According to the engine "powering" our listserve, there are 902 recipients, not 3000....and I have appreciated everyone's responses to this point.  Thank you!

I picked out a few observations from the discussion so far:

"Hobbyists may be key to the survival of the bees but commercial beekeepers are key to the pollination of crops and the security of food production. Each has a role to play."  --Des Cannon

"Hobbyists are important because that is one avenue to become a commercial bee keeper. (Working for one is the second, inheriting Dad's business the third.)"  --Jorg Kewisch

"What you are going to keep track of is not individual hives, but yards."  -- Stan Sandler

"Hobby beekeepers can vote, and this is the one area where "more beekeepers" can make a difference..."  --James Fischer

Those that care for animals can vote, so the more the merrier.

Commercial cattle operations don't keep track of individuals....at least, not to "know" them....nowadays they have bar-coded ear tags for their herds of 1000's, and can track performance/life records of individual cows by simply scanning the ear tag.   Bessie is the family cow....she was never a large-scale production animal.  She even looks different (production animals are high-maintenance.....).

This reality is neither good nor bad in and of itself...it "is what it is".  Both scenarios have their place....the analogy might be that Bessie can make a difference for all cows because her owner really attends to HER, and really "knows" her, but the importance of the anonymous large herds is that they feed the world.

Still, Bessie could wander off into the woods and potentially survive, but not the average production animal, whose udders barely clear the ground and whose frame is weakened by spending her life standing around in a freestall barn.  Are there beekeeping parallels to that?

Christina



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