I remember some recent discussion following the announcement by M & S
that they had established up to 1000 hives of honeybees. They made the
announcement with a fanfare of how good this was for bees - but there
was quite an outcry saying that this wouldn't be good environmental
behaviour - the new bees would use resources that would therefore no
longer be available to other bees and insects. See
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/apr/16/marks-spencer-honeybee-project-threat-biodiversity-conservationists-aoe
Gilliane
On 08/07/2021 08:48, Dorothy Hall wrote:
I can recommend books by David Goulson, co-founder of the Bumblebee Conservation Trust. I have a Sting in the Tale and The Garden Jungle, if anyone would like to borrow them. The loss of hay meadows and other changes in farming practices have had a massive impact on some species of bumblebee. Creating more forage is the way to go.
Dorothy
On Thu, Jul 8, 2021 at 8:43 AM Oxnatbees <oxnatbees@xxxxxxxxx <mailto:oxnatbees@xxxxxxxxx>> wrote:
Mark, sometimes out-apiaries are more trouble than they're worth,
so don't leap to using them.
I wanted more hives and our garden couldn't really take any more,
so I put overspill on a nearby allotment. No problem, easy access.
Eventually due to allotment politics I had to move them on, they
are now a mile from home and I only see them rarely. And they are
300 ? yards from where I can park, down a hill. It's a great spot
for bees but a lot of walking back and forth on hot days when e.g.
harvesting honey.
But they have their place. John Haverson in Andover, Hampshire
tells of having 6 hives in his garden which always struggled. He
moved 3 elsewhere and they all boomed. There just wasn't quite
enough forage for 6 round his house.
Paul
On Thu, 8 Jul 2021, 08:32 Oxnatbees, <oxnatbees@xxxxxxxxx
<mailto:oxnatbees@xxxxxxxxx>> wrote:
No I didn't circulate anything from Ireland that I can recall.
I've heard this about honeybees too. The problem happens when
e.g. a commercial beekeeper puts dozens of hives in one spot,
so doesn't really come into play for the people in our group.
There are 249 species of bee in the UK, and 27 ? bumblebees,
lots of moths and wasps etc, they all need nectar and pollen.
Many are short range flyers so are badly affected by being
isolated in agricultural zones where the crops only bloom for
a few weeks a year - many British cities, with gardens, are
now better habitats than their surrounding countryside:
surveys find a greater variety of insects in the cities. Still
small numbers, though.
Oxford has University Parks and the Botanic Gardens, both
planted with exotic trees for a big range of food. Lots of
nice gardens. It's not a concrete desert and when OBKA were
still allowed to publish membership lists, I counted only
about 80 members within the ring road. In contrast, there will
be thousands of beekeepers in London and perhaps less green
space per person.
To give an idea of how forage has declined: I think it was a
book by Tickner Edwardes where he said he grew up in the 1920s
in a village in one of the intense agrarian areas of Englnd
where 3 beekeepers had 20-40 hives each. He retired back to
the same village in the 1980s and struggled to keep 3 hives going.
Paul
On Thu, 8 Jul 2021, 08:11 Barbara Elizabeth Robinson,
<liz20swan@xxxxxxxxx <mailto:liz20swan@xxxxxxxxx>> wrote:
Just trying to remember where I read it - Paul did you
circulate it?
Liz.
On Thu, Jul 8, 2021, 08:10 Barbara Elizabeth Robinson
<liz20swan@xxxxxxxxx <mailto:liz20swan@xxxxxxxxx>> wrote:
Hi.
Yes I have read an article about this from the Irish
Beekeepers - also saying much better to promote better
planting and therefore better forage for all pollinators.
Liz Robinson
On Thu, Jul 8, 2021, 07:20 Dawn Gosling
<magikmum49@xxxxxxxxx <mailto:magikmum49@xxxxxxxxx>>
wrote:
I dont know if anyone else heard the World Service
on BBC this morning but they were talking to
beekeepers in Africa, North America and London.
One of the beekeepers I think it was the chap in
London, said that there are too many bees and this
is killing of our indeginoue bees. We should be
providing natural food for bees but not keeping
them in such number.
Is this now the theory? Or has it been the theory
all along?
Dawn
