frazzledfozzle

Yes Mot was hit hard but Wakefield never got the hail and don't know about Tap.

How’s everyone’s crop looking. Ours is pretty rubbish . The weather has been terrible for ages only just starting to get some heat some days. lawns are still bright green and growing we’ve had so much rain and clag some areas haven’t really flowered after a massive flowering last season. would be good to get an idea on what the commercial crop is going to look like this season. .

There’s an unbelievable amount of hops being planted in the Tasman area and hundreds and hundreds of acres more going in. Even Dairy farms are being converted .

this is exactly what I think has happened and is happening. Those of us doing honey before manuka are aware of what it’s like producing low value honey and working through winter or even doing a night job after your full day of beekeeping. Our first honey cheque was $24000 (total) I can still remember that day, it was so exciting it was more than a years wages I had never seen that much money in our bank account. Today I would be devastated if that was our total payment even 4 times that much wouldn’t be much better. Then along came Manuka and we got used to high ret

true but houses in Nelson that were $400k three years ago are $600k now so it evens out.

I’m working on it The Coast is my favourite place in the world.

It’s blimmen freezing here so tempted to light the fire the past few nights. not honey weather that’s for sure.

The reporting by stuff is abysmal not only is it often factually incorrect it’s always littered with spelling mistakes and the articles they publish are often just click bait . housing prices, greedy landlords, dirty freedom campers Boomers who have taken all the riches for themselves and left the world polluted and dying. these are the top rating articles I see in the paper and online day after day, month after month and year after year.

I’m wondering if Gerald is a beekeeper why does he have settlers honey bringing their beehives onto his property ?

geez what a crock of .....

reckon pulling your plonker I have a vivid imagination and I don’t want to tell you the details of my mind picture right now

Ohh that's soul destroying. Nothing we worse than doing all the work and expense to get healthy hives into honey and turnaround pulling empty boxes. Feel for you Maru we've all been there and done that

It is to a certain extent. The resident queen right now is getting on and won’t be laying as prolifically as a young one. Introducing a young queen will increase healthy bee numbers quickly.

Those canvas seat covers are great ours have completely died anyone know where to get them from ?

God I hate those metal bars whoever invented them was a sadist .

Reading about the trade war between Australia and China that seems to be escalating daily and the thought that Honey could be next on the list for high tariffs I wonder if we will have a spike in demand for our genuine NZ Manuka honey.

is that a good price @Maru Hoani? has the market for 10+ been affected as much as the 5+ I wonder.

and you wouldn’t be the first one I’ve heard say that over the past couple of weeks

Not to sound to harsh but are you sure you have time to look after the bees properly ? Bees don’t wait for you to finish work or have time to look through them. if you can’t look through your bees on a regular basis is there any point in having them ? There’s no good reason for a hive in your backyard to starve over winter it seems to me you just don’t have the time or the inclination to do what needs to be done when it needs to be done .

if you are processing and storing your own honey it’s definitely worth harvesting the early honey but if paying for those services not so much

probably not halved but definitely a lot less.

We are the same @jamesc we don’t put hives into honey areas until the kamahi is finished and we leave the honeydew on for the bees at the end of the season. No point in harvesting non manuka because the per kg price barely covers the expenses. it means our production has been halved and we have downsized in hive numbers by half.

Absolutely !

MPI...no surprises there

It’s been terrible over the hill too kaihoka just awful with so much rain. we are still feeding to keep hives alive.