# Just curious



## sqkcrk (Dec 10, 2005)

Matt,
What do you do for a living? How many ride in your car? How much do you make per hour or are you on a salary plus benefits type pay? People always want to know what someone else makes. As if it is supposed to make them feel good about themselves or is a contest or something. But then they don't really ask what it costs. Shipping is only one cost. And the grower pays for it, ultimately.

To answer your questions, since almond pollinators are busy working, 17 rows of 6 fourway pallets each, $2.25 to $3.00 per mile, sometimes yes, sometimes no.


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## Daniel Y (Sep 12, 2011)

440
couple grand
no Btu I have had several people tell me they can come back fairly well built up. Time on the almonds seems to be more about them building up rather than production. Almond pollination is also geared more about the pollen. growers want to see bees start at 10a.m and be finished for the day at about 2 P.M. in other words there are so many bees they are all pretty much starving. The idea is that if all pollen each day is gathered by the bees. then they got maximum pollination. That is according to info I got from the California Almond Growers website. Sort of like the idea situation for the grower with no concern for the bees.


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## Matt903 (Apr 8, 2013)

sqkcrk said:


> Matt,
> What do you do for a living? How many ride in your car? How much do you make per hour or are you on a salary plus benefits type pay? People always want to know what someone else makes. As if it is supposed to make them feel good about themselves or is a contest or something. But then they don't really ask what it costs. Shipping is only one cost. And the grower pays for it, ultimately.



Sqkcrk,

I meant no disrespect with my question, I don t feel it is a contest at all, just a field of beekeeping I was curious about. Since I asked about money and you asked me, I will tell you. 4 people ride in my car, I am an assistant principal in a rural school district, my base salary is 38,000 a year on an eleven month contract, I might get a 2000 bonus depending on student test scores, and I get health insurance and retirement after 30 years. As I look back on my original post, I think you took me wrong. I didn't mean "other half" in the context of "rich" commercial beekeepers. I meant it in the context of the other side of beekeeping, the side I know nothing about. 
Thanks for your answers.


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## clyderoad (Jun 10, 2012)

Matt903 said:


> Hello
> Just a hobbyist/sideliner with a couple of commercial questions. For you almond pollinators..how many hives can you get on a flatbed 18 wheeler? What is the cost to ship the bees to CA, say 500 miles? Do you get any honey from almonds? I have no intention to get into migratory beekeeping, but the whole process interests me, just wondered how the other half lived


I don't see your question as disrespectful at all.
Judging by his answer maybe sqkcrk didn't read the question, or is having a bad day.
The largest bee event in the US is an interesting topic.


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## Tenbears (May 15, 2012)

Don't sweat it, the problem with the written word is it leaves room for inflection, or expression. 
It is not like you called your local Taxidermist and asked him to instruct you on how to tan your own hide.


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## sqkcrk (Dec 10, 2005)

Matt903 said:


> sqkcrk said:
> 
> 
> > Matt,
> ...


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## grozzie2 (Jun 3, 2011)

sqkcrk said:


> Matt,
> What do you do for a living? How many ride in your car? How much do you make per hour or are you on a salary plus benefits type pay?


Ooops, did somebody urinate in the corn flakes this morning 

But your post does remind me, I've been rude, I read and sometime participate in the commercial section, yet I've never introduced myself. Allow me to do that now. I'll answer the questions out of order.

My name is Gerry, last name withheld for reasons spelled out below. I drive a Prius, it seats 5 when the seats are all up. It seats 2 with the back seats down, and that leaves enough room for me to move a couple double deeps in the back. I dont have enough hives to justify a truck to move them, and the Prius gets the job done just fine for my needs. When I had to move all 10 hives at once this summer, I rented a u-haul and hooked it up behind the camper van (seats 3), then towed the trailer to our new home. We dont move our hives up into the mountains to chase the fireweed like many of the folks in this area. Now that we have bought a small acreage and moved onto it, I dont envision moving hives at all anymore.

I graduated from the role of regular employee to the C-Suite in the 90's, my first gig as CEO for a small corp. On the work front today, I have 3 jobs. 

Job One - I am the CEO of a corporation. I get a small monthly stipend for that job, no benefits, the rest of my renumeration schedule is based on financial performance of the corp. It's not a large corp, we only did a tad under 2 million in sales last year. When all the dust settles after the accountants have finished year end, my slice of that is a comfortable living in most years, sometimes it ain't so great. Actual number can vary widely from year to year, fiscal 2013 was pretty good, but I still remember 2005, which hardly covered groceries. I am a signficant shareholder in this corp. My wife works at the management level of a very large corp, she brings home the benefits (extended health, life insurance, etc) for both of us. Her job comes with a pension, mine doesn't.

Job Two - I sit on the board of directors for a much larger multi-national company, which measures sales in 10's of millions per quarter. I only get small stipend for that job, but the perks are pretty good, they fly me into town for board meetings, and once in a while we go off on a weekend jaunt to upscale resorts for corporate planning sessions. This corp is a multi-national that builds electronic gadgets for various specialty sectors of the consumer market and we used to participate in the aviation marketplace. My wife will occasionally work with these folks as a consultant for the HR department, when they need to do a placement at the executive level. I have no share interest in this corp, but I have close friends that are significant shareholders. A side effect of this position, anything I write that may be published or otherwise made public with my name attached, must be vetted by a corp communications department, hence the nameless moniker for an online presence in hobby fields.

Job Three - Way back in the bad old days, I was what most city folks would call a 'bush pilot', did that full time for over a decade. Today I still dabble with the airplanes, I refer to it as my 'hobby job'. I haven't flown full time for 25 years, but I've kept my hand in on a casual basis ever since. Today I am the head of training (Chief Pilot) for a small airline. I do it for fun, it doesn't pay much, but it keeps my licenses all current and up to date. I've tried to get fired from that one a few times over the last couple years, but the owner just laughs at me when I try and makes comments to the effect of 'where else am I going to find a 'go anywhere' kinda guy, with more than 30 years experience in the business, that works for next to nothing. I am a small minority shareholder in this corp.

In the business world, I am very focussed on product identification, revenue streams, efficient production, yadda yadda. It's a slow time of the year right now, and I've been spending a lot of time reading, not a lot of time working for the last few weeks. I do an 'unwind and decompress' every year around this time, we are past year end, and done with fiscal Q1. Q1 is a busy / stressful time of year because we deal with both quarterly and annual reports / results, with accountants taking up way more of my time than should be permitted. Everybody tends to take a few weeks of relax time early in Q2, and I am no exception.

I read the commercial section here, because I'm always interested in how other business, in other fields, operate at both large and small scales. I already work in managing 3 of them, all in completely different fields, and learned a long time ago, ya just never know when a tidbit you pick up from one, can be applied to another. I had no idea what I was getting into when I took up hives in the yard as a hobby, and have learned quite a bit along the way. When I first started, the thought had never crossed my mind that bees could be a viable business, it was one of the eye opening things I learned along the way, along with a myriad of other lessons that have come out of my hobby.

I'm always on a learning quest, and every hobby I take up, inevitably that learning quest leads me to understanding how the business end works. My bees in the back yard are no different.


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## RAK (May 2, 2010)

Matt903 said:


> Do you get any honey from almonds? I have no intention to get into migratory beekeeping, but the whole process interests me, just wondered how the other half lived



*Do you get any honey from almonds?*

We don't put honey supers on during almonds. we run doubles and in a good year the bees gain some weight. Most of this honey collected is used up during the few weeks until apples. Honey is converted into bees.

I have thrown on a second deep with a few drawn combs + foundation onto some singles and bees had box filled by end of pollination.


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## Roland (Dec 14, 2008)

Good recovery, Matt903, you replied with open honesty, and stayed calm in the face of SQKCRK. We will all learn from each other now. Thank you.

Crazy Roland


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