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Thread: Do beekeepers live longer

  1. #1

    Default Do beekeepers live longer

    I was told the other day that beekeepers live longer. The person who said this added it was just an observation rather than an established fact. What does everyone else think? Is there any basis for this?

  2. #2
    Administrator gavin's Avatar
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    LOL! I wouldn't pay too much attention to that fellow - he can bulls&%*£ along with the best of them. But your car-share person and the fellow I met in Perth might suggest it was true. Or is it simply that beekeeping keeps you going out and even being sociable, so the old ones are noticed more?

    Looking forward to seeing what the rest make of this.

    G.

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    I think it's just that from February to April feels like 100 years

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    Senior Member Jon's Avatar
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    Well they live longer than lion tamers, bungee jumpers, mercenaries and deep fried Mars bar aficionados.

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    Administrator gavin's Avatar
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    I rest my case. These Chinese know a thing or two about living long lives.

    http://en.uuuwell.com/article-244536-1.html

    For anyone unwilling to click the link, Confucius, he say:

    '.... hundred people to more than 200 people over a letter, investigate and understand the reasons for their longevity, a careful analysis of these when he wrote back, we found a striking phenomenon: there are 143 of these people is longevity beekeepers, there are 34 people had been kept a bee people. Thus the first to propose "beekeepers longevity" argument. Our physician, nutrition and health experts to investigate career longevity analysis of consensus, in turn discharge the order of 10 kinds of career longevity: First, beekeepers, and second, the modern farmer, third, musician, painter Fourth, Fifth, writers and artists, six medical staff, seven sports workers, eight horticulture operators, nine are archaeologists, ten is a monk.'

    I believe that Google helped turn the Chinese into some sort of variant of English. I'm sticking to beekeeping as a hobby, and eating plenty of Chinese carry-outs just to be sure.
    Last edited by gavin; 07-03-2012 at 12:49 AM.

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    Senior Member Jon's Avatar
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    A koi carp named Hanako lived to the ripe old age of 226 and there is no record of it ever keeping bees in a national, Warré or top bar hive.

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    Administrator gavin's Avatar
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    LOL! The Fortingall Yew is reputed to be about 5000 years old and although it is a mere shell of its former self I'll bet in its prime it was home to the odd colony or two. Unfortunately I have no proof.

    http://www.forestry.gov.uk/forestry/INFD-6UFC5F

    Interestingly, there is a yew in the estate where I keep my bees which might be (the yew, not the estate nor the bees) even older. And there are bees in the castle roof mere yards from the yew.

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    Senior Member Jon's Avatar
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    5000 years? Pah, tis but a sapling!

    http://news.nationalgeographic.com/n...dest-tree.html

    And this one is no spring chicken and has at least two distinct colonies in it.
    They are definitely honey bees as one stung me right between the eyes Sunday week ago.





    This one is far bigger and likely has bees in it but I haven't paid homage to it in a long time.

    http://www.mexconnect.com/articles/7...e-in-the-world
    Last edited by Jon; 07-03-2012 at 12:50 AM.

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    Administrator gavin's Avatar
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    Re-sprouting from rootstocks hardly counts but I'll give you that, it is old. The Druids will have been dancing naked round the Fortingall Yew in its prime, anxious about the bees in that tree stinging them between the ... well, between something.

    El Arbol de Tule is a mere baby though.

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    Senior Member Jon's Avatar
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    Would look good in a back garden I reckon.
    Oneupmanship over the neighbours who insist on planting Leylandii and Castlewellan Gold.

    There must be beekeepers on some of the National Executive bodies who are at least 200 years old and I have not mentioned the BBKA up to this point.

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