Keeping Bees

For years my wife has wanted to raise honey bees.  As a purely academic question, bees seemed interesting to me but getting stung didn’t seem like the best pastime.  So in 2016, while surfing the net, I started reading more in depth about bees.  The more I learned, the more interested I became, so by the next morning I had order 2 colonies (hives) and a nuc (nucleus or small hive).  I told my wife we had two months to read up and then we were going to have bees.  So over the next eight weeks we read eight different books on beekeeping and spent countless hours reading posts on bee forums.  We ordered various pieces of equipment including Ultrabreeze suits (supposed to be the best and I didn’t want to get stung).  Being a geek mechanical engineer, I designed some great hive stands and had them built and powder coated by a fab shop in College Station, Texas.

 

 

Amazingly complex hive stand (most people use cinder blocks).

When the bees were ready for pickup I drove to Navasota, Texas with my son and picked them up.  My wife and daughter had to travel for a funeral so I had a friend help me put the colonies on the stands and put the nuc into its own 10 frame deep brood box.  I should have had a mentor help, but no bees or people died so it was a success!  I will tell you the first time opening a hive and hearing that hum is a little intimidating.  We have been enjoying working with the bees and eating (and selling) our own local honey.  It has been a great business venture and I am glad my wife always wanted to be a beekeeper.

 

Putting the nuc into its new home.

 

Our healthy and happy bees (the tan circles are capped brood)