" If the goal is to follow
> Darwinian beekeeping, and part of Darwinian beekeeping is to reproduce (as
> closely as possible) natural colony density levels, and natural colony
> density levels amount to 2.5 to 5 colonies per square mile, you very well
> may find the neighbor down the street that has 3 colonies in his back yard
> just eliminated your possibility of actually following Darwinian beekeeping
> accurately by already possessing all of the colonies that your location may
> naturally hold."

Seeley is not telling anyone how to do things. His book describes what he has learned from the wild bees etc... For example, I'm in bear country which makes it impractical to space colonies at distances other than to fence up to 10 or 20 colonies per yard inside electric fencing. All he is doing is giving suggestions of changes beekeepers can make to allow the bees to realize their evolutionary adaptations that have evolved over millions of years. Location would be important as well as the type of beekeeping in any given area.

If beekeepers are losing their bees annually and replace with treated colonies they are in no way close to practicing Darwinian at any level. Wolves in sheep's clothing.    

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