Bee School

The process of learning what we needed to know to start keeping bees was very enjoyable, if a little overwhelming at first. We started, as I mentioned in my first post, by attending a meeting of our local beekeepers association after finding out that they offer an annual "Bee School". We went to the January 2012 meeting, and were pleased to find a very diverse group of people in the association. There were association members all the way from commercial keepers to brand new hobbyists like us. The meeting was great, with discussion time and planned presentations on the agenda, and we decided that we would attend "Bee School" the next month.

"Bee School" consisted of three 2-hour classes on consecutive Tuesday and Thursday evenings, followed by the monthly meeting. The classes cost $30 and included that year's association and a copy of the book being used for class that year. For 2012, the book was "Beekeeping for Dummies." During the class, pretty much every aspect of beekeeping was covered, including a lot of great information about nectar flows and integrated pest management (IPM) for our area. Much of the class was taught by members of the association, with some presentations from honey bee researchers at local universities. The book was occasionally used as a reference, but was not the main subject matter of the classes.

After the first class, I was extremely glad that we had decided to wait a year before getting our first bees, because I quickly realized exactly how little we knew about bees and beekeeping. A friend from work and her husband joined us in the classes, and got their first bees that year - they had a rough first year, losing their bees. I can't help but think that they would have had a smoother first year if they had a stronger grasp on the information before getting started.

After the classes, Mama Lion was pretty keen on getting some sort of pollinator going in our garden, and one of the things we had learned about was a species of bee called Orchard Mason Bees. Mason Bees are solitary bees, and nest in small holes in trees and other wood. They don't produce wax or honey like honey bees do, and don't really need any management other than providing a block of wood with holes in it for them to nest in. A local beekeeping supply shop sells tubes of Mason Bee cocoons, so we ordered a few of those to scratch the beekeeping itch while we learned more about the project ahead of us. That's all for today, and I'll leave you with a video of our Mason Bees at their nesting block.