A Foray Into Beekeeping 101

Brooke Bowman
by Brooke Bowman
2 Materials
$150
3 Hours
Medium
My husband has wanted to get honeybees since we first moved onto our property. We visited an exhibit all about them at the local county fair about five years ago, and we’ve tucked the idea in the back of our minds for a while. This spring, we started to give it some more serious thought. We have a little place in the back where a fire pit used to be. One afternoon, we dumped about a truckload of gravel onto the spot to make it flat again and to prevent weeds from growing up around the base of the beekeeping stand. We then went to our local farm and garden store to get the stand. It was a solid wood tone when we first got it, so we painted it with safe white paint to stand out brightly in the backyard and add a little character. We are definitely first-timers in this experience and we’re unsure how successful this honey harvesting season will be, but we are excited to begin.
Backing up the truck to dump the gravel in the backyard spot!
First, we set up the stand and box. It has a few different compartments and pieces, and we had to learn all about which part does what before we could begin.Next, we went to get our bees! We live in the Triad area of North Carolina but we had to travel up to Brushy Mountain, about 45 minutes away, to a beekeeping farm to get this box of bees. I’ll admit that seeing so many clustered together and flapping their wings kind of gave me the heebie-jeebies at first, but I’ve since grown quite fond of the quiet chatter.
You have to isolate the queen bee from the rest of the pack so she can do her job and stay protected. She comes in a little cage, and we inserted her in a special spot on top of the box, between the frames. Over time, the queen bee will work her way through her candy cage and be free to move about. She is marked with a crimson dot so if we see her flying around or among the others in the hive, we’ll know which one she is. The other bees consist of female worker bees and male drones.
Preparing to release the rest of the hive into the honeybee box and stand.
I still have a sort of difficult time looking at this picture, but here they are! All 10,000 of them. That’s right. We have ten thousand new pets! It’s crazy to look at, but we’re excited about all the delicious honey these bees will help us produce this year. While it was still in its early, unstable stages, a huge storm came through and threatened to blow our honeybee stand down. We strapped it down and hoped for the best, and in the morning, all was well. The rain and wind were, however, harsh enough to blow a few dangling shingles from our roof. We’re now in the process of negotiating our roof restoration but our tiniest pets are safe and sound.
We go to check on the hive’s progress every morning and so far, it seems they are building a little wall of honeycomb. We’re anxious to see what comes of this new adventure. It’s been a learning journey, to say the least!
Suggested materials:
  • Honeybee Stand   (Hardware Store)
  • Honeybees   (Farm Store)
Brooke Bowman
Want more details about this and other DIY projects? Check out my blog post!
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