Q&A for How to Become a Beekeeper

Yes, but there are a lot of laws and regulations in Norway when it comes to beekeeping. Look up your local laws and contact your agricultural department to find out what you'll need to submit.

Yes! Nigeria is actually a phenomenal climate and environment for beekeeping, and honey fetches a good price in Nigeria.

Fertilize? No. Bees are definitely helpful when it comes to the health of a garden, and you may see more flowers and plants growing in the presence of bees, but they aren't going to fertilize your soil in the technical sense.

So long as your bees are healthy, you don't need to do anything to make the honey edible. It's (generally) safe to eat right off of the honeycomb. Some honey can be tainted if the bees are working around toxic plants, but this is exceptionally rare.

Your environment sounds fine. The bees will find the resources they need so long as there's some source of nectar in the area, and Michigan generally gets enough rain that water shouldn't be a big problem. The bears are definitely a concern, though. You have to keep a tall fence around the bees if you want to totally ensure that bears don't destroy your hive. Electric fences are ideal, since they'll definitely send bears running away. Beyond that, just make sure you have plenty of bear repellant on hand and follow your local news every day to look out for bear sightings in your area.

Yes. You've got more than enough space and it sounds like your bees will have plenty of plants and water nearby to be happy and healthy.

It depends a bit on where you live and what the weather is like, but bees will typically swarm in April or May. They will also swarm if they run out of space at some point or the colony gets too big. For the direction, you want it facing the sunrise. In the northern hemisphere, that means it should face east, south, or some combination of the two. Bees in a top bar hive should start building off of the starter wax, but otherwise than that, it's identical to a standard Langstroth hive in terms of the colony's behavior.

Go online and search for the nearest beekeeper in your area. Call them, and ask where they got their boxes (or if they'd be willing to sell you some of their boxes). They'll be able to point you in the right direction.

You don't need a degree, but you might want to consider taking beekeeping classes at a college or university.

Location is a tricky question and is mostly evaluated from your general surroundings, make sure the hive is in a fertile place (regarding flowers and vegetation) and at least 10 metres from the closest house.

Yes. In most cases a hive will raise a new queen to take the place of a queen that has died.

As long as you are old enough to take care of a living animal, I'd say you're old enough to be a beekeeper, although you should have some adults around to help you out. Remember to take safety precautions too!

You dont have to harvest the honey, the bees will eat it as their food. Bees make honey as their winter food, but sometimes make too much, so that's what we humans take.

You can order bees off of the internet or contact a local beekeeping group to inquire about who sells bees in your area.

Typically you should remove your honey in late summer. This is when the honey combs will be full and capped with wax.

There is a lot of good information on the websites of beekeeping organizations, such as the website of the American Beekeeping Federation.

It depends on how much honey the beekeeper gets. Bees can make 20-60 pounds of honey a day depending on a variety of factors, such as geographic location, weather, temperature, pests, local flora, and more.

It depends on how many flowers they pollinate. If they pollinate more flowers, then you'll get more honey!