Desert | honey-bee

Ba’er Sheva

The next beekeeper I visited was in Ba’er Sheva. Ba’er Sheva is an interesting city because it is the intermittent zone between the desert and Mediterranean influences. My friend in Ba’er Sheva had 4 hives he too believed in the anthroposophical approach to beekeeping. The Do-Nothing method, his hives at first seemed fine but when taking a closer look at his hives I saw massive amounts of deformed wing virus, bees crawling away from the hive, varroosis and mites everywhere. He had said that these hives were about three years old. I am curious to know whether these hives are able to survive in these current conditions for much longer. My analysis of the situation was that because of the climate and the continuation of nectar flow throughout the year the bees never went dormant, thus, creating a balance between the amount of bees and mites. Looking at the hives in these conditions I am not sure they would be able to survive much longer. Only the future can tell. What I appreciated about this beekeeper was his bottom board. He was telling me how in his locality it can get over 100 degrees regularly to prevent his bees from overheating he makes sure to increase the airflow in his hive by various bottom boards.

Sde Boker

The final Beekeeper I went to was all the way in the desert. I was curious to see how his hives were doing. His hives to my surprise were fine. The hives were a little smaller because there were not as many resources in the area, because of this circumstance he actually kept his hives smaller to adjust for the fewer amounts of nectar and pollen sources in the area. He had 5 hives in the desert and believed in an anthroposophical view of beekeeping. What he would do is just take hive bodies and flip them so that the empty bottom one would go to the top this way his hives always stayed 2 medium supers deep each containing 8 frames. The amount of honey he harvested was not an excess but it was enough for his families’ consumption. He said that his hives have not been affected by Varroa Mites due to his secluded location. He was talking about his desire to produce more honey but to do this he had been planting various types of eucalyptus trees. The types of eucalyptus trees he used were able to survive on less than 200MM of water, as well as, being completely flooded. This is because in his location there are flash floods that occur. However it is only for about 2 weeks of the year and the rest of the year it is an arid desert. By planting trees he explained to me that he is working on not only greening the desert but also being able to produce a large honey crop in 10-15 years from now.