Hive Management: A Seasonal Guide for Beekeepers (Storey's Down-To-Earth Guides)

Product Description

The beekeeper year begins with a late winter hive inspection and ends with "putting the bees to bed" in the autumn. Richard Bonney believes that each beekeeping activity should be performed with an eye toward the overall well-being of the colony, as part of an integrated year-round program of hive management.

 

Long-term success in beekeeping can only be achieved by understanding the intimate lives, behaviors, and motivations of honey bees -- the factors which govern the life of each colony. Richard Bonney explains the reasons behind common practices that many beekeepers perform without really knowing why. He also stresses when to take timely actions that will prevent problems in future seasons.

Hive Management offers concise, up-to-date information on the whole range of beekeeping tasks, including:

-- How to prevent, control, and capture swarms.

-- What you can tell from an outside inspection of your hives.

-- When and how to "take the crop" and harvest honey.

-- How to successfully requeen -- from handling and marking queens to methods of introducing one into a hive.

-- The problem signs to look for when you open up a hive.

For the practicing beekeeper who needs more information, or for the serious novice who wants to start out right, Hive Management offers sensible advice to help keep your honey bees thriving. 

The Beekeeper's Handbook, Third Edition

Product Description

Diana Sammataro and Alphonse Avitabile have revised and expanded their clear and comprehensive guide to cover changes in beekeeping. They discuss the crisis created by the parasitic bee mites. In less than a decade, for example, Varroa mites have saturated the North American honey bee population with disastrous results, devastating both managed and wild populations. The new edition of The Beekeeper Handbook covers mite detection and control as well as the selection and testing of bees that may have some tolerance to mites.

 

*Serves as a comprehensive well-illustrated introduction for beginners and a valuable reference for the experienced beekeeper.

*Outlines options for each operation within beekeeping, listing advantages and disadvantages of each alternative.

*Provides easy-to-follow directions and diagrams.

*Includes glossary and updated bibliography suggesting more detailed information on the topics discussed.

From the Back Cover

"For two decades The Beekeeper Handbook has guided thousands of beginning and advanced beekeepers in the how-to's of this entertaining and profitable pastime. . . . This third edition brings beekeeping to the threshold of the twenty-first century, with all its challenges. . . . Simply put, it is the best of the best of beekeeping books."--Roger A. Morse, from the Foreword

The Complete Guide to Beekeeping for Fun & Profit: Everything You Need to Know Explained Simply (Back-To-Basics Farming)

Product Description

Beekeeping is both a hobby and a practical business plan that many individuals have taken up in recent years as a viable way to culture a valuable natural resource and have fun in the process. In any given year, an effectively built beekeeping business can bring profits up to 500 percent of your investment according to numerous private beekeepers. The benefit of growing your own honey and selling it to local customers for between $3 and $6 a pound depending on how you cultivate and whether your honey is completely organic can be a huge boon for anyone with the money and time to invest. This book walks all motivated potential beekeepers through the process of building and operating their beekeeping business from the ground up, ensuring it is both a fun hobby and a great way to make a little extra money on the side. You will learn everything you need to effectively start beekeeping for profit and fun, including what materials you need, what kinds of bees are best for honey or wax production. You will learn all of the fundamental safety equipment you need to effectively handle the bees and where to place your hives on your property to take advantage of natural circumstances. You will learn the basics you need to understand what bees do and how they interact, including details about the queen bee, the worker bees, drones, and foragers. You will learn how seasonal changes affect your colonies, and how to use your smoke to access and gather honey from your bees. The best in home beekeeping professionals have been interviewed and their expertise and insights have been gathered here for you to review, providing additional details about the kinds and methods of honey gathering that you can profit from you. You will learn how to install everything and keep your colonies updated. You will learn how to keep the necessary records and how to sell your honey and what the best prices for that honey is. You will learn what is involved in opening a colony and how to manage pests effectively without endangering the bees or the honey. You will learn how to manage your hives in the winter and fall and what you can do with everything your bees produce. For anyone who has ever considered beekeeping as a hobby or source of side income, this is the book for you.

Honey Bees and Beekeeping: A Year in the Life of an Apiary, 3rd Edition

Product Description

Beekeeping is enjoyable and satisfying, whether you're a professional or a novice. With a bit of ingenuity and a little knowledge, anyone can successfully raise honey bees. Learn how to set up and maintain your own honey bee colony from Keith Delaplane, Ph.D., one of the nation's foremost entomologists as he guides you through each step, from buying tools and selecting healthy bees, to havesting and selling honey.

Honey Bees: Letters from the Hive

Product Description

In Honey Bees: Letters From the Hive, bee expert Stephen Buchmann takes readers on an incredible tour. Enter a beehive--one part nursery, one part honey factory, one part queen bee sanctum--then fly through backyard gardens, open fields, and deserts where wildflowers bloom. It's fascinating--and delicious!

Hailed for their hard work and harmonious society, bees make possible life on earth as we know it. This fundamental link between bees and humans reaches beyond biology to our environment and our culture: bees have long played important roles in art, religion, literature, and medicine--and, of course, in the kitchen.

For honey fanatics and all who have a sweet tooth, this book not only entertains and enlightens but also reminds us of the fragility of humanity's relationship with nature.

About the Author

Stephen Buchmann is a beekeeper and an associate professor of entomology at the University of Arizona in Tucson. He served on a National Academy of Sciences committee on the status of pollinators in North America and is a member of the Pollinator Partnership. He coauthored two nonfiction adult titles, The Forgotten Pollinators and Letters from the Hive: An Intimate History of Bees, Honey and Humankind, and a picture book, The Bee Tree. He is directing and filming a documentary about the Yucatecan Maya and their sacred beecraft. He lives in Tuscon, Arizona

The Biology of the Honey Bee

Product Description

From ancient cave paintings of honey bee nests to modern science's richly diversified investigation of honey bee biology and its applications, the human imagination has long been captivated by the mysterious and highly sophisticated behavior of this paragon among insect societies. In the first broad treatment of honey bee biology to appear in decades, Mark Winston provides rare access to the world of this extraordinary insect.

In a bright and engaging style Winston probes the dynamics of the honey bee's social organization. He recreates for us the complex infrastructure of the nest, describes the highly specialized behavior of workers, queens, and drones, and examines in detail the remarkable ability of the honey bee colony to regulate its functions according to events within and outside the nest. Winston integrates into his discussion the results of recent studies, bringing into sharp focus topics of current bee research.

These include the exquisite architecture of the nest and its relation to bee physiology; the intricate division of labor and the relevance of a temporal caste structure to efficient functioning of the colony; and, finally, the life-death struggles of swarming, supersedure, and mating that mark the reproductive cycle of the honey bee.

The Biology of the Honey Bee not only reviews the basic aspects of social behavior, ecology, anatomy, physiology, and genetics, it also summarizes major controversies in contemporary honey bee research, such as the importance of kin recognition in the evolution of social behavior and the role of the well-known dance language in honey bee communication.

Thorough, well-illustrated, and lucidly written, this book will for many years be a valuable resource for scholars, students, and beekeepers alike.

Review

Masterly...Without hesitation I recommend this book to a wide range of potential readers.
--John B. Free (Science )

Mark Winston offers a comprehensive account, covering aspects of anatomy and physiology as well as systematics, ecology and behavior...A useful overview of the biology of an insect that holds considerable interest for both economic and academic reasons. Rich in descriptive detail and well referenced, it will also serve as a basis for more detailed exploration of particular aspects of honey bee biology.  - Sarah Corbet (Times Higher Education Supplement )

This very readable book brings together the wealth of scattered information on the complex honey bee in a way that will serve as a standard for many years.
--Roger G. Bland (Science Books & Films )

Winston's writing is brisk and enthusiastic and the book's illustrations clear and informative. This is a delightful study of an odd, yet oddly familiar, creature.
--John R. Alden (Wall Street Journal )

Amazing Honey Bee Facts

I think we should get ourselves some honey bee facts, after all so many healing and health-promoting opportunities for the humans begin with this little busy creature.

As you read the following 20 statements about honey's great creator, you will be so intrigued just like me by this teensy-weensy fellow's extraordinary abilities.

1. The honey bee has been around for 30 million years.

2. It is the only insect that produces food eaten by man.

3. Honey bees are environmentally friendly and are vital as pollinators.

4. They are insects with a scientific name - Apis mellifera.

5. They have 6 legs, 2 eyes, and 2 wings, a nectar pouch, and a stomach.

6. The honeybee's wings stroke 11,400 times per minute, thus making their distinctive buzz.

7. A honey bee can fly for up to six miles, and as fast as 15 miles per hour, hence it would have to fly around 90,000 miles - three times around the globe - to make one pound of honey.

8. The average honey bee will actually make only one twelfth of a teaspoon of honey in its lifetime.

9. It takes about 556 workers to gather 1 pound of honey from about 2 million flowers.

10. It takes one ounce of honey to fuel a bee's flight around the world.

11. A honey bee visits 50 to 100 flowers during a collection trip.

12. A colony of bees consists of 20,000-60,000 honeybees and one queen.

13. Worker honey bees are female, live 6 to 8 weeks and do all the work.

14. The queen bee lives for about 2-3 years and is the only bee that lays eggs. She is the busiest in the summer months, when the hive needs to be at its maximum strength, and lays up to 2500 eggs per day.

15. The male honey bees are called drones, and they do no work at all, have no stinger, all they do is mating.

16. Each honey bee colony has a unique odour for members' identification.

17. Only worker bees sting, and only if they feel threatened and they die once they sting. Queens have a stinger, but don't leave the hive to help defend it.

18. It is estimated that 1100 honey bee stings are required to be fatal.

19. Honey bees communicate with one another by "dancing".

20. During winter, honey bees feed on the honey they collected during the warmer months. They form a tight cluster in their hive to keep the queen and themselves warm.
My most memorable honey bee fact is No 19: Honey bees communicate with one another by "dancing". And the most incredible to me is No 2: It is the only insect that produces edible food for man!

Source: http://www.benefits-of-honey.com/

R. Tan is the owner of the website http://www.benefits-of-honey.com/ which is a rich honey resource community specially built for all the honey lovers and fans in this world. She has packed this website with a wide range of quality contents on honey based on her knowledge and experience with honey, so as to promote its invaluable benefits which she believes could bring many positive spin-offs in everyone's daily life.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Ruth_Tan

Bad Beekeeping

Product Description

A million pounds of honey. Produced by a billion bees!

This memoir reconstructs the life of a young man from Pennsylvania as he drops into the bald prairie badlands of southern Saskatchewan. He buys a honey ranch and keeps the bees that make the honey. But he also spends winters in Florida swamps, nurse-maid to ten thousand dainty queen bees.

From the dusty Canadian prairie to the thick palmetto swamps of the American south, the reader meets with simple folks who shape the protagonist's character - including a Cree rancher with three sons playing NFL hockey, a Hutterite preacher who yearns to roam the globe, a reclusive bee-eating homesteader, and a grey-headed widow who grows grapefruit, plays a nasty game of scrabble, and lives with four vicious dogs.

Encompassing a ten-year period, this true story evolves from the earnest inexperience of the young man as he learns an art and builds a business. Carefully researched natural biology runs counterpoint to human social activities. Bee craft serves as the setting for expositions that contrast American and Canadian lifestyles, while exemplifying the harsh reality of a man working with and against the physical environment.

About the Author

Ron Miksha had 2,000 hives of bees twenty years ago. He produced over a million pounds of honey in Saskatchewan and sold thousands of queen bees in Florida, one of only a handful of people to have kept bees in both countries, hauling hives thousands of miles every year. Ron's interest in beekeeping stretches back to his childhood and his family's farm in the eastern USA.

As a teenager, he was the youngest apiary inspector for the state of Pennsylvania. Ron kept bees there, but soon moved his hives to Florida, where he raised queens to sell to other beekeepers.

A chance meeting led him to Val Marie - a desolate, windy prairie town in Saskatchewan, Canada, where he bought a small honey farm and expanded it into a large business. He produced queens in Florida during the winter and extracted honey in Saskatchewan during the summer. The adventure lasted ten years. Then a series of hot dry summers, small crops, and low prices convinced Ron to sell the farm and retire - at age 32!

After his beekeeping career ended, Ron decided to try university. He chose Earth Sciences as his second career, won seventeen excellence scholarships at the University of Saskatchewan and graduated with honours in Geophysics. Now Ron Miksha is president of a seismic geoscience company. Ron is a father, a scientist, a member of Mensa, and a licensed engineer.

Ron still keeps bees - as a hobby. His fifteen hives are on a grassy meadow in the Rocky Mountain foothills near his home in Calgary.

Today, Ron is president of the Calgary Beekeepers' Association. A well-known and controversial figure in the beekeeping industry, Ron Miksha writes extensively for bee journals around the world. Bad Beekeeping is his first book.

Keeping Bees And Making Honey

Product Description - Keeping Bees And Making Honey

Beekeeping isn't just for the country dweller-- hives can be found on many an urban rooftop, inner-city balcony or mounted on walls in the strangest of places.

Keeping Bees and Making Honey is a comprehensive and attractive lifestyle guide to beekeeping that takes readers from finding their bees to getting them home, housing them, collecting honey and using their produce.

The book includes a detailed look at the history of bees and beekeeping, and an extensive introduction to help readers to fully understand bees and keep them happy.

Keeping Bees And Making Honey is packed with images, information, practical advice, recipes and gardening tips, Keeping Bees and Making Honey is the ideal companion for every aspiring beekeeper.

About the Author

Alison Benjamin is a Guardian journalist. She writes on environmental issues and social affairs and currently edits The Guardian's environment website. Brian McCallum is a designer, builder and yachtsman. Alison and Brian ? who now studies apiculture ? have many hives in different locations across London.

Their blog www.urbanbees.co.uk provides a fascinating insight into beekeeping in the city.

Natural Beekeeping: Organic Approaches to Modern Apiculture

Product Description - Natural Beekeeping

The various chemicals used in beekeeping have, for the past decades, held Varroa Destructor, a mite, and other major pests at bay, but chemical-resistance is building and evolution threatens to overtake the best that laboratory chemists have to offer. In fact, there is evidence that chemical treatments are making the problem worse.

Natural Beekeeping flips the script on traditional approaches by proposing a program of selective breeding and natural hive management.

Conrad brings together the best organic and natural approaches to keeping honeybees healthy and productive here in one book. Readers will learn about nontoxic methods of controlling mites, eliminating American foulbrood disease (without the use of antibiotics), breeding strategies, and many other tips and techniques for maintaining healthy hives.

Conrad's reservoir of knowledge comes from years of experience and a far-flung community of fellow beekeepers who are all interested in ecologically sustainable apiculture. Specific concepts and detailed management techniques are covered in a matter-of-fact, easy to implement way.

Natural Beekeeping describes opportunities for the seasoned professional to modify existing operations to improve the quality of hive products, increase profits, and eliminate the use of chemical treatments.

Beginners will need no other book to guide them. Whether you are an experienced apiculturist looking for ideas to develop an Integrated Pest Management approach or someone who wants to sell honey at a premium price, this is the book you've been waiting for.

About the Author

Ross Conrad learned his craft from the late Charles Mraz, world-renowned beekeeper and founder of Champlain Valley Apiaries in Vermont. Former president of the Vermont Beekeepers Association, Conrad has written numerous articles on organic farming, natural healing, and health issues. His market-garden business supplies local stores with fruits, vegetables, and honey.

Gary Paul Nabhan has been the founder of the Forgotten Pollinators campaign, the Migratory Pollinators Project, and the Renewing America’s Food Traditions (RAFT) consortium. He is co-author or editor of The Forgotten Pollinators, Conserving Migratory Pollinators and Nectar Corridors in Western North America, and Coming Home to Eat.

Build Your Own Beehives With the Garden Beehive Construction Guide 2.0

Interested in getting your own backyard beehive? Don't know where to start?

What would you think if I told you that you can build your own beehive for less than the cost of a dinner for two at your favorite restaurant?

 

It's true!

 

Nick Hampshire shows you how to do it in Garden Hive Construction Guide 2.0.

You will learn how to:

• Choose the best materials for your beehive
• Easily build your own hive parts
• Quickly make either frames or top bars for your hive
• Select and apply your preferred wood finish for your perfect backyard beehive
• Choose a good location and install your finished beehive ready for your own honeybees!

Here's the best part. This is an all in one package...it has all the information you need to build a garden beehive in less than one afternoon!

 

Buy It Now and Get Started Right Away

The Barefoot Beekeeper

Product Description - The Barefoot Beekeeper

THIRD EDITION (2009)

 

A revolutionary book about sustainable, chemical-free, natural beekeeping, with no heavy lifting.

 

The author strips away all complications, showing how you can make everything you need yourself, even using recycled materials and simple tools - you do not need to buy any additional equipment at all!

 

Reader Reviews

 

After reading The Barefoot Beekeeper I knew immediately I had found what I had been thinking about and searching for for years. It inspired me to immediately build several Top Bar hives and change my manner of keeping bees. . .

 

Read as much as you can about bees and beekeeping, but do buy this one and follow it's suggested path.

 

The best book out there as far as I'm concerned for those interested in pursuing sustainable beekeeping.

 

A very helpful primer and a VERY inspiring discussion of sustainable beekeeping.

 

As an argument for sustainable beekeeping, the writing is unparalleled.

 

These are just a few reviews from readers of the barefoot beekeeper, so why not give it a try.

Honey Bee Hobbyist: The Care and Keeping of Bees (Hobby Farm) [Paperback]

Product Description

Bee keeping isn't just for the professional farmer—bees can be kept in any situation from the simple backyard patio and garden to large expanses of farm land. This comprehensive and attractive beekeeping guide, from Hobby Farm Press, the same people who bring you Hobby Farms and Hobby Farm Home magazine, Beekeeping takes readers from finding their bees, housing them, collecting honey and using their produce for pleasure and possible profit. This colorful book, including entertaining chapters on the history of bees and beekeeping, serves as an extensive introduction to help novice beekeepers fully understand this exciting hobby!

About the Author

Norman Gary received his PhD degree in Apiculture (the scientific study and management of honeybees), a very rare degree in the field of Entomology. After 3 years of postdoctoral research at Cornell, he joined the faculty at the University of California (Davis Campus) in 1962 as a professor and research scientist, a career that would last 32 years. Norman has published over 100 scientific papers and chapters in 4 books. Beginning in the ‘60s, he developed a secondary career in the entertainment world as a “bee wrangler,” training his favorite insect to perform in action scenes in movies, television shows, and commercials. He did bee scenes in 18 movies, working with about 40 well-known movie stars, appeared as a guest in more than 70 television shows, did 6 commercials with bees. Norman is also an accomplished musician, playing professionally for 45 years, including his own Dixieland band, the Beez Kneez Jazz Band. He holds two Guinness world records for bee stunts, invented a patented bee apparatus and developed the “Thriller Bee Show” that was performed at fairs, festivals, and other events. He was a member of the Screen Actors Guild, American Federation of Radio and Television Artists, and 10 other professional organizations. Norman is currently retired, after raising two children with his wife in Citrus Heights, CA.

 

Beekeeping Equipment

Whether you are running a beekeeping business or starting off as a hobby, one of the things you are going to need is beekeeping equipment.

When starting out, beekeeping equipment does not need to be expensive, but it does pay to take your time and carry out your research before parting with your hard earned money.

Before buying your bees, it is essential that you have the correct equipment in place, so that once your colony of bees arrive your ready to go from the start.

Beehive

This is the bee’s house, so take your time when deciding on what type to buy. The hives need to be protected from strong winds and each one of the hives must contain 5 supers, as this is where the honey is going to be stored.

Protective Equipment

Before working with bees you MUST ensure that you have the right sort of protective clothing. This should consist of a head cover, gloves and a beekeeper jacket.

Spacers and Smokers

Smokers are required when it is time to harvest the honey from the hives. The parts of a smoker include bellows, a funnel and a chamber that's used for combustion.

Metal Hive Tool

A tool that is used to open the hives and helps in separating the components within the hive.

Bee Brush

Another essential element of beekeeping equipment is a bee brush, as this helps to push the bees aside when you need to work on the hive or retrieve the honey.

Fumer Board

The fumer board is an essential piece of beekeeping equipment that helps you to remove the bees from the hive.

The above list is only a guide, but remember that before spending any money do you research. There is lots of information available free on the internet, but if you are looking for a good guide then any of the guide highlighted on my site will give you an excellent start.

Make Big Business In Beekeeping: Practical Tips And Secrets On Making Honey And Other Bee Products, Beekeeping Equipment And Bee Pest Control So You Know ... To A Backyard Hobby Or A Big-Time

Product Description

The experts say that if you are planning to get into beekeeping, either as a hobby or a business, the best way to start is to ask someone who is experienced in beekeeping to help you out. The support of beekeeping associations are a great way to find help since they could give you somebody who could be your mentor while you're in the process of learning the basics. As an excellent start-up guide, these are the most basic considerations:

1. Start with just two hives first. One hive can churn out about 50-100 pounds of honey every year. That amount can easily already help you make money.

2. Bees will need water so make sure that you have a water source near your apiary as they tend to go to the nearest water supply they can find.

3. Invest in new equipment. Never risk buying secondhand beekeeping equipment as there might be the chance that viruses and molds will transmit diseases to your bee colony.

4. Affordable and practical bee sources to start in on are package bees and nucleus. Be sure to inspect that they are free from mites and diseases before buying them. The beekeeping business is a demanding enterprise. It will require proficient knowledge and some practiced skills in order to gain success.

The backyard Beekeeper

Product Description

The Backyard Beekeeper, now revised and expanded, makes the time-honored and complex tradition of beekeeping an enjoyable and accessible backyard pastime that will appeal to gardeners, crafters, and cooks everywhere. This expanded edition gives you even more information on "greening" your beekeeping with sustainable practices, pesticide-resistant bees, and urban and suburban beekeeping. More than a guide to beekeeping, it is a handbook for harvesting the products of a beehive and a honey cookbook--all in one lively, beautifully illustrated reference. This complete honey bee resource contains general information on bees; a how-to guide to the art of bee keeping and how to set up, care for, and harvest honey from your own colonies; as well as tons of bee-related facts and projects. You'll learn the best place to locate your new bee colonies for their safety and yours, and you'll study the best organic and nontoxic ways to care for your bees, from providing fresh water and protection from the elements to keeping them healthy, happy, and productive. Recipes of delicious treats, and instructions on how to use honey and beeswax to make candles and beauty treatments are also included.

About the Author

Kim Flottum has been the editor of Bee Culture magazine for more than 20 years. He is also the author of The Backyard Beekeeper's Honey Handbook (Quarry, 2008). He edited (with Dr. Shimanuki and Ann Harman) the popular 41st edition of the ABC and XYZ of Bee Culture, the bible of U.S. beekeeping. Kim blogs for www.thedailygreen.com on the beekeeping world, plus he is a regular columnist for the U.K. beekeeping magazine The Beekeeper's Quarterly. He also contributes to Bee Craft magazine in the U.K., Farming Magazine, Homestead.org, and Back Home magazine in the U.S. He and his wife Kathy are hobby beekeepers, manage an Observation Hive in the local Library, and eat well from their backyard garden.

Beekeeping for Beginners

Reviews

This book is perfect, the text is clear and easy to use and the contents has a mixure of practical beekeeping and delicious recipes. 

The book catches your imagination and provides you with a great start to your new hobby.

Beekeeping and all you need to know

If you are looking for great hobby, then you must learn the art of beekeeping because in all essence it is very, very simple and easy to get started.

Beekeeping for beginners is best looked upon as a hobby in the first instance and once you gain experience you can expand your hobby or progress to a profitable business.

Beekeeping for beginners is the start of a long and extremely interesting journey and in order to learn about this mystical hobby, you need to make sure you are fully aware of the pitfalls of the trade and by reading any book on beekeeping for beginners will provide this basic information for you.

There are lots of aspects involved in beekeeping that you need to know. One of the best things to do is to search the internet and read all information that you can get about beekeeping, however, if you are reading the articles on my site you have already started on this journey, as “All about beekeeping” will provide you with the information you require, so please bookmark my site and come back to visit to obtain the most up to date information on beekeeping and in particular beekeeping for beginners.

At the start, beekeeping can be daunting, but the first thing that you need to make sure of is the safety of your family, neighbours and friends. You do not want someone to get stung by your bees, so it is therefore important that you make precautions for people to know that you are keeping and caring for bees in the area. You will also need to check with your local authority to ensure that you can keep bees in your area.

I have chosen to add the book "Beekeeping for Beginners" to this site, as I feel it will provide you with an excellent start to your hobby, so please take the time to review it, as it provides an honest and unbiased view of this fantastic hobby.

Self - Sufficiency Beekeeping

Product Description

As sustainability and organic living become increasingly popular, so does a desire to live a more self-sufficient lifestyle. This timely book will help you to achieve self-sufficiency and make beekeeping a reality. Beekeeping is about management, control and learning to understand the honeybee. It can also become a very enjoyable and sociable pastime - visiting others' hives and picking up vital hints and tips is all part of the fun - and farming and eating honey that your own bees have produced is a pure delight. Joanna Ryde covers all aspects of beekeeping, from the basic tools and equipment needed for setting up a hive to detailed advice on when to harvest honey and honey-inspired recipes, from delicious cakes to beauty products. This really is the definitive guide for anyone thinking of keeping bees.

About the Author

Joanna Ryde is a dedicated beekeeper with four years experience. She currently has four hives in her garden in Hampshire and sells her honey and home-made honey products locally.

Guide to Bees & Honey: The World's Best Selling Guide to Beekeeping

Review

If there is one book that should be on the shelf of every beekeeper, it is Ted Hooper's classic - Beekeeping

Product Description

This is the ideal guide for anyone wanting to start beekeeping and a revered reference book for experienced beekeepers. It includes information on all you need to know, including how to avoid swarms, plan requeening, or provide the colony with winter stores. It features key information on Varroa. It is copiously illustrated throughout.

Fully revised and updated, this new edition of 'Guide to Bees and Honey' also presents expert advice for readers who plan to maintain a few hives for personal recreational use, as well as those who want to expand an existing colony into a commercial venture.

The Addiction of Beekeeping

Beekeeping has a fascinating history and began thousands of years ago, but today they are as important and vital to modern industry and agriculture as they were all these years ago. 

The first known hives were believed to have been discovered as early as 2,000 BC, but there is research to suggest that it could have been as early as 7,000BC.

In the 21^st Century, beekeeping continues to be a popular and expanding hobby or business and if done right can give you a very comfortable living. 

The good thing about beekeeping is that to start with you do not need a large area of land and just because you live within the city boundaries should not prevent you from working with bees. If you are looking for a hobby, love the outdoors and no matter where you live, then beekeeping is almost definitely worth considering.

Beekeeping can be a hobby for yourself, the family or if you really like a profitable business. Why not start a beekeeping club where you become the expert and teach others about the fantastic art and skill of beekeeping.

As with everything in life, you will need to take things slow at the beginning, but over a period of time you will learn and before you know it you will have your own hives with your own bees making honey.

A Practical Manual of Beekeeping: How to Keep Bees and Develop Your Full Potential as an Apiarist

Review

This book lives up to its title. An excellent book to get you started, with plenty for the experienced beekeeper.

Product Description

A fascinating hobby; a remunerative business; or a globetrotting career? Which type of beekeeper do you want to be? It is entirely up to you: beekeeping can provide it all.Beekeeping can provide anyone with an interesting and useful hobby or a lucrative and rewarding business. It is recognised as a vital agricultural industry and can therefore also offer you a globe trotting career. The whole subject is, however, often shrouded in mystery and loaded with jargon, leaving many people unaware of its true potential or how to start. This book strips away all the mystery and explains step by step how - from day one - you can start beekeeping as a hobby; how you can progress to running a beekeeping business; or how you can start a career as a beekeeper which can quite easily take you all over the world. No other guide explains in such detail the true potential and accessibility of beekeeping or of being a beekeeper.

From the Author

In many countries, beekeeping has often been regarded as the domain of vaguely eccentric elderly men and women who potter about in their bee clothing with their stinging insects, whereas in fact beekeeping is a dynamic global industry worth literally billions of pounds, euros and dollars and is of strategic interest to governments worldwide. Because of this importance, it offers young men and women (or older ones as well) a fantastic globe trotting career as a beekeeper, scientist, biologist or business owner and so not only does this book tell you how to keep bees but also how you too can benefit from what I reckon is a life changing interest in these amazing insects. If you are wondering what to do in life and are just starting out or have come to a crossroads in your life where you need something more, or if you simply want a hobby that exercises your mind, why not have a go. You won't regret it. It's all in the book. I took it up in my early 40s and never looked back.

About the Author

David Cramp started beekeeping as a hobby in 1991 before spending a year at the Bee Research Unit at Cardiff University. He started a beekeeping company in Spain, producing organic honey, and after 12 years moved with his wife and two daughters to New Zealand to manage a 4000 hive operation, specialising in pollination and manuka honey. David writes for the beekeeping press in the UK, the USA and Spain and is the author of the Beekeeper's Field Guide. He edits the online beekeeping magazine Apis UK and is now starting his own honey bee queen rearing business.

Is beekeeping for you?

Beekeeping in its own right can be a hobby, a lucrative and enjoyable business or a worldwide career.

Do you know what kind of beekeeper you are or want to be.

Beekeeping will very quickly capture your imagination and allow you to experience this highly lucrative and rewarding business or hobby, which is recognised throughout the world and is vital to the agricultural industry.

The whole subject of beekeeping has been kept secret for many years and the mystery surrounding it can be very addictive.

When most people take up beekeeping, the amount of information in circulation can leave many people unaware of its true potential and depending on your knowledge can sometimes be confusing.

From day one - you can start beekeeping as a hobby, learn how you can progress to running a beekeeping business or learn how you can start a career as a beekeeper.

No other guide will explains in such detail the true potential and accessibility of beekeeping or of being a beekeeper.