I'm showing my age, but after 40 years working with bees, I'm sticking with
my original terms and definitions for beekeeping in USA. They are simple
and reflect my own bias:
1) Hobby beekeeper - has one or a small number of colonies, keeps bees
mainly for enjoyment. Doesn't mind making some money selling honey, maybe
making bee boxes, etc.
2) Sideliner beekeeper - has another business or a day job that provides
the majority of income, runs enough colonies to make the beekeeping part a
business, not just a hobby. Often has from a few dozen to a few hundred
colonies. May or may not keep bees for enjoyment, does want to make a profit
to supplement the main business or job. (Often ends up subsidizing the
bee operatiion from the other business or job).
3) Commercial - makes their primary income from beekeeping - whether honey
production, pollination, queen and package production, or some
combination of these activities. (And, for most, by my definition, a commercial
beekeeper makes enough to support a family - I'm not talking about some hermit
living in a hut off the income of a small number of hives). Generally
likes bees (I've met a few who don't); its too much work to do unless you like
bees.
If you ask me 'how many colonies' - that's a bit of a geographical and
business issue. I've seen a few beekeepers make a family living off of 500
colonies, but these are usually folks who have a diverse set of activities to
produce income, often living in a semi-rural area where they have local
customers for queens, packages, honey, some truck garden pollination, maybe
write about bees, sell bee equipment, etc.
Normally, I don't see many established 'commercial' operations (big enough
to support a family) much under 1,000 colonies, and in western states,
like MT and the Dakotas, I consider 2500-3500 to be more typical of minimum
size, with 5-10,000 not uncommon, and the upper limit as high as 80,000 or
more.
I do not like the new trend to rename hobby and sideliner beekeepers as
'sustainable' beekeeping, implying that commercial beekeeping is not
sustainable.
I'd argue that most hobby beekeeping is only sustainable because the
beekeeper takes extraordinary steps to keep bees alive - feeding, re-queening,
replace losses with packages, etc. Run a profit/loss analysis, and its not
sustainable other than from the 'keeping' by the person putting money and
effort into keeping the colonies going.
Of the sideliners, tell me you've successfully kept up you colony numbers
for 10 years or more, and I'll grant you the term - sustainable. I've
known lots of sidelines, who started growing their bee business, catching
swarms, buying up old equipment, etc. Works fine for a few years, then
problems like mites, breakdown of comb and re-emergence of spores-induced disease,
having too many colonies to manage, or a couple of drought years cause the
whole operation to suddenly go belly up financially.
Commercial - that's a bit of a self-selecting issue. Increase the size of
the operation, and the management logistics increase. Yes, you may make
more money, but you can also get into trouble fast. As Allen commented,
finding someone who can successfully manage a large bee operation is not easy.
Thus, I tend to think that large scale bee operations, ESPECIALLY those
that have either transcended several generations, or have been the major
source of income for most of the career life of the beekeeper are the
SUSTAINABLE beekeeping operations.
Jerry
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