basics

[bee-nuts]

I think there should be a section on here that has the basic begginer questions and answers.  I constantly see; how much does a quart of honey wight, how to make 1:1 sugar surup ect.

Seems like a good idea to me.  Unless of course there is already but I have not seen it. 

[asciibaron]

how much does a quart of honey weigh, and is it more than a duck  :-D

a simple FAQ type post might do the trick.

[Robo]

Perhaps a good idea in principle, but I'm not sure it is practical.  It would take a great deal of time for someone to organize the information in some type of meaningful way and I have a feeling you would still get a lot of folks who would rather throw out a question rather than take the time to go through and seek out what they are looking for.   Most of the information is available already and we do have a good search function that unfortunately a lot of folks won't make the effort to use.  It seems to be easier to let someone else do the work for them.  Of course, if someone is interested in taking on such an effort, I am not opposed.

We had discussed creating a wiki at one point, but once a again, it requires a lot of effort and none of us had the bandwidth.

[Joelel]

I suggest,if you don't want to read or answer questions,then don't.

[Kathyp]

search works pretty well for me, but it would be nice if it could be narrowed a bit.  sometimes i get TMI  :shock:

[ziffabeek]

I try to use the search and have with success before.  It's just that often it seems that there is something that is specific to my question that the search doesn't always cover.  And sometimes I just like to see what people think, or I"m panicking and forget to search or need reassurance.  Sometimes it just makes you feel better to have someone reply to your question, especially when you don't feel too sure of yourself  :-\.

If it's really bad, maybe a sticky post at the top with the headline "Don't forget to use search!  You might find your answer there!" would help people remember to do that first.  But I suspect it might not because of the reasons above.

I guess if you made a "newbie" section you could limit access to the rest of the forums to only reading until somebody get's less newbish.  That would keep all of the annoying questions in one place, I guess.  But it might curtail some of the conversations.

I know that I and I'm pretty sure all of the other new beekeepers really value this site and appreciate the time our "elders" spend helping us out.

love,
liz

[bee-nuts]

This forum works great for getting questions answered most of the time.  I just think it would be nice to have some basics answered.  Sometimes you may need to know things right away.  Of course the answer is most likely somewhere on the net, or can be answered by someone on forum.  Some newbies could be embarrassed to ask something as basic  as how to make sugar syrup.  Just my opinion.

[Bee-Bop]

John Clayton;

I'll bet not 1 in a 100 of this forum's users,have taken the time to read your;

Beekeeping Terminology & Back yard Beekeeping Course - and it's 18 informative pages

These are right here on your site. and cover a lot of the basics.

Bush's & Robo's sites plus a few others have the basics, only problem is you have to read and remember
the info.

They also are prerty good for review.

I won't mention Bee books at the library, or your local bee club.

Bee-Bop

[RayMarler]

http://www.beemaster.com/site/honeybee/beehome.htm
scroll down for topics near the bottom half of the page.

http://www.bushfarms.com/bees.htm

http://robo.bushkillfarms.com/

http://www.beesource.com/

All these are excellent links for anyone considering beekeeping or for already experienced beekeepers as well.

[bee-nuts]

All fantastic websites and information.  I have surfed all.  It takes time for anyone new at beekeeping to become familiar with some, any or all of these.  I found this forum by searching beekeeping forums.  I was not even aware of the rest of beemasters stuff for a bit of time.  I only made a suggestion.  I was not insinuating that the forum, beemasters, and others were lacking adequate information or sources for it.  I think this forum is absolutely fantastic.  That does not mean however that it would not benefit newbies to have some of the basics provided.  I am not annoyed by the repeated questions and the ill suggestion made, as if I were, is ignorant.  I'm sure most of mine have been asked plenty of times one way or another and that would make me a hypocrite.  However simple economics will teach you that if there is a large demand for something, it might be a good idea to supply it.  Who ever makes it the easiest to acquire profits from it.  Do you like waiting for an hour in line for a cheese burger?  No, you will go somewhere else.

Robo stated:

"Perhaps a good idea in principle, but I'm not sure it is practical.  It would take a great deal of time for someone to organize the information in some type of meaningful way and I have a feeling you would still get a lot of folks who would rather throw out a question rather than take the time to go through and seek out what they are looking for.   Most of the information is available already and we do have a good search function that unfortunately a lot of folks won't make the effort to use.  It seems to be easier to let someone else do the work for them.  Of course, if someone is interested in taking on such an effort, I am not opposed."
 
Works for me.