Beekeeping? It’s the bee’s knees

Honeybees in Britain are dying out at an alarming rate, writes Kate Hodal – but there is something we can do about it

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IT’S the stuff that sweetens our cakes, soothes our sore throats and unwittingly fills our gardens with flowers – but come this Christmas, British honey will no longer stock our supermarket shelves.

The honeybees that produce the sweet stuff are dying en masse due to parasites, bad weather and pesticides – and it’s not a problem unique to Britain.

Nearly all colonies in the wild have died out, according to the British Beekeepers’ Association, and without any beekeepers to care for them, honeybees could disappear entirely within only a few years.

This is bad news: Albert Einstein once warned, allegedly, that if bees disappeared, man would have only another four years to live. The decline of honeybees not only threatens the crucial pollination of our crops, it has unknown consequences for the survival of plants and flowers – for a symbiotic relationship that has existed between flora needing pollination and bees which pollinate for the last 100million years.

The good thing is that there is something we can do about it. We can become beekeepers.

GETTING YOUR BUZZ ON

Beekeeping isn’t the most glamorous of hobbies with its Michelin-man white jump suit and netted veil, but it will keep the future of honeybees, and honey, alive. And this, as Winnie the Pooh would say, is “a very good thing”.

Cultivating the little buzzers is essential for both our stomachs and our pockets, as about one-third of the food we eat in Britain depends on bees, and the honey they make contributes £165million to the UK economy every year.

But there’s more to it than just that, says Chris Deaves, chair of education at the British Beekeepers’ Association and a beekeeper himself for the past 20-odd years.

“Bees’ work is far more subtle than you think: the cotton we wear is often pollinated by bees; fodder we feed our cattle is pollinated by bees, and foods like carrots and turnips require the honeybee to make the seeds for next year.”

Honeybees work as one giant super-animal, with thousands of female worker bees living and working alongside one queen bee and a few male drones (which mate with the queen). They can travel up to five kilometres to forage for pollen and nectar, and have intricate means of communicating with one another where they have been and what they have been up to.

They are such an ancient, interesting and vital species to mankind that the Egyptians recorded their beekeeping efforts in pharaohs’ tombs. In other words, they are worth keeping around.

SO HOW DO I GET STARTED?

First off, says Deaves, find out more about it.

“Keeping bees is a form of animal husbandry,” he explains.

“Your responsibility is to look after the bees: to find out what diseases they can be prone to, how to control a swarm, and to know what the bees are doing at each part of the year – where they are in their cycle of growth, reproduction, feeding and decline. It’s not just a matter of bunging a hive in the corner and standing back to get honey.”

By contacting the Scottish Beekeepers Association (www.scottishbeekeepers.org.uk), you can find a local association that will most likely have a few hives and, perhaps, offer some courses on beekeeping.

“At the very least, you’ll find a local beekeeper who can show you the ins and outs,” says Deaves.

The next thing to look out for is space. You don’t need to live in the country to keep bees – in fact, urban honey tends to be more varied in its flavours, particularly because the allotments, gardens, roofs and terraces of cities produce greater feeding variety than the large mono-crops of the countryside.

Luxury food brand Fortnum and Mason has proved what a hit urban honey can be – it has four hives in Mayfair, in London. Stocks have sold out and its live honeybee cam (www.fortnumandmason.com/ Fortnums-Bees/Home.aspx) has proved a massive internet hit.

There’s also a scaled-down hive on the roof of the Royal Festival Hall in London, with a blog that makes for great bee reading on getting started (royalfestivalhive.typepad.com).

Some gardens and parks across the UK have their own hives where you could add your own, but setting up a hive at home is easier than you might think.

“All you need is around 10-20sq ft and enough space to stand up the hives in stacks,” says Deaves.

“You can keep them in your garden, on the roof, on an allotment, or even on wasteland on the side of a railway.”

HOW MUCH DOES IT COST?

Expect to pay £100 for a nucleus (starter kit) of bees and another £100 for equipment. You don’t need all the equipment right away, nor do you need to buy everything new, so do your research before you start putting your money down.

“All beekeeping associations have equipment schemes, second-hand schemes and bee auctions in the spring for the beginner,” advises Deaves.

“And if you have any carpentry skills, you could make a whole lot of the equipment yourself.”

WHAT CAN I EXPECT?

Honey, and lots of it. Bees in Britain tend to produce a bit of honey in the spring and loads more in the summer (when we have a good summer, that is), so autumn is a good time for you to get prepped. If you start cultivating your bees in spring next year, you can expect to have honey in late-June or early-July – just in time for a glass of naturally sweetened cool lemonade.

WHAT ARE THE BENEFITS?

Well, there’s having your own supply of honey; being the owner of a hive of thousands of honeybees, and the relaxation that many associate with beekeeping.

“The thing that really hooks you is the taste of the honey – it’s just amazing,” says Mikey Tomkins, who helped to set up the hive on top of the Royal Festival Hall.

“Honey is something you normally associate with a jar in the supermarket, and you have no idea where it comes from really, and then there you are, watching it happen right in front of you. It’s irresistible.”

ANY DRAWBACKS?

“You have to learn quite a lot,” warns Deaves.

“Don’t get the bees and then wonder what to do with them.

“Bear in mind that women tend to make better beekeepers than men,” Deaves adds.

“Men tend to treat bees like they’re a dog and assert their control over them. You cannot out-aggress a beehive no matter how hard you try. Try to be more gentle and considerate and you’ll get much better hives as a result.”

There’s no harm in learning more about it, say both Tomkins and Deaves. The best plus of all, adds Deaves, is that “your friends will look at you in puzzlement and amazement, and – whether you are a boy or a girl – you always get to have a shed where no one else can go”.

To find out more about beekeeping, whether you are in the city or in the country, see the Scottish Beekeepers Association website at www.scottishbee keepers.org.uk