John and Judy Dobson operate Beeline Limited from Kereru in Hawke’s Bay, New Zealand. Kereru is a small farming district 60 km's southwest from Napier/Hastings on the East Coast of the North Island at an altitude of 400 metres and on the Northeastern slopes of the Whakarara mountain range. The business has operated successfully for 40 years producing queen cells, queen bees, nucleus colonies, pollen, royal jelly, and propolis for sale, with the last seven years by the next generation from the same site. Carricell and Queen Cell incubating equipment has been and still is a large part of our work. 

 

However, change is inevitable, so seven years ago the supply of bees to NZ customers has been passed on to the younger generation.  Kereru Queen Bees Ltd was established by our 3 daughters & their husbands to follow on in our footsteps.  A huge thank you goes to all our NZ customers for supporting the new business & helping it to succeed.

 

Carricell & Queen Cell Incubation Equipment has been produced and supplied by us for nearly 40 years with the early prototypes being designed by John for his own use. The incubator business will continue for a few more years yet, until such time as we arrange for someone else to take over the manufacturing. Kereru Queen Bees will probably take the incubator business over in 2-3 years. Currently we send the Carricells to over 25 countries.

 

The school bus business operated successfully for approximately 35 years & has now finished when the contracts expired nearly 3 years ago in December 2021.

 

As you can see, we are slowly reducing our workload as we get older, but still appear to be very busy…  We have travelled over 70,000 kilometres in our campervan which we purchased new in November 2015. Without the bees & school buses to keep us busy, we hope to travel more in NZ using our e-bikes, kayaks & motorcycles along with a few overseas trips as well.

 

Judy is a keen adventurer, gardener, tree planter & motorcyclist, who looks after me well. John enjoys motorcycling, inventing, organising holidays, and helping Judy. The seven children in our blended family range from age thirty-eight through to forty-eight.  John has eight grandchildren & Judy has five, with three great grandsons.