David
Melanie and I have been talking about keeping bees for several years, in fact right from when we first met.
This happened because Melanie had a historical book referencing honey bees with that distinctive old library storage smell to it on her kitchen table. I wanted to impress as you do when dating, I was therefore interested in bees!
Somehow beekeeping draw me in and I actually started reading more and more for my own interest, at this stage I was confident Melanie had fallen for my charm!
I never thought I would be a beekeeper; I don’t come from farming, small holding or a country background, I am Mr Suburbia I suppose.
What has amazed me about the bees or beekeeping is how little we really know. Originally I wanted to see the classic WBC hive decorating our garden; I did not have any idea or agenda relating to bee practices or bee population health.
Thankfully my in-depth reading whilst travelling extensively for my new job, international sales manager for an industrial pumping equipment manufacture gave me the airport, and plane reading time to discover what seems to be rudimentary, common sense, and sensitive to the bees requirements, that being natural beekeeping!
Thankfully I am now doing a lot, lot less air miles and in time might even be able to claim to be green!
Melanie and I decided on the Warre beehive and its methodology as our natural beekeeping approach. The facts that feral bee colonies survive in the wild without chemical cure intervention for modern hive diseases such as the Varrao mite is a big message to the bee world that we need to understand better and respect more.
For example, the average temperature within a Warre beehive is approx 1 deg above that which the Varrao mite will not reproduce at. Warre beehive colonies will survive, adapting, keeping the mite population under control without intervention. There is no scientific proof for or against; there simply has been no in-depth research!
More beekeepers new and experienced need to adopt natural beekeeping. The more popular Warre beekeeping becomes, interested associations, government and research bodies will be obliged to respond to popular demand and this website is all about encouraging Natural Beekeeping and thus preventing any further decline in numbers of the UK honey bee.
Please do feel free to express your comments on our blog. Plus, if you have one of our Warre hives, and adopt natural-beekeeping please use your order membership number to contact us direct, ask questions, seek reassurance or ask advice on any of your beekeeping needs.
Many thanks for helping the UK honey bee.
Melanie and David
