Kim Pezza - Backyard Farming: Keeping Honey Bees: From Hive Management to Honey Harvesting and More

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Backyard Farming: Keeping Honey Bees
Text copyright 2013 Hatherleigh Press

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available upon request.
eISBN: 978-1-57826-453-7

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic or otherwise, without written permission from the publisher.

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Interior Design by Nick Macagnone

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The world of beekeeping is one full of mystery and intrigue for the common man. As they watch the beekeeper, carefully moving among their hives in their full protective suits, gathering honey from the unique little insects that make it, many people wonder what it must be like to keep bees themselves.

Also, now, with issues like colony collapse posing a major survival problem to the honeybees world, more and more backyard farmers and homesteaders are becoming interested in beekeeping. Yet how do you know if beekeeping is really for you?

Adding hives and honeybees to your backyard farm requires a little more time, effort, and investment than planting a garden or raising chickens. Local restrictions and space requirements are even more important to consider. By deciding to keep honeybees, you are making a decision to install and maintain a small world run by your bees and watched over by you. If done correctly, however, keeping bees can be an enjoyable and incredibly rewarding experience.

Along with helpful hints and expert tips, this book touches on the basics of beekeeping: from obtaining bees and what the different varieties available to new beekeepers are to choosing the right environment for producing the right types of honey. In clear, easy-to-understand language, this book helps to teach you what to expect as a beekeeper, the pros and cons of the trade, and how the ways in which the bees are kept affect almost every stage of their lives.

Backyard Farming: Keeping Honey Bees will be an excellent go-to source for those who may be considering obtaining their own hives, but are not quite sure whether it is for them. With this book written with these excited new beekeepers in mind, even the most novice readers will find themselves ready to add beekeeping to their backyard farms.

Backyard Farming: Keeping Honey Bees is meant to be a source for those who are considering a start in the world of bees. Laying out the basics simply and clearly without a lot of complicated, in-depth information, it will give potential new beekeepers an idea of what they can expect when (or if) they decide to have a hive of their own or if it is a hobby or potential business that they even want to continue to pursue.

So sit back with your favorite beverage (perhaps with a little honey?) and begin your adventure with honeybees, honey, and all the magic that beekeepers cherish about their little charges.

Kim Pezza grew up among orchards and dairy and beef farms having lived most of her life in the Finger Lakes region of New York State. She has raised pigs, poultry and game birds, rabbits and goats, and is experienced in growing herbs and vegetables. In her spare time, Kim also teaches workshops in a variety of areas, from art and simple computers for seniors, to making herb butter, oils, and vinegars. She continues to learn new techniques and skills and is currently looking to turn her grandparents 1800s farm into a small, working homestead.

I t is a good bet that there are probably only a few people in the United Statesor anywhere else for that matterwho have never seen a honeybee at least once in their lives. It is also well known how important these busy, buzzy little girls (yes, girls, but well cover that later) are to our own food supply. It has even entered the public consciousness that honeybees are now facing peril on a worldwide scale. However, what isnt well known is just how long and storied a history the honeybee has, dating back millions of years (around 60 million years in fact).

There is even evidence to suggest that a bee species native to North America lived approximately 14 million years ago, its existence proven through a worker-bee fossil found in Nevada in 2009. Unfortunately, those bees died out long ago, and the honeybee did not reappear on the North American continent again until about 1622, when European settlers brought their hives with them. Like many other species of wildlife that originated with the European settlers, it is thought that some bees left their captivity and set up shop in the untamed wilderness of North America.

Yet it isnt just prehistoric North America that has played host to honeybees. A 19 million-year-old giant honeybee fossil was found on Iki Island, Japan, and there is evidence of beekeeping going as far back as ancient Egypt, Greece, and Spain. Some of this evidence even includes excavations of preserved hives. In fact, the Egyptian Papyrus Ebers, the oldest known book of medicine, includes a number of recipes that utilize honey for its curative effects.

Despite being one of the oldest agricultural practices known to man, beekeeping continues to find popularity today, not only in rural fields, farms, and backyards, but in the urban landscape as well. Small city lots, suburban backyards, and building rooftops have all become home to hives, not only in the United States, but in other areas of the world as well. Ironically, as enthusiasm for bees and beekeeping continues to grow, the worlds bee population continues to shrink. The decline of the honeybee population in the United States alone has resulted in a 50 percent decrease over the last fifty years. People are not only becoming involved in the plight of the honeybee and what humans stand to lose with the loss of the bees, but are getting involved with beekeeping themselves. By learning to keep bees, you are joining a proud tradition, which has existed and thrived for thousands of years, at one of the most important times in its history.