> But the old adage still applies:'All beekeeping is local'.

Such a statement is fraught with peril. If your success is local, could it be that it cannot be reproduced elsewhere? In another locality what you see may simply not apply. Further, most beekeeping in this country is not local at all, since the beekeepers are migratory by nature. They may take advantage of local conditions, but they can hardly be said to have a particular locality. 

But beyond that, honey bees have never been restricted to a particular locality, any more than people have. There may be isolated pockets which tend to develop characters of their own, but these don't last. Every day another human language is lost, and more people adopt English, Mandarin, or another of the major languages, so the tendency of the world is to become less local. 

Only isolationists (xenophobes) hold forth on the virtues of isolation, the rest of us prefer to take advantage of being members of a huge interdependent network, in which information, goods, and services flow freely. Sure, there are many downsides to this system -- contagions of all sorts (viruses, both biological and cybernetic abound). Bad ideas and bad food still create pain and death. 

But the networked world has the capacity to spread good ideas, to allow us to share what we know, to battle secrecy and willful ignorance. In a small community, conformity can cripple creativity, while the same creativity will flourish in a more diverse environment. 

I suggest beekeeping is not particularly local at all. Like it or not, bees and people are everywhere and go everywhere. Some of our chief features are the ability to change, adapt, and grow.

PLB

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