No amount of talking about bees will give you the experience of handling them. During this module you will learn where to get the opportunity to handle bees, how to prepare for your up-close encounters with them, and you will have gained your first hands-on experience with these fascinating insects. Preparing for this includes understanding bee motivations, their behaviour as a superorganism and also appropriate use of PPE and dealing with bee stings.
You will decide what bees to start with and where to get them. By the end of the module you will have your first bees and know how to care for them and prepare them for winter, ready for your first full year’s beekeeping season in Module Three.
Your bees can be obtained in a number of different ways and a few different forms. Nature’s way of producing new colonies is for the bees to swarm and find a new home. We can provide them with this home and catch our bees for free, or buy our honey bee colonies from other beekeepers. There are pros and cons to both and you will learn what these are and then implement your chosen strategy.
In this course, the bees are your teacher – you learn together with your bees, from your bees, and my role is less that of a teacher and more of a guide: helping you to understand what you’re seeing and respond in a way that serves your bees; growing a mutually beneficial relationship between your bees and you.
