JAmuses: Destination East or West I don't care

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OK ... so this part of the forum is about Glyphosate ... chemicals right .... I was gonna put it into the apiary diary as it was an event in February ..... but then I thought Grant might take umbrage.... so.
Our game plan for the year was diversification, Split the risk with bees in multiple locations ..... I would have liked to have gone back up north and made some real coin, but the Missus said NO , so being a real bloke I kowtowed and obeyed .
Instead we went East and West .... 'Destination East or West I don't care'....
It's been interesting to see the difference.
Our Eastern hives all went onto paid pollination, guaranteed income, assuming the landowners pay up, because for many of our new customers, paying for beehives is a new thing ..... so in once sense it was a relief to secure a real job for our bees and be able to budget on new tyres and repairs and RMP payments, not to mention Varroa treatments.
We went down into the flatlands today. It was hot and dusty.
The bees had done okay, ish. We escaped a couple of hundy boxes today from several sites. The dilemma is is whether I homogenise the Radish with the Pakchoi and the Phacellia as we extract and end up with several thousand litres of ...... honey laced with chemical from one dodgy site.
Our established pollination contracts know how to look after our bees. The hives looked good.
The worry is the new boys.
In one yard we worked against the clock, missing out on afternoon smoko to beat the irrigator as it cranked round the crop while the bees were in full flight.
Other yards had a couple of boxes on, but no bees. Six frames of brood ready to hatch, but nothing in the honey box.

Some guys might just say 'Hmm' , no bees ......
But after you been in the game for a few years you get too say, ' Hmmm , no bees..... why not, because I know they can do better.'

And I sort of remember a piece of poetry I read in the visitor centre at Arthurs Pass a few years ago that went along the lines of...
'You canna pick a flower and not alter a star.'
 

tommy dave

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not sure I see the dilemma? seems like the sensible option is to keep the honey from the longstanding locations separate from the honey from the new sites? obviously don't need to worry about the honey from those sites with nothing in the honey box. What am I missing?
The dilemma is is whether I homogenise the Radish with the Pakchoi and the Phacellia as we extract and end up with several thousand litres of ...... honey laced with chemical from one dodgy site.
Our established pollination contracts know how to look after our bees. The hives looked good.
The worry is the new boys.
In one yard we worked against the clock, missing out on afternoon smoko to beat the irrigator as it cranked round the crop while the bees were in full flight.
Other yards had a couple of boxes on, but no bees. Six frames of brood ready to hatch, but nothing in the honey box.
 
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My thoughts exactly TD ..... only buyers these days want all honeys homogenised as it simplifies their packing run.
I think we'll keep the suspect boxes seperate and maybe blend it with @stoney glyphosate for a super brew.
 
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@James You don’t have to homogenise everything together... you choose your batch size.. I’m not into a big single melting pot batch collected over months.. I like the snapshot batches.. november matagouri, January Manuka March Honeydew

far out this honey game is getting harder and harder with the hoops to hop through getting tighter..
I’ve been advised today by my friendly local forest office to move my bees from there privately owned site if I wish to avoid producing anymore “sweet weed killer” as the choppers back in the air shortly...
I need a night up the hill in the hut.. just me, my rifle, a venison salami and a box of Cheds crackers.. oh and the tub of Vespex and 50 or so bait stations.. thinking time.
 
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Uh .... shes a dirty old world in 100% pure . Huts still here.... Stags are’nt roaring yet.... but the neighbour sure has some nice lookin ones😋

60ABDBB5-007B-4D56-A5C6-DE049AA7422D.jpeg
 
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only buyers these days want all honeys homogenised as it simplifies their packing run.
depends on who you sell to i suppose. sounds like your selling to small players.
most of the one i know of will pick and choose what drums they will buy. which means you get stuck with all the unwanted honey.
homogenising cuts down the amount of sampling and testing you need to do. ie 10 drums as one batch instead of paying for 10 lots of testing.

packers will pick what drums meet their specs, and then blend and pack. would be a pretty small packer who doesn't do their own blending.
 

kaihoka

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most of the one i know of will pick and choose what drums they will buy. which means you get stuck with all the unwanted honey.
some beek friends had pure manuka last yr that they got $20kg for. they also had muliflora that they sold for less but the buyer had to take it if he wanted the manuka.
is that a common scenario these days. ?
 
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some beek friends had pure manuka last yr that they got $20kg for. they also had muliflora that they sold for less but the buyer had to take it if he wanted the manuka.
is that a common scenario these days. ?
not really.
fantastic if you can leverage a deal like that, but many won't touch the multi with a barge pole.
it all depends on the buyer and whats on the market.
 
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