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years invested until commercial

19K views 44 replies 19 participants last post by  sqkcrk 
#1 ·
How many years of beekeeping have you all taken to get to a larger/commercial scale ?

and what do you consider commercial scale?

Ben
 
#35 ·
What about yards? What type of land do you utilize moving from 5 hives to 100 in a few years? Do most of you own a few dozen acres? A few hundred acres? Of do you just wait till there's too many hives in one location, then ask a farmer to place some there for free pollination?

The equipment is easy for me to plan for (theoretically, at least. you always end up short handed in the peak of the season when you do your best to over prepare), but it's difficult to tell if I have too many hives in one location. If the area gets too crowded, I get robbing issues. It's a whole lot easier to get an extra swarm than it is to get an extra outyard (that isn't an hour and a half away :)).
 
#37 ·
Spc K, I have yds I inherited from other beekeepers and I have yds I established myself by asking landowners. A few are located on land owned by people who asked me to put my bees there for the Summer. All sorts of ways to do it. One yd I'd really like to use belongs to a Church. The land is vacant. It's flat mostly and well graveled, since the Church used to be there. It would make a great staging yd for gathering hives and loading the semi. Centrally located too. But, no, liability concerns on the part of the Insurance Co. the Church uses.

Find a location which suits you. Find the landowner. Knock on their door /w a jar of honey in hand and ask. Hand them the jar, giving it to them whetrher they let you occupy their land or not. Maybe they know someone in the neighborhood who would.

It's like closing a sale. One of the questions one should remember to ask is, "Do you know anyone else who might let me put bees on their property?" or "Since you seem to like my honey, who else should I approach?"

Be friendly and be prepared to be turned down. You are the one who likes stinging insects after all. :)

Way to go Don. Good work. Get the Mrs. to go w/ you.
 
#38 ·
That's what I figured Mark.
It seems like alot of work to get yards together. Almost as much work as the rest of the beekeeping operation. Considering that some yards will not be too close to you, some won't have good forage in their area, some will be in flood plains or susceptible to theft, some will have liability issues, some you may not get along with the owner, and some will just not work out (for one reason or another). With it taking so much time and energy to find a yard, then spend all the time and energy to move the bees there, only to have some % of them not work out, it seems like your job would be mostly "yard locator" and less beekeeper.

But I'm sure once you get the good yards, you treat them like gold and hold on to them for years.
 
#39 ·
Yes, I do. I know yds that have had bees in them for generations.
I don't spend a lot of time yd searching. Just keep my ears and eyes open. Some people look at the Forest and see trees and some see lumber, or houses, or hockey sticks. Do it long enough and you will be driving down the road and your mind will simply think, "Boy, that would be a nice place to have bees."
 
#40 ·
Well this was a funny day , i was back out in the building cutting more wood for boxes and i was called out to the shop by my father. I went in the shop and there stood a guy wanting to speak about Bees ... well i wasn't sure if it was a good or bad thing at first , because i thought maybe it was a municipality guy saying he had complaints about my bees or something silly . But he said he was a Haskap Farmer and he had a need of a beekeeper to put hives on his land permanently , At first i was kinda shocked , because i have been looking for another place to put bees for good foraging . He said he would help me get the land setup for them and i could use the land as much as i needed plus there is lots of open fields around the area that are grown over with wildflowers after the Haskaps are done blooming.

So i told him how i was growing the business and he was happy to see someone my age to have such an interest in beekeeping and farming , because there really isn't that many people doing it around my area.

Also the honey made from haskaps is being sold for a premium according to the owner. he has another 2000 plants coming in to plant as well. and the whole area is electric fenced too.

So i'm very happy today : ) i was actually a little worried about finding more land for putting bees on .

here is a photo from a haskap blog he was in. http://www.lahaveforests.com/lahave-blog/richard-and-corriness-haskap-orchard-barrs-corner.html

Should be a fun year.

Ben
 
#43 ·
That's a large chunk of change ! 20 K ... That is my entire take home pay for the year. Wow.

Another reason i would like to have a second income other than my wife to be's . With the price of gas rising and everything else effected by it going up , it's hard to live on that . even being very careful with our money , it's seems there isn't much left over LOL I'm sure there is a lot of people doing the same or worse , I am just trying to make the most out of my life .

Ben
 
#45 ·
Ben, what's your goal? What's your dream? What are you willing to give up to reach your goal or dream. I imagine that most people enjoy their standard of living and aren't willing to sacrifice it to become a full time beekeeper. If you are a good businessman maybe you don't have to. But, unless you can get your spouse fully involved and willing to travel w/ you, you will spend a lot of time apart. Michael Palmer and others like him being the exception.

If you are serious about expansion into fulltime beekeeping and don't want to travel w/ your bees and spend a lot of time away from home and family follow Michael Palmers way. It works for him and works well.
 
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