Lecture - Beekeeping for Poverty Alleviation by Pam Gregory
Pam recognised influences from John Atkinson from the Welsh National Bee Unit and John Holmes a Kenyan Bee Keeper,
She recommended using indigenous, bees, they are easier to obtain its better than shipping bees across the planet with possible unknown outcomes. Her program was aimed at rural communities / individuals. Bee keeping should not for bee keeping in large settlements or cities, where pollution, populations, and a lack of both nectar and pollen sources could pose problems, though not completely ruled out.
Beekeeping in rural settings can generate, cash income and locally it could be significant sums. Pam found that the honey itself was not eaten, but used as a medicine. The honey was having to be transported long distances, and packaging was a problem. However as honey does not deteriorate like other produce it wasn't ideal but manageable. The beekeepers could keep the produce for a while before going to market. Weight can be an issue moving large quantities, and supplying to some organisations can also be a problem. ie a customer may want 10 tonnes regularly, not happening.
Some of the advantages were that the bees don't compete for land. The bee keeper and the projects improved social status. She did make a comment about a bee keeper that had improved his status and now owned his own home, was respected by the village and was able to give back to his own community. It can destabilise existing hierarchy overtime I guess.
Extractors etc were not possible to obtain or to expensive for these projects, however the use of a Honey press was preferred. I was not familiar with a honey press, its just a method of using a force to push the honey out of the comb. Which seemed a waste as the bees would have to build more comb. Pam was happy with this and I guess its good for bee hygiene. Bee suits like those available in Britain were too expensive for these projects and a make your own from local materials was essential, Pam showed pictures of people wearing home made bee suits, from plastic. They seemed to do the trick.
She highlighted some negatives, to many hives in one apiary, and that disease and virus, can build up. In truth its a good project, one I would like to participate in.
Lecture - What is wrong with Modern Bee Keeping by Philip Chandler http://biobees.blogspot.com/
Philip Chandler's lecture was interesting and he seems to be controversial. He critised the BBKA and traditional practices. He actual read his entire lecture verbose from notes.
Bee keepers traditionally used bees as a beast of burden to collect Honey and Wax, they didn't care for these creatures themselves. He gave a quote from A Gilman dated 1928/29 "The Creator intended the bee for the comfort of man, as truly as he did the horse or the cow". He also stated that Traditional hives are designed by men for men. It was previously a domain for men and this is changing, but the traditional practices remain and are prevalent. Traditional hives are difficult to handle and can be heavy. He has a point.
He is an advocate of using a Top Bar Hive and gave advantages including the fact that the hive is stationary. Its easier to add additional frames for honey. He didn't talk much about problems. I wondered how he coped with swarms. Does he have 2 top bar hives at all his apiaries. He mentioned that he does not use api-guard or its equivalent commercial products to deal with varroa. He only uses icing sugar, to encourage the bees to clean themselves. The top bar hives don't have varora floors so does varroa build up ?
He also mentioned Bolivia and the 11 new rights of nature. Nature in Boliva now has the same rights as people. I have read about this but I don't recall if he mentioned what all 11 rights were.
After the lecture he had lots of people argue with his pre-notions. He did mention several other people these included Kirk Webster http://kirkwebster.com/
You can download the whole lecture in a podcast format from http://biobees.libsyn.com/
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