A few useful questions about Beekeeping - and the answers.

Not all beekeepers will necessarily agree with our answers as each beekeeper has his/her own way of beekeeping.

If you enrol on a beekeeping course with us, all these subjects and many more will be covered.

Q: I looked through the catalogues of suppliers and saw that there are lots of different types of hives. Which kind should I buy to start up?
A: Once you decide what to buy and you buy it, it is very difficult to change, so make a good decision before you start. Up here in the far North of England we tend to use the British National Hive. In Scotland they tend to use the Smith Hive and in the South of England and Midlands the Langstroth Hive is quite popular, but they use other hives too. Buy a hive which is compatible with your area. Go to your local Beekeepers Association meetings and ask questions. People are always happy to help. You are well advised to get the same as other beekeepers in your area so that you can buy and sell bees and hive parts without problems. If the parts you buy don't fit your hives then they are not much use to you.

Q: How much does it cost to start up?
A: How long is a piece of string? A hive is made up of  many parts. Do you need them all? In the first year you will not need a lot of them.  You will need a ventilated floor, a brood box and frames with wax, a nucleus of bees, a crown board and a roof. You will need a hive tool a smoker and a bee suit. You may need an empty shallow box (super) too, to put your feeder in. That is the basic minimum and in the first year you may get away with not needing to buy more till year 2. How much it costs depends on where you buy it. Shop around. See our list of suppliers.

Q: I live in a town, can I keep bees there?
A: Probably. If you have a garden, that is usually fine. If you have a flat roof, that is very, very good (see Urban Beekeeping). Bees like the height, it is away from neighbours and children (watch the wind!). But it will be hard to move the hives. N.B. Make sure your roof does not get punctured. Also remember that if you are lucky your hive could end up by being very, very, very heavy. You can keep them in a small garden too, if carefully placed. Ask help of an experienced beekeeper and he should be able to help you place hives in most situations.

Q: How many hives should I keep?
A: Lots of people say that they only want one hive. That is fine. No problem, except if the bees die you will have to buy some more and that will cost a lot. If you have two, then you can use one to support the other, with bees, new queens, and of course if one dies you can use the other to make your own Nucleus for free (saving over £100).

Q: What do I need to buy as the basics (apart from hives) when I start beekeeping?
A: I have answered most of that above. However, you will need a bee suit, and they come in the smock form or the boiler suit form. (You can save money by buying a simple workman's boiler suit and a veil.) You will need a smoker, a hive tool, a beekeeping course or at the very least some good books on beekeeping (Ted Hooper's book A Guide to Bees and Honey is thought to be a good place to start) and the kit mentioned above. You will need to buy more later, of course, but this much will get you going.

Q: What about the Omlet Beehaus, hive?
A: It is a High-Tec new beehive, recently hit the market. It is not easily compatible with other hives as the frames are very deep, but has huge advantages for people who have mobility problems, cannot lift heavy weights or who have bad backs as everything is done at a sensible height. It cannot be moved very easily, but if you only want to keep it at the end of the garden and never move it then this is not a problem. As a Beehaus is very long and flat with a removable divider in the middle, you can have a colony of bees in each end, which means it is like 2 hives in one. However, some people feel that it is best to keep one half empty of bees in case you wish to use the empty half for Swarm Control. If you buy a Beehaus you get the full beekeeping kit with it. For full and precise information see the Beehaus site.