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Informed Discussion of Beekeeping Issues and Bee Biology

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Subject:
From:
"E.t. Ash" <[log in to unmask]>
Reply To:
Informed Discussion of Beekeeping Issues and Bee Biology <[log in to unmask]>
Date:
Tue, 9 Jun 2015 03:28:57 -0400
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a Peter Borst snip...
In the short term, what is needed is not honey production but experience. Later, novices will not need to open the hives up frequently, as they learn to read external signs. 

At first, they need all the hands-on time they can possibly get. I learned beekeeping by working 12 hour days, 6-7 days a week the first season. Most small timers won't get that much beekeeping experience in their whole life. 

Et replies...
We punch about 500 + student per year thru our club's bee school.  This is quite often the most frequent question posed by new comer to beekeeping.  The first thing I suggest to the novice is that they have some purpose in opening a hive and therefore limit the casual dismantling of hives < it is my basic belief that 'inspection' for me can means something quite different for a novice if you simply count the frames removed from any given hive and the potential risk to the hive's short term health is directly connected the the number and how many frames are removed and then inspected.  It is not that uncommon to speak to new comers that over inspect hives in what I suspect is a response to worrying about their newly acquired interest.  These folks basic intention is admirable but their actions are fraught with potential risk to the hive itself.

My view here is much the same as Peter expressed above in that learning in the early years is much more important than maximizing a honey crop.  I do sometimes have to remind the newer students at the Texas A&M Bee Lab that in the short run inspection can create a certain defensive response in a hive and therefore if some group or individual is scheduled to be shown the bee lab that any inspection the students need to do (relative to their research) should be scheduled for after and not before the tour.    

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