> Its not really safe to compare two single years-unless you are confident that there is little year to year variation

Why would you assume that I deliberately skewed the numbers, rather than that I picked representative numbers?

Did you look at the sources? They were both US government publications which attempted to show the state of beekeeping in the USA at those two junctures. Honestly, does anyone else BUT me have honey production numbers going back into the 1800s? Well, I do. 

Averages, according to a Roger Morse article in ABJ, 1983

1930  35# @ colony  
1940  46
1950  42
1960  49
1970  52
1980  44

low 
1933  33#
high
1969  60#

number of colonies was essentially steady , with a peak around WW II

1899  4.1 million colonies
1909  3.4
1919  3.5
1930  4.7
1940  4.4
1950  5.6
1960  5.0
1970  4.3
1980  4.1

low
1909  3.4
high
1947  5.9

Both Randy and I take seriously the role of bringing good information to the public. Usually you see figures like the number of colonies went from 6 million to 2 million, leaving out most of the important facts, such as changes in accounting practices, the wars, the impact of honey imports, etc

PLB

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