I’m one of those out there that likes to read the emails. Beats TV and you learn a lot. But I don’t know how you find the time to communicate so often.  Honey production is in full swing here although things are drying out.
A lot of small paddocks of corn are grown as silage fodder for cattle feed in the winter in New Zealand.  Some beekeepers in the Waikato (central North Island)  and the east coast of the North Island report that their hives dwindle if apiaries are close to corn crops during the summer when they should be collecting clover honey, so have moved them well away from farms growing corn.  
We have every sort of neonicotite registered for use here. Our environment agency believes everything that the companies give them because we no longer test new products on bees - something we did 30 odd years ago.
 My own personal experience with these new sprays was when Bayer produced this new “Bee Safe” product for kiwifruit. Put on 17 days before the bees went in so should have been safe.  Hives were bubbling when they came out but a month later they collapsed.  I believe the spray caused a brood break and once on fresh pollen brood rearing commenced again. The hives wintered well but it put me off bee safe sprays.  When the kiwifruit grower asked for the spray he had used in previous years, the company had taken it off the market.  Bayer changed it’s classification.
 We hear that some years, bees coming out of kiwifruit pollination are quite weak.  They are now starting to audit a few hives as they go in and when they are about to come out often only 10 days apart) to check colony strength.  It has been suggested that up to 40% of the field bees disappear in the first few days when in the kiwifruit orchards.
 The national beekeepers association have put out a survey asking beekeepers to report bee losses.
 Frank Lindsay
 NZ
 
 		 	   		  
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