Greetings all,

Just about to start beekeeping, and so I will probably visit this forum regularly for a while. One question I had at present is this:

I live in the Santa Ynez Valley, north of Santa Barbara, CA, USA. The Sunset Garden Book zone for where we live is 14. We have a 20-acre parcel, and the acre around our house is fenced and planted, and the other 19 acres are just native oak woodland, with lots of sage and sagebrush, etc. The garden in the protected area around our house is blessed with gazillion active and happy bees! They love our mediterranean and native plants. No idea where their hives are, by the way.

When we get our first hive, my wife was thinking of putting it under an oak in our backyard, but I was wondering if any new bees we get to populate that hive will compete adversely with the existing bees. I don't know much about bee diseases yet, but I understand that they exist, and I am concerned about a new tribe of bees infecting the existing colonies, and we end up accidentally decimating our presently healthy bee population ( either by disease or warfare).

Am I worrying too much about this? My preference would be to put my new hive anywhere else on the property so any newly imported bees aren't tempted to compete directly with the colonies that currently service our garden.

Any thoughts/suggestions are much appreciated.

Chuck