What is it?
- At its simplest and most naive - let the bees get on with it.
- Bees have coped alone long before we interfered.
- Minimum interference by beekeeper
- No treatment for Varroa
- Advocated by Thomas Seeley
Why do it?
- Everything a colony does when left alone aims to
- help the colony survive
and - assist reproduction and thus the survival of the species
- Those colonies unable to survive will perish - and so will their genetic line
- What is left is colonies of bees capable of resisting pests and diseases.
- This is part of natural selection
- It assumes bees are the best beekeepers
- "Darwinian Beekeeping" is also called "Apicentric Beekeeping"
How do bees in the wild behave differently?
- Natural colonies are built by local bees
- We do import bees from outside our area
- We should use bees naturally bred from local bees
- They are well spaced in the wild
- Not common in the UK where there is not much "wild"
- Minimises drifting between hives and pathogen spread
- We do put many hives close together
- We should restrict the apiary to hives 30 metres apart
- The bees build a small nest cavity in the trunk of a tree or similar
- Small enough to control - temperature, humidity and cleanliness
- We do build a vast tower with two brood boxes and four supers
- We should use one brood box and one super
- They coat the inside of the cavity with propolis
- Seals all cracks and provides a bug resistant lining to the cavity
- We do supply hives already smooth on the inside
- We could supply hives with rough wood inside
- The bees swarm freely
- Bees that swarm cannot carry much in the way of contamination
- We do discourage swarming because of its affect the honey yield
- We should allow swarming
- Natural wild colonies may be 15% to 20% drone comb
- We do restrict drone comb
- We should encorage drone brood.
- Research suggests drones are much more than sperm banks
- The entrance is often several metres above ground.
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- A clearer flight path to food sources.
- Less chance of being disturbed
- We do put the entrance about half a metre up
- We could put the entrance much higher
- Diverse food sources
- Not easy to find in the UK - except in urban environments.
- How healthy would you be if you always ate the same things?
- We do put hives in areas of monoculture
- We should ensure there is a variety of food available
- No treatment for diseases
- If they die due to a disease then they were not robust enough.
- Only those who adapt to survive will survive.
- That is evolution in action
- We do treat hives even if they are weak
- This allows varroa to evolve to cope with the treatment
- We should euthanise or requeen hives which are weak
- This prevents the colony being a source of pathogens
Colonies will last longer but be less productive.
There is a lot of material by Thomas Seeley on YouTube: .