Max-how do you get your bees to make organic honey?
>
> From: Max Sanders <mazsand...@yahoo.com>
> Date: 2006/02/21 Tue AM 12:59:39 EST
> To: silver-list@eskimo.com
> Subject: RE: CS>honeybees & CS?
>
> First of all if you do not have mites (and are sure) do not buy or use anyone
> elses used equipment (more a concern for other problems). There are more
> natural defenses that may work. I have also been a beekeeper on and off for
> many years. The last time we got up to 75 hives and became quite known for
> our quality honey which we sold in our health food store. The local
> beekeepers in our area were not even trying to go organic. And I understood.
> If you have to buy/replace a large percentage of your hive's bees each year,
> you could never make a living. The only people in the area that did not get
> the mites were hobby beekeepers who were somewhat isolated and fortunate. We
> tried essentail oils working with a bug doc in some SE University, we tried
> lots of stuff - and we never figured it out to the point where we were making
> money at it. We did refuse to use the chemicals, but the choice that some
> "organic" beekeepers use is formic acid. I refused to use that as well. Ther!
> e are
> other ideas including a smaller cell size and of course breeding attempts,
> but the problem is huge and important.
> But I had other sources of income and though I was researching several
> aspects of beekeeping and honey production, I sure sympathized with the
> beekeepers who needed the honey revenue. Beekeepers are a wonderful lot.
>
> Do support your local beekeeper, and you may get a better quality of honey if
> you ask about his mite methods - some will go right for the banned poisons,
> and they don't have to be "factory" operations.
>
> There is no way that you NEED to feed sugar water. Leave them a whole super
> of honey, enough to get them through the winter AND the spring. Save some
> supers w honey in the frames to feed them in the spring if they need it -
> check in those early warm days, that's when they starve. Only if you have no
> other honey saved and they need something must you use sugar. Others use it
> because it is a cheap substitute for the honey.
>
> I am not an expert on silver (or bees) but mites themselves would likely be
> unaffected. Still, it may provide some protection for other bee ills -
> beekeepers do use antibiotics for some things - don't know about silver as a
> replacement. By not medicating you would present an oppotunity to keep strong
> hives that MAY be strong enough to not be killed off if and when infected by
> the mites or other natural stresses - and then develop resistant offspring.
> That would only help the population. I say Don't medicate - especially if
> you have no reason to do it. But keep an eye on your hives....man, I miss
> it. You can do a world of good just by replacing a queen...
>
> Maz
>
> Wendy <wen...@tuxnightclub.com> wrote: Deb:
>
> My husband and I have 2 hobby hives for honey for our own use. I've
> tried and tried to find information supporting not medicating them and
> not feeding them sugar water but all of the beekeepers say there are no
> bees in Canada that are strong enough anymore and that it must be done.
>
> I told my husband about Juliette Levy and how she says in her old herbal
> books over the years says that they should NOT be medicated at all and
> that they should be fed their own honey rather then the sugar water. He
> argues that it is now 2006 and things have changed.
>
> I asked my husband what would happen if we didn't medicate and he said
> we could jeopardize other beekeepers hives in the area, the wild bees
> too if ours got infected, plus you would lose all the bees.
>
> What is one to do???
>
> I wonder if bowls of CS were placed near the hives would they 'drink'
> it?? Could it make them stronger to resist mites?
>
> Could you soak the hives in silver or spray them down???
>
> Any thoughts?
>
> Musing.....
>
> Wendy
>
>
>
>
>
> > Problems with tracheal mites as well as other diseases can certainly
> be
> > seen as symptoms of a weakened constitution, the same sort of holistic
>
> > perspective we apply to human illnesses. In fact some observers of
> > commercial beekeeping practices predicted as early as the 1920s the
> demise
> > of honeybees that has occurred in the last 15 years. All bees,
> including
> > wild ones, have most definitely been affected by big Ag. with it's
> > pesticides and the overall degradation of their environment. Its
> likely
> > that the phenomenon of swarming has gradually affected wild bee
> genetics
> > as well. By the time mites showed up, the bees were already
> struggling
> > and thus less able to develop defenses. Of course, conventional
> > beekeeping as taught at the agricultural extension services virtually
>
> > refuses to recognize environmental sources of harm, much less that any
> of
> > the methods they promote might be detrimental.
>
>
> > DByron
>
>
>
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