>Again using the numbers above, 600 commercial beekeepers owning an average
of 2500 hives each would only account for 1.5 million hives.
Now you've got me curious about these figures. I wonder about the average,
since many beekeepers going to almonds manage 10,000 or more hives.
I just checked the 2010 mailing list for the Calif State Beekeepers. There
are about 180 registered as "commercial." If we add the number of large
beekeepers in such states as Texas, the Dakotas, and Florida, there may
well be more than 600 of the big boys.
In the 2007 Census of Agriculture, there were only 28,000 "farms" reporting
having bees, with a total of just under 3 million hives. The average
number of hives per reporting farm was 104.
For South Dakota, the average was 1716.
For North Dakota, 2257.
California 1073.
Montana 649
Texas appears to have more recreational beekeepers at an average of 100
hives.
For the first four states above (all with average hive numbers above 600),
the total number of reporting beekeepers was 1802. So I'm thinking that
there are likely more than 600 commercial beekeepers managing large numbers
of hives.
For the six states taht account for over half the hives in the U.S., the
total number of hives is 1,659,000; the total reporting beekeepers was
2856, for an average of 580 hives each. If we use the equation T = R x Mr
+ C x Mc, where T = total number of hives, R = # of recreational
beekeepers, C = # of commercial guys, Mr = mean number of recreational
hives (10), and Mc = mean number of hives for a commercial guy (2500), we
can then solve for C, since we know that C + R = 2856.
The result is 669 commercial guys running 1,672,500 hives and 2790
recreational beekeepers running 27,900 hives.
The commercial guys would account for 23% of the beekeepers in those states.
The commercial guys would be running 98.5% of the hives.
If instead we set the average number of hives per recreational beekeeper at
5, and for the commercial guys at 3000, then we get a different result:
549 commercial, and 2316 recreational. Commercials would make up 19% of
all beekeepers, and run 99.2% of the hives.
In either case, if we extrapolate to the entire U.S. population, there
would be about 1000 - 1300 commercial beekeepers, running 99% of the
hives. Obviously, these figures underestimate the total number of hives in
the U.S. (accounting for only a bit over 3 million hives). But it's likely
safe to assume that the additional number are run mainly by recreational
beekeepers with only a few hives.
That adjustment, plus an adjustment for the sideline beekeepers, would
bring the percentage of commercial beekeepers down to a lower percentage.
Since I feel that these are important figures to know, I'd appreciate any
additional information from the List.
--
Randy Oliver
Grass Valley, CA
www.ScientificBeekeeping.com
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