On 14/07/2014 4:16 AM, Peter L Borst wrote:
> an alternate take:
>
> In a discussion with Nick Calderone about painting hives different colors, he said that a variety of colors was useful for nucs in helping the queens to orient, but painting production hives was counterproductive. Better to paint them all the same color. If the supers are all different colors every time you come into the yard and add or subtract supers, the hives all look completely different. But with a uniform color, they look pretty much the same (taller or shorter, maybe). Also, placing them widely spaced is a lot more useful than marking the hives. He wanted at least six feet between hives.
>
> Disclaimer: I don't do any of this, but it makes perfect sense to me.


At the recent Queensland Beekeepers Association conference there was a 
presentation from a bloke who was electronically tagging field bees.   
The tags were read on exit and return.  IIRC there were four hives 
involved and they were widely spaced.  The amount of movement between 
hives was quite interesting, including at least one bee moving from 
parent hive for a week or so and then going back to mother.

Trevor Weatherhead might have a better memory of all the data than me, 
but then he is a trifle busy at the moment.  As far as I know it is not 
published yet.  At least I couldn't find it.

Geoff Manning

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