Getting a buzz out of making honey

by Tammy McAllister
BBC Somerset

The novice beekeepers checking hives for the veroa mite

Despite a disappointing summer novice beekeepers in Somerset are feeling positive about building their colonies and producing honey in the future.

The Rent-a-Hive scheme has been running for four years at the Taunton and District Division of the Somerset Beekeepers Association and in the past year its popularity has grown.

Compared to this time last year, there has been a 25% increase in the number of people who've put their names down for the Beginners Beekeepers Lectures.

The course starts in February 2010 and 100 people have already signed up - anyone who joins this course is then given a chance to join the Rent-a-Hive scheme, where names are picked out of a hat.

Nucleus colonies

Barbera Drakeford, the project's co-ordinator, said: "We only have a certain number of nucleus colonies to make available to the Rent-a-Hive beekeepers so there could be quite a lot of disappointed people."

A nucleus colony is a starter colony consisting of around 5,000 to 10,000 honeybees, which are bred by the more experienced beekeepers at the association.

Those nucleus colonies are then given to each pair of novice beekeepers, who are given practical help and advice of how to manage their new hive, which they take home at the end of September.

This year, 22 people joined the scheme and paired up to look after their own hive, which were all based at the Taunton base in Heatherton Park, near Wellington.

For some people, making honey was not the motivating factor.

David Sanderson joined the course in February.

"I just always had an interest. Animal husbandry is great, you're not just looking after yourself but other things and other people and that to me is commitment."

'Most enjoyable'

Like the other novices, he spoke highly of the course and how it was run.

"It is most enjoyable, what we have here is a fabulous situation, certainly from a teaching point of view. We're all learning all the time."

Although there were high hopes this summer of hot weather, which helps honeybees build up their stores, it didn't quite turn out that way.

Alan Clark, novice beekeeper, said: "It's not been a particularly good year, last year was pretty disastrous but up to July this year, it was looking quite good and then the weather changed.

"The stores that the bees were making, which is honey to you and me, started to be depleted because the bees needed some food. They weren't getting it from the flowers and so started to use up the honey in the hive, so actually had to end up feeding the bees ourselves."

Queen bee

The beekeepers meet every fortnight or so, and this particular session involved placing Apiguard in the hives to prevent the spread of the veroa mite.

This bug has decimated honeybee colonies over the past few years up and down the country.

Beekeepers remain vigilant about the risk.

Rosemary Hawkin, who is a member of the scheme, said: "We're putting on the Apiguard treatment, which kills the veroa but not the bees and it's put on it two stages.

"It's put on one day and two weeks later, you put another one on, and that's because of the life cycle of the bee. So when the bee has the Apiguard on, it kills the veroa off and any of the bees that are emerging from the cells which wouldn't have had the treatment will get it the next time."

By next year, the each colony is expected to grow to around 40,000 as this number rises dramatically in spring when queen bee lays 1,000 eggs a day in May and June.

Once each hive has built up its stores to around 200lbs of honey and nectar to survive, beekeepers will then able to take off some honey for themselves.

"I'm interested in building up a colony of bees," said John.

"I'd be quite happy for them to keep the honey and build up their colony over the winter so that they build up to a strong colony for next year and that's when you can start collecting the honey."