I'll ask my son-in-law who is a statistician with the NASS in Washington
D.C. to check a bit further on the hive count methodology. He told me that
the IRS shares information from 1040Fs submitted each year. According to
him, there is a little known IRS requirement to report honey sales of $1000
or more and that provides a basis for some of the statistical reports
regarding the number of colonies. I have 50 hives so I report my income each
year. However our bee club of 220 members have in excess of 400 hives. No
entity other than our club tracks the number of hives and most do not submit
a 1040F. Perhaps the sampling method used by NASS is close. I'll check
further.
Gary 

 

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