> My question relating to the above is why take all these surveys on survival rates when I believe most hobbyists aren’t involved with surveys?

This is simply not the case. The Bee Informed Partnership has definitely reached out to all categories and compiled a very broad range of statistics. I have been disappointed in some things with BIP, but data collection is definitely not one of them. And I have come to realize that the analysis of this mountain of data is much more difficult than anyone imagines. Please look at this, for example:

Average loss suffered by beekeepers who indicated the reason or reasons they kept bees

Reason- number of respondents- number of colonies

Pollination of commercial crops- 1,132- 282,360
Selling Honey- 1,460- 301,914
Honey for personal Use- 1,998- 22,625
Queen and Package production- 165- 57,202
Enjoyment- 3,599- 42,327
Nuc production- 231- 68,059
Teaching and Research- 808- 15,570
Wax and other colony bi-products- 5- 37
Pollen- 1,128- 282,327
Breeding- 4- 77
Pollination of local garden and environment- 3- 11
Apitherapy- 8- 28
Help the bees and environment- 88- 1,425
To give gifts- 3- 14

https://beeinformed.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/ReasonKeepBees-RF.pdf

If you are going to criticize Bee Informed, you had better bee informed
PLB

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