly alternatively to sell cut comb?). Lots of money needed for that, when it's very much in short supply.

Any thoughts or advice very welcome.

PS: I have no experience of bees other than Amm, and introducing another type would nearly double my work and make life very complicated. But I can't help but feel that Amm should logically be the best suited to conditions here. Or am I tying one hand behind my back?