Why do you want to keep bees?

(extract from The Barefoot Beekeeper by P J Chandler)

If your main concern is to obtain maximum amounts of honey from your hives, regardless of all other considerations, then you are reading the wrong book. Not that this style of beekeeping cannot produce decent amounts of honey – it certainly can – but the emphasis here is on sustainability and keeping healthy bees rather than setting records for honey crops, which inevitably has a cost.

The essence of sustainability is to work well within the limits of a natural system: pushing any living thing beyond its natural capacity can only lead to trouble.

Let me lay my cards on the table right away: I believe that beekeeping should be a small-scale, 'cottage industry' or hobby and should be carried out in the spirit of respect and appreciation for the bees and the part they play in our agriculture and in nature. I disapprove of large-scale, commercial beekeeping because it inevitably leads to a 'factory farming' mentality in the way bees are treated, handled and robbed and a lack of consideration of its effects on biodiversity.

Bees evolved to live in colonies distributed across the land according to the availability of food. Forcing 30, 50, 100 or more colonies to share the territory that, perhaps half a dozen or fewer would naturally occupy is bound to lead to concentrations of diseases and parasites that could not otherwise occur and that can only be dealt with by means of chemical interventions, which, I and many others believe, weaken the bees' natural defenses.

Bees love to feed on a multiplicity of flowers, as can be easily demonstrated by the variety of different pollens they will collect if sited in a wild place with diverse flora. Transporting them to a position where there is only a single crop of, say, oilseed rape within reach prevents them from exercising their desire for diversity and causes an unnatural concentration within the hive of a single pollen, which is most likely lacking in some of the elements they require for full health. Yet migratory beekeeping is practised in just this way on an industrial scale in some countries, especially the USA.

From a conservation point of view, unnaturally large concentrations of honeybees can also threaten the existence of other important and, in places, endangered pollinating insects, such as bumble bees and the many other species that benefit both wild and cultivated plants.

Sustainable beekeeping is small-scale by definition. It is 'backyard beekeeping' by people who want to have a few hives at the bottom of their garden, on their roof (there are a surprising number of roof-top beekeepers in our cities) or in their own or a neighbour's field or orchard.

Probably you want to produce modest quantities of honey for your family and friends, with maybe a surplus to sell at the gate or in the local market. You will have by-products; most obviously beeswax, which you can make into useful stuff like candles, skin creams, wood polish and leather treatments, so beekeeping could become the core of a profitable sideline.

And you are interested in bees for their own sake, I hope. If not yet, I have no doubt that you will be soon.
You may have been to an open day hosted by your local beekeeping association, or read a book or two, or perhaps you have taken the plunge already and bought a second-hand WBC or National hive and captured a swarm or obtained a 'nuc'1. You may have browsed through the catalogues of beekeeping suppliers, wondering at the enormous number of specialized gadgets and pieces of equipment you seem to need and wondering where you would put it all and how you would pay for it.

In this case, you will be truly thankful to know that my mission throughout this book is to show you that, (a) beekeeping does not have to be as complicated as some would make it out to be and (b) you need none of the stuff in those glossy catalogues in order to keep healthy, happy and productive bees.

None of it at all.

You will recall that the sub-title of this book is 'A simple, sustainable approach to small-scale beekeeping' and that is what I have in mind throughout and I would like you to keep in mind: simple, sustainable, small-scale.
The system I will describe here is about as simple as beekeeping can get, while maintaining provision for inspections, comfortable over-wintering and non-destructive harvesting. Everything you need is in one box – the beehive – which you can make yourself if you follow my instructions. You can buy or make yourself a veil. If you are nervous, you could even get a beekeeper's suit or a smock, but any light-coloured shirt will do as well. A hive tool can be handy, but a strong, sharp, flat-bladed knife will also work.

Some of the things you will not need include:
frames
foundation wax
supers
centrifugal extractor
bottling equipment
de-capping knife and tray
bee escapes
mouse guards
queen excluders
fancy feeders
space suits
bee blower

and you probably won't need gloves or a smoker, but if you already use them, or are nervous of bees, then by all means use them if they help you to feel more confident.

What you will need is a hive – probably two or three or more in time – and I will show you how to build them cheaply and easily, using only hand tools if you prefer, with only rudimentary woodworking skills.

Bees are fascinating creatures and among the many beekeepers I know or have talked to – even commercial men - I can't think of any who keep them just for the income they generate.

So be warned: if you start keeping bees and develop a real interest in them, it will be with you for life. And I doubt very much that you will regret it for a moment.

The Barefoot Beekeeper is available from www.biobees.com

The free supplement, 'How to Build a Top Bar Hive' is available from the same site.

The Barefoot Beekeeper now available

Just to let you know that I have published The Barefoot Beekeeper in both PDF (downloadable) and printed form on Lulu (see www.biobees.com for links and stuff).

I will most likely offer a DNL version soon for those of you who liked the page-turning effect, but it will have to wait a while as I have a stack of other stuff to catch up with - including building some more hives!

Many thanks to those of you who wrote back with comments and thoughts about why women seem to be more attracted to this style of beekeeping. Of course, you all have your own reasons so I cannot generalize, but it is interesting that just under half the people on this list are women, which compares to what - maybe one beekeeper in 20 or so in conventional beekeeping.

I designed my TBH to be accessible to people with disabilities, so it would be great to hear from anyone with mobility issues or other disability that would normally prevent them from taking up beekeeping, but who are now able to do so.

So, thank you all for your interest, enjoy the free downloads and get a copy of the Barefoot Beekeeper if you can - I think you will enjoy it.

How To Build a Top Bar Hive

I'm getting a lot of interest in the free 'How to build a top bar hive' ebook, especially since I made a PDF version available. The most remarkable thing is that the majority of feedback I am getting is coming from women!

Now I have been to quite a few beekeepers' meetings and you can usually count the number of women present on the thumbs of one hand, so it is great that women are attracted to this particular branch of the craft. There is, of course, no good reason why women should not be beekeepers, but I suspect that a lot of you have been put off by the heavy lifting involved in using 'normal' hives - and maybe by the rather 'male', controlling attitude of modern beekeeping?

I'm speculating here and would be pleased if some of you will tell me your reasons for being drawn to top bar hives and sustainable beekeeping.

The Barefoot Beekeeper is more-or less on track for release around the end of April. Perhaps May 1 would be an appropriate date - or maybe May 2 on the full moon and a biodynamic 'flower day'.

This online publishing business has become complicated of late by the addition of new formats, my favourite being DNL (see http://www.desktopauthor.com/ where you can find the TBH book under 'samples'). Unfortunately, this format is Windows-only at present, so I will have to produce a PDF version as well for the anarchists!

OK, that's enough from me. Best wishes for your beekeeping efforts and do email me with comments and questions. I can't promise a rapid response, but I will do my best to answer everyone.

Happy beekeeping!

Phil Chandler
www.biobees.com

Biodynamic Beekeeping: a weekend with Michael Weiler

A review of 'The Nature of Bees and Biodynamic Beekeeping',

at The Hatch, Thornbury, 26^th-28^th August 2005

It took me a while to find The Hatch community in Thornbury, just north of Bristol, and even as I arrived I wondered if I really had the right place. Most of the people gathered on the grass in front of the entrance appeared to be in their twenties – surely this was not a beekeeping event?

But it was. I am past my half century, yet I am usually one of the younger members at meetings of beekeepers, so it was greatly encouraging to find that more than half the forty-odd people here – apparently willing to sit through a whole weekend of bee-talk – were under thirty. Better yet, a much higher proportion than is usual were women. Even Michael Weiler, our speaker for the weekend, is younger than me – albeit only by a couple of years. Michael runs a health food shop within a special needs community, similar to our Camphill communities, on a 100 hectare farm near Stuttgart in Germany and is an experienced beekeeper who looks after fifty colonies.

During the past five years I have become something of a bee nerd. I have kept my own bees in standard hives, hives of my own design and the traditional skep. I have read just about all the major books on the subject and many of the minor ones. I have watched and assisted other beekeepers and for a year worked at Buckfast Abbey, probably the best-known commercial beekeeping enterprise in Britain and even the world, thanks to the work of Brother Adam, who lived and worked there for most of his 98 year life. None of this, of course, makes me any sort of expert. Most of the beekeepers I know have many more years of experience and I would not presume to elevate myself to their rank, but I can say that I have studied the subject in some depth and gained quite a bit of practical and theoretical knowledge in that time. Only a few weeks previously I attended a week-long intensive course at the Central Science Laboratory near York, so this weekend was an opportunity to extend my learning and I was looking forward to discovering how biodynamic beekeeping differs from what we have come to accept as 'normal' beekeeping, which, from my perspective, is in urgent need of some radical re-thinking.

Michael was introduced by Bernard Jarman, executive director of the Biodynamic Agricultural Association (BDAA) for ten years.

Had Michael been a native English speaker, he may have been tempted to deliver the information content at a faster pace, which may have overwhelmed those in the group with little background knowledge. As it was, his thoughful and gently-paced delivery enabled even complete beginners to follow his talks, while giving the more experienced listeners time to consider the implications of this or that procedure and to ask questions, which Michael was always willing to answer. When he occasionally ran out of English vocabulary, several German-speaking members of the audience were able to provide helpful suggestions.

In contrast to the more general approach to teaching beekeeping, Michael stressed the importance of learning about the nature of bees before learning how to handle and cultivate them. He reminded us that Rudolf Steiner had given eight lectures about bees, which he considered to be more important to agriculture than any of the domesticated species because of their vital work in pollinating crops. Albert Einstein considered them so vital that he predicted an early end to human life on earth should the honeybee become extinct.

Although Michael and his fellow biodynamic beekeepers use 'modern' rectangular wooden hives with moveable frames, they do not fit the frames with wax foundation, according to general practice. He considers that building wax comb is an important, natural function of the honeybee and that suppressing this function, by providing ready-made foundation sheets embossed with the honeycomb pattern, causes the bees unecessary stress. There is also the danger inherent in the common practice of recycling wax into new foundation whereby lipophilic substances from anti-parasite treatments will tend to concentrate in the wax, leading to a build-up of toxins that could damage bees, as well as encourage the development of mites resistant to such treatments. In the biodynamic system, bees are allowed to build their own comb according to their needs, thus acknowledging that the bees know better than we do what is best for them.

Michael noted the common objection from beekeepers that, left to their own devices, bees will build comb containing many more large drone-sized cells that they would if provided with smaller-cell worker-sized foundation, thus potentially reducing the space for raising worker brood. On the face of it, a reduction in the working population ought to result in lower honey yields, but in practice this appears not to be the case. One of Michael's friends is a commercial beekeeper with 500 hives, who makes a good living using the biodynamic system and has excellent honey crops.

Michael considers that allowing the bees to decide on the male/female balance in the hive gives them more control and thus results in a less stressed colony. Although it is generally considered that the drone bee's only function is to mate with a queen – something that only a tiny proportion of drones actually achieve in practice – there may be other secondary functions of which we are unaware, possibly including helping to keep the brood warm. Another advantage of having large numbers of drones around an apiary is that our queens are more likely to mate with our own drones, thus helping to maintain our blood lines.

Another unusual feature of this system is the non-use of the queen excluder – a wire screen that allows the passage of worker bees into the honey storage boxes placed on top of the hive, but prevents the passage of the queen, thus keeping her below in the brood chamber. Michael says that only rarely does the queen actually lay in the honey boxes and when she does it is a simple matter to separate out the few affected frames.

Debates about the necessity or otherwise of queen excluders have been endemic since the advent of the modern hive and Michael's argument against them is that by denying the queen access to the honey its 'energetic' qualities are changed. As an example, he said that honey from oilsed rape, which commonly crystallizes in the comb very quickly (making it difficult to extract) does not do so as readily when the queen has access to it. Few conventional beekeepers are likely to understand or even believe this, but given the evidence of a successful commercial operation, they may be persuaded to try it for themselves.

Against the general trend, biodynamic beekeepers raise queens exclusively from those generated by the swarming impulse, when queen cells are made – sometimes in quantity – by the bees in preparation for sending out a swarm, as their primary mechanism for reproducing the collective organism of the bee colony. This behaviour is unique to the honeybee and provides us with the means for increasing our stock. Michael does not consider that this practice encourages swarming, despite the attempts of some bee breeders to select for a low tendency to swarm. He and his colleagues do practice a form of artificial swarming in order to prevent the loss of prime swarms, which would otherwise result in a greatly reduced worker population and subsequent lower honey yields.

Most commercial beekeepers either raise their own queens using a process known as 'grafting' - which entails the transfer of young larvae from worker cells into artificial queen cups - or they buy in queens from breeders who use either the same system or artificial insemination. Both are anathema to the biodynamic beekeeper, who considers queens raised by artificial means as inevitably inferior to those raised within the colony by natural means. Michael acknowledged that queens raised under the supercedure impulse – arising when a colony considers that its queen needs to be replaced – are probably the best queens of all, but pointed out that supercedure is hard to predict compared with swarming and that queens heading prime swarms are often superceded anyway soon after the swarm establishes itself.

The other outstanding difference between this system and the modern norm is the approach to winter feeding. Most commercial beekeepers – with an eye on profits - take as much honey as possible and feed back sugar syrup to the bees to make up any shortfall below the amount they need to sustain them through the winter. This practice is avoided as far as possible by biodynamic beekeepers, who do their best to leave ample supplies of honey for the bees' winter stores and only feed sugar syrup – with a little chamomile tea added - when absolutely necessary, as when, for example, a period of bad weather in the spring causes a shortage of nectar and the bees are in danger of starvation. Refined sugar is certainly more difficult for the bees to deal with than their natural food and some believe that it causes dysentery and other disorders. In any case, no-one can dispute that bees prefer honey and that they know better than we do what is good for them.

We had an opportunity to examine and open one of the three colonies kept at The Hatch, which, for some of the group, was their first opportunity to see the inside of a hive. There was some added interest as the drones were at that moment being evicted by the workers in preparation for the winter, a normal occurrence but not well known other than to beekeepers.

This weekend reinforced my view that a mutually successful and sustainable relationship with our bees must be based on a truly holistic approach: we need to learn more about how the colony works as a complete, living entity and the manifold ways in which it interacts with its environment and with other living things. For too long we have been locked in an old-fashioned, reductionist approach , dealing with bees as if they were mere machines created solely for our benefit, instead of highly-evolved, wild creatures, with which we are privileged to work.

For me and many others this was an inspirational weekend, conducted by a teacher with a great passion for bees and deep understanding of their nature. I had already begun to apply organic principles within my own beekeeping and I am now convinced that the biodynammic route is the one I shall take, mainly because it facilitates the bees in their natural processes and causes them the minimum amount of stress - surely the root cause of the manifold problems they face in the modern world.

I hope that other beekeepers, both new and experienced, will take the time to learn about this system and discover its advantages both for themselves and for the bees. I also hope that the BDAA will arrange more events like this one.

Philip Chandler