Keep Bees...Are You Kidding?

Why you ask would someone want to become a beekeeper.

My fascination with keeping bees began quite accidentally.  About two years ago, my best friend and her husband decided to keep bees and they setup two hives on their rural property.

Opening the hive for inspection.

 As the year progressed, she would tell me what was happening in the hives and that they were attending a monthly meeting for NEOBA beekeepers in the area.  I asked if I could go with her the next month, and I did.  I found the individuals in the group to be very passionate about beekeeping and willing to impart their knowledge and love of bees to anyone who was interested.  

Reviewing a frame of bees and looking for the queen.

I continued to attend the meetings for the remainder of the year and signed up for a Beginning Beekeeping class that fall.  My friend and her husband also invited me to come "work the bees" one weekend and I was hooked!  While I am usually pretty wary of wasps and bees, I found the hives to be very fascinating and wanted to learn more.

Cutting the swarm from the tree.

 At one point last spring, my friends found one of their hives had swarmed and began the process of recovering them.  They presented a program at one of the following monthly meetings and it was absolutely amazing to me.  From their pictures you could see all of the bees marching back into the new hive, which was really cool.

All the bees marching into the new hive.

With warm weather just around the corner and spring being the best time to setup a new hive, I have decided to setup my own bee hives and will be blogging about that process in the days to come.   I will admit it seems a little scary having thousands of bees taking up residence in my backyard, but I know it will be fascinating to watch them work and to enjoy the rewards of their efforts.......lots of HONEY!!  I hope it will be a fun and rewarding experience and look forward to letting you in on the process.  

Stay tuned...