Since varroa arrived in Europe and America in the 1980’s, most beekeepers have found it necessary to treat their colonies with chemicals in order to avoid heavy colony losses. But a minority of beekeepers have managed to care for their colonies without the use of chemicals and have done so with not just tolerable colony losses, but with losses that are sometimes equal to or smaller than the losses of those beekeepers who treat with chemicals. With the help of thirty examples of treatment-free beekeepers in Europe and America, including famous names in varroa-resistant bee breeding, this book documents the encouraging success and growing popularity of beekeeping without chemicals, and details the bee husbandries of the beekeepers presented.
About the author
After a career in research biochemistry David Heaf settled in north-west Wales where he works as a translator and, with his wife Pat, manages a large vegetable garden. He took up beekeeping in 2003 with the National hive, but a few years later switched to the Warré hive, now wintering about 10 of them. In 2010, Northern Bee Books published his book The Bee-friendly Beekeeper and in 2013 invited him to write a manual on Natural Beekeeping with the Warré Hive.
