Newbeekeeper looking to work with a commercial beekeeper to learn

[beegeorge]

I have a friend,, 24 yrs old with a masters in Biology, who is very interested in beekeeping and would love the oportunity to work for a commercial beekeeper overwintering in the southeast and help them get their hives ready for moving back north. He wants to learn grafting, queen rearing, splitting, and hive nutrition to begin wth,,,

He is also interested in helping with migrating pollination services, and to learn more about beekeeping that way.

I am helping him get started with his first 2 hives, but I am not big enough to employ anyone.

Should anyone need help in the southeast, or perhaps anywhere, let me know and I can give you his contact info.

apreciate any help you can provide

[Joel]

Your friend might find he'll do better in taking a beginners beekeeping course and getting through a season or 2 learning the basics 1st. Most of the commercial guys I know would expect at least a year or two of miminal experiance before jumping into the things listed and I suspest would be very hesitant. Not because they don't want to share but because in a full time operation the pedal is to the metal on most work days. I think once you spend a day afield with anybody commerical you'll be amazed at the pace work gets done, how much goes into the manipulations in that time and how much gets done every single day. That makes teaching difficult. Someone with experiance can pick things up as the day moves along. It comes down to him needing to walk before he runs and queen rearing, grafting and splits really require mastering a few basics first. Full time beekeeping is a dash almost every day to say the least and to have a complete novice tagging along can be a bit much when the work today has to get done today. Perhaps since he has a degree he might look into an internship at a university which has a beekeeping research program for starters such as Dyce or U of GA where the pace is more suited to teaching a beginner. With that under is belt he could apply for a position as they are posted and gain good knowlege for himself while providing good support for a commercial operation. In fairness to the newbie and the commericial operator that would be my suggestion.

[Jeanette]

Theres a chap in east central Florida looking for a full time helper. I saw the message posted about a week ago at: http://forum.beemaster.com/index.php/topic,39941.0.html

[beegeorge]

thank you I will pass it on

[UVBee]

If he was out in CA, we could start talking...