SMALL HONEY CROP

Bay of Plenty Beacon, Volume 5, Issue 42, 20 April 1942, Page 5

SMALL HONEY CROP

EFFECT OF BAD WEATHER

BEES STILL NEED WINTER FEED

Chving to the very small crop being gathered during the season just closed, nearly all honey in stock at present is from last year's yield.

A local apiarist said recently that because of the unusually bad season he AA r ould haA r e under half his usual output on the market this year.

The flowers appear in December nnd January and it is essential that the weather should be fine while the (lowers are there. This season bad weather set in at the beginning of December and lasted almost continuously until January As all flowers have been one month late it was hoped to get a good honey crop tn February, but very little appeared and the season is now over. Fed on Sugar Bees have to be fed on sugar or honey, except in the summer when they are gathering. They will require considerable feeding again this year until December, as . thev have not sufficient lionev stored to. last them through the winter. Scarcely any clover honey was obtained this season, most of the crop being purely from blackberry flowers. As most apiarists spread their hives over wide areas and in different types of country, they usually catch a crop somewhere. This year, however, there has been a light crop all over New Zealand, and especially in'the Waikato and Taranaki. Very seldom do apiarists have a medium season, the crop always being either very good or very poor.