Dear Charles,


Whether we call it an "unpredictable set of circumstances" (Juanse) or "luck" (myself, Peter Borst), there are issues beyond your control that can affect your annual income when you are a beekeeper.  And that makes it very difficult to plan ahead.  Can you pay the mortgage next year, and still commit to the ongoing cost of your child's college tuition?  What about buying that next new (or used) vehicle that you desperately need?  Or, can you cope with that increase in property/school taxes we just had (100% here in my area this last year 2015)?  Would you like to take a vacation....ever?  Many of the best vacations require a year's advance reservation.


In beekeeping, it is location, location....or market, market (!) or maybe connections, connections...whatever the parameter, you don't have the control you claim to have.  Even people like Randy Oliver are dependent on outside income (giving presentations, writing articles, getting online donations) to supplement their beekeeping endeavors.


I love beekeeping and I do not criticize anyone who has to work outside of beekeeping (including Randy, of course) in order to "put bread on the table".  But to claim you have the ability to control your degree of success, if you know what you are doing, is just plain fantasy, IMO.  My dad left beekeeping to become a marine dealer, I left it to become a professor.  Luck is less of an issue for us these days.


Christina

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