I have some equipment/advise for sale or trade..
Some say (Vanishing of the Bees) it's futile to try raising bees near GMO food crops.
I recently started. All for free. Got a local animal control officer to start calling me when he finds hives that are on the move in somebodies front yard in their bushes. Works out well in the spring when it is still cold in the mornings.
I like the idea of honey but love the idea that they are working on the farm for me in a way that I nor my kids ever could buy pollinating all my veggies and fruit trees like they were their own. I have already seen an increase in production just from having one hive. Adding more Supers for next year. We need to do what we can to make sure they don't die out all together. Kind of like heritage breeds of poultry. Unless we help propagate the species they my die off all together.
I like the idea of honey but love the idea that they are working on the farm for me in a way that I nor my kids ever could buy pollinating all my veggies and fruit trees like they were their own. I have already seen an increase in production just from having one hive. Adding more Supers for next year. We need to do what we can to make sure they don't die out all together. Kind of like heritage breeds of poultry. Unless we help propagate the species they my die off all together.
I keep bees and have for several years. This is the wrong time of the year to try to get started, unless someone has an established hive that they want to part with. The advice about re queening the africanized bees is correct. You should go to some bee keeper meetings, and if you can, go out with a beekeeper when he is working his hive. Some people can't take being surrounded by hundreds of angry bees, even in a bee suit. Best to find out before you get heavily invested in equipment and bees. If after this experience, all is good with you, you can start collecting the hives and all the equipment you will need to install a package of bees in the spring. Dadant ( a bee equipment supplier) has a good book, First Lessons in Beekeeping. You can learn a lot from reading it.
Thanks all for the advice. I'm very, very rural and think bees will do well out here. I think I may read all I can on the subject over the winter and maybe try to get started up next spring.
I saw a series on RFDTV a couple of years ago (Honey Bees and Beekeeping 1.1: A Year in the Life of an Apiary) wherein Dr. Keith Delaplane of the University of Georgia taught you what you needed to know about beekeeping, from how to get started on up. I didn't realize that it was 20 years old 'til I just now went searching for it, but it looks like you can buy it on DVD.
Part of the show is available on YouTube; here's part of the first episode:
[video=youtube_share;UjrdwXXEtLo]http://youtu.be/UjrdwXXEtLo[/video]
The book of the same name is available on Amazon:
http://www.amazon.com/Honey-Bees-Beekeeping-Apiary-Edition/dp/1929832311
Part of the show is available on YouTube; here's part of the first episode:
[video=youtube_share;UjrdwXXEtLo]http://youtu.be/UjrdwXXEtLo[/video]
The book of the same name is available on Amazon:
http://www.amazon.com/Honey-Bees-Beekeeping-Apiary-Edition/dp/1929832311
