Cotton/soybean honey.

can I place my hives in your field?

Tenbears said:

can I place my hives in your field?

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I was thinking more along the lines of possible bee dangers, maybe certain sprays I should be aware of or should they be moved before ANY spraying is done?

There aren't any cotton or soybeans in this area AFAIK. But before placing any hives, I'd ask (and note) what sprays the farmer has used in the past. I'd also ask the farmer to commit to giving you reasonable notice before spraying anything.

Before committing to place the hives, I'd research those previously used sprays to see their potential impact on bees. And I'd be prepared to move the hives on short notice if/when the farmer decides to spray something that isn't suitable for bees.

You'll need to ask about if and/or when any pesticides or fungicides may be applied. Most farmers down here are using neonic coated seed,which keeps the pest numbers down and gets rid of a great deal of foliar spraying. Fungicides are sometimes applied and theses can affect bee bread production. That's the theory, anyway. Round-up I wouldn't worry too much about. My hives got sprayed with itlast yea and never missed a lick. Also, try to keep yourhives out of the way as much as possibe.

you might ask him what variety of beans he plants, the way I understand it, there are only a hand full of long season varieties that even produce nectar. I am literally surrounded by bean fields and all are short season beans and AFAIK I have never got a drop of honey off them.

Harley Craig said:

you might ask him what variety of beans he plants, the way I understand it, there are only a hand full of long season varieties that even produce nectar. I am literally surrounded by bean fields and all are short season beans and AFAIK I have never got a drop of honey off them.

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I have heard that the white soybean blooms do not help honey production. Has anyone experienced this?

ask if the cotton is self fertile variety. Most of the cotton here no longer produces nectar.

Can't really say on the white blossoms. The easy way to see a nectar flow in soybeans is to look for butterflies flying across the tops of the rows. And here's a difference you may see between North and South. Harley Craig didn't see any flow from short season 'beans, but I was on short season, indeterminate 'beans and got a decent flow from them. So long as the soil moisture was good.

I'm hoping for a flow on beans shortly. We had a good rain last night, so I'm stacking extracted supers tomorrow and we'll see what they do.

here is an interesting discussion from the archive

http://www.beesource.com/forums/archive/index.php/t-235969.html

Cotton normally gets lots of spray. Fungicide, growth regulator, and boll opener, at the minimum. (I am only familiar with spindle picked vatieties).

I checked the beans yesterday and added drawn supers. Not blooming yet, but they should start shortly. Had rain last week and night time temps are holding 72+, so I'm hoping for a flow.