The Beekeeper

A beekeeper is a person who raises, and keeps bees. There are thousands of beekeepers in the US that keep bees, and around 250 commercial beekeepers in the state of Texas. A beekeeper's job is to take care of the bees, and usually to try to harvest honey. Most beekeepers make around 50lbs of honey per hive. Here is an outline of what we do throughout the year:

Spring

Prepare the bees for making honey by boosting their strength. We want around 60,000-100,000 bees per hive. We also split the bees. At times, beehives get too strong so we take some of the bees and make a new hive. This is called splitting a hive.

 Summer

Summer is the time to harvest the honey from the bees. If you are a commercial beekeeper, you move your beehives to a different location where they will make more honey. We also make sure our bees can get to water. The bees keep the beehive around 93 degrees, no matter how hot or cold it is outside. During the summer, the bees will actually get water, and stand at the entrance of the hive and fan their wings while they release the water they gathered. This creates an actual air-conditioning system.

Fall

During the fall, we are preparing our bees for winter by making sure they are strong enough. During the winter, the bees huddle into a tight cluster in the center of the beehive and vibrate. This friction produces heat which keeps the hive around 93 degrees. If there are not enough bees in the hive, they cannot keep themselves warm enough.  We make sure the bees have plenty of honey to eat. Bees must have honey to produce warmth, so we must make sure they won't run low.

Winter

We must keep the hives out of the direct wind, and make sure the bees have plenty to eat. We begin feeding the bees in January to get them ready for the coming honey flow in spring.