>"lies, damn lies, and statistics."  Amen to that! and thanks Pete, and Mr. Twain.

IMHO it is impossible to infer any reliable information from the chart. One, there is no such thing as an "average" colony or even an "average" operation. Over the decades the emphasis, geographic distribution, and operation size has shifted from manly eastern honey producers of moderate size to very large western migratory outfits. I am discounting hobby beekeepers only because even though they are the large majority of beeks they do not show up in the production statistics because of reporting error and they represent a fraction of overall colonies. The shift in emphasis from honey production to pollination and package and queen operations will result in a lot more reported colonies without a corresponding increase in overall honey production, skewing the per colony yield down.  

The reporting methods are woefully lacking.  Even as a small producer, I fill out the NASS survey each year but believe that I am in the minority. Our state statistics have remained at 50# +/_ for decades due to no real reliable reporting. My average remains around 3 times that but varies quite a bit from one year to the next. I worked on a report from our ag dept. and know that the registered colonies are perhaps half of the total count in the state. Any statistic that relies on voluntary self reporting is highly suspect. To take an unreliable bit of information and then use it to extrapolate large trends is a pretty good example of "garbage in garbage out".

The questions of  how land use, agricultural practice, and climate change effects honey yield would need to know how much honey is collected by bees in total over a given area. Counting colonies, even if accurate, will not tell you how much nectar is out there. Not that I have any answers as to how to do it better but I believe we would be best to admit that we just don't know rather then rely on questionable statistics.

Paul Hosticka
Dayton WA

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