Bees on the boat

[drone1952]

Hi,
Sorry bother you with my question but I want your help.
Some years ago ( about 15) I read in beekeeping magazine an article about a beekeeper keeping his bees on the boat. As far I can remember he travel with his boat with hives on a river in France.
Thanks for help.

[Scadsobees]

Hmmm...that would be interesting!  I'd imagine he couldn't move very far during the day, and only at night, and then at least 3 miles.  The bees would be very confused, and lose a lot of foraging time after he moved.

Rick

[johnnybigfish]

hey drone! Welcome to the forums, by the way!
 I read something just recently about people who do the boat thing but I cant remember where i saw it. Heck of a way to move pollinators though, huh?

your friend,
john

[indypartridge]

In France, floating bee-hives are very common. One barge contains from sixty to a hundred hives, which are well defended from the inclemency of the weather. Thus the owners float them gently down the stream, while, they gather their honey from the flowers along its banks; a single bee-house yields the proprietor a considerable income.

http://chestofbooks.com/reference/The-Domestic-Encyclopaedia-Vol1/Bee-Hives.html

This is very similar to the beekeepers 4000 years ago in Egypt. The bee hives were placed on barges that would start up the Nile and as the season changed the barges floated downstream, 30 miles at a time, at night so the bees were always in a honey flow area.

http://www.rawhoneybest.com/raw-honey-organic-honey/

EIGHT HUNDRED FLOATING BEEHIVES.CAPT. PERRINE'S CURIOUS EXPERIMENT FOLLOWING THE WILLOW-BLOOM FROM NEW-ORLEANS TO ST. PAUL, AND GATHERING THE HONEY FROM IT

http://query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=9D05E6DC143EE63BBC4F52DFB1668383669FDE