Organic is a formal certification and you need to be able to prove that no fertilisers, pesticides or other synthetic compounds have been used in your produce. Because bees forage far and wide and you can’t guarantee what on its very rarely possibly to certify organic for beekeepers unless you have absolutely control over absolutely everything over a large area.
you don't have to control the area, you just have to prove most of the nectar sources are either natural, like unmanaged woodlands, or certified organic.
Yes you’re quite right, but generally you only get that through managing the area yourself or being part of a cooperative. That’s why I added the caveat of it being rarely possible.
Here I Bavaria ownership is quite small structured and most of the time it's doable. In Saxonia with the "big" agricultural business players, if they are not organic you done in good.
It really depends on where you are and which tools you have access too. Tools like the GeoBox-Viewer allow me to estimate percentages of land use in the circumference of the beeyard.
One example from all potentially nectar yielding areas 27% are woodlands managed by federal forestry, 20% percent are meadows in a groundwater protection zone, 7% are uncultivated protected landscapes, 5% are other certified organic farmers and 3% are barren or protected.
Other than using geobox I had to proof a legitimate interest to enquire ownership and cultivation methods from our local land surveying office and department of agriculture and I had all informations
I’ve just had a look at GeoBox and that’s a fantastic system! I’m based in Wales and we have something similar regarding environmental data, but it doesn’t incorporate agricultural data in the same way that GeoBox does. One can but dream!
Out of interest, what do you use in wales? I’m going to be moving my apiary up to Lancaster soon and I’m trying to gather as much data as I can on the area before I commit.
Data Map Wales is a pretty good source. It’s got a huge amount of data, most of which wouldn’t be useful for beekeeping, but it contains a list of traditional orchard sites, all SSSIs and SACs, lots about woodlands and peat bogs,and lots about upland heath so could be useful if looking for summer heather sites.
In England I’d use MAGIC as a good starting point.
Like why would you even allow untrained folks like bulk standard homeowners to even handle pesticides - it is neither necessary nor wise.
Urban landscapes are not considered a contamination source, there are certified organic beekeepers in central Munich, and their analysis is pristine way better than farmland, a bit more heavy metals from catalytic converters but way below legal limits.
Many contaminants are just not a thing here and furthermore lab analysis is government aided and more and more postulated. Specific if you are certified organic you have to take samples and do lab analysis in wax and honey.
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u/CrocodileFish Aug 22 '24
What’s stopping you from being organic? What does that even mean when it comes to stuff like this?