> HI , We had the same type of problem in California 2 years ago. >After Andy did his post , I called down to where I'm getting my bees in >the spring.My source is ok but there were some around Yuba City that did >get cleaned out pretty bad.There was ten miles along the river that did >get wipped out. Hi Roy, One guy told me from the air that at one time he could see bee hives the full length of the river system into the San Francisco Bay from both the north and southern river systems. > Last night I talked to a lady that gathers information for the US >government on honey production and numbers of hives.The numbers are still >coming in , but that 10 mile strech took out 16,000 hives. Most of the information is incomplete, but I got one report that one beekeeper or group of beekeepers from Florida lost 11,000 from one holding yard. I did not report that because I have not had a chance to confirm it. I would not be surprised that the total numbers will be close to 100,000, but thats just an educated guess at this time. >off with the problem now then in 2-3 weeks from now.All the bees are not >in the area for Almounds.I don't like to see us loose any hives, but it >could have been much worse. I can't remember the total number that are >trucked into California for pollenation , the # is way over 50,000 >hives.We do not need a lose of one more hive , with the other problems California receives closer to 450,000 hives each winter and spring from out of state for almond pollination. Several honey bee keepers bring in 10,000 or more hives each and many bring in 5,000+. The total lost from this one big storm that affected the river systems from Fresno north will be between 8 and 10% of the total number of hives in California which are estimated at 850-900,000. >that we have.The winter loss in the USA will be more than expected. We had NEWS to me, most beekeepers here report no unusual losses at this time. > We all need to help get more people back into beekeeping. It can help >soften the fall.Too many eggs in one basket is not smart business.We The "too many eggs in one basket" can be expressed as too many bees in one area and this is in my opinion the reason for all the new problems beekeepers are having today such as mites.... >better take a very good look at what we are doing in agriculture and see >if it works with or against nature. If its against nature , we loose. The danger in this is that we may find that we are no longer needed..! > David , we will come out of this flooding loss , but I hope we come out a Some will and some won't it depends more on their personal financial condition then anything else, speaking from my own experience which I won't bore you with the details except to say the shock of losing one's ability to provide his livelihood is something that is no difference then a death in the family, or a marriage turned bad. Some people get over it real fast and start right over and some never do. >of its world.The view is different when we come down off of the mountain >that we have made for ourselves. Yeh, I been there, and in the long fall from my high mountain its the first stop that gets you, the trip down was not that bad. ttul, the OLd Drone (c) Permission is granted to freely copy this document in any form, or to print for any use. (w)Opinions are not necessarily facts. Use at own risk. --- ~ QMPro 1.53 ~ http://www.kuai.se/~beeman/