first year

[JRS]

there's a paradox to beekeeping it seems,to keep bees successfuly you most be knowledgable about your bees,to know your bees you most have them for years on end.first you buy,try,fail,buy again,try again probably fail again and so on until finally something that looks like hope.And amongst your trial and error you ask questions and the answer you get is most times  similar to a DEM. REP. slug fest.So the only other thing to do is find a willing beekeeper to let you help,let you do the work,let you learn.But alas you may live in a stste such as I where there is none,or none within 100 miles then what?Ask questions everyone can agree on?Or simply just get ideas?Does it all just add up to trial by fire,do the confused simply do what the pilgrims did or is there any absalution?(just wondering)

[Cindi]

newcomer.  It sounds like you have summed it up pretty good.  But, you need to remember that if you study alot before you get the bees, listen to the problems and/or failure that people have encountered and listened to how they fixed these problems, you will have a pretty good handle on things.

It does take time to even begin to understand all the stuff.  It is overwhelming and sometimes scarey.  I have been keeping bees now for 2 months short of two years.  Blunders I have made, lost colonies, bought colonies, made colonies.  I feel like I have just begun to touch the tip of the iceberg. 

But if you feel that you want to try to keep some bees, you should do that.  There is a myriad of people that you can turn to for advice.  We all were beginner beekeepers at one point in time.  And I don't doubt for a minute that we all asked really simple and perhaps questions that sounded to ourselves (and others) like dumb.  BUT these questions must be answered, no matter how insignificant they may seem.  That is how we learn.

About 8 months after I had been keeping bees, I ran into a guy that said that he would answer any questions that I would ask.  Well, he never knew what he was in for.  I had been writing down every question that I thought about while I was studying.  By the time I had finished my question list, it was to the tune of 104 of them. Yikes...oh well, I typed them out and e-mailed them to this poor soul.

The short of this story, he never responded back.  I in all my infinite wisdom, this must have overwhelmed him so badly he just cut right out.  I never have had the guts to e-mail this man back again to see if he even ever got around to answering any of them. I don't think he did.

Fortunatley, I put a little note in the questions that got him off the hook.  I knew that he was heading into the spring being very busy with his bees.  So I told him that if life got too busy, not to fear that I would ever be upset.  Which I was not.  I kept studying and I think now that I could answer all the 104 questions.  You must listen, read, learn.

That is how I feel about this, you will get many other differing statements and opinions, listen to them all, these responses will be your amunition to make some decisions that you obviously are very much in need of attending to.  Good luck.  You will love beekeeping.  It is a haunting and wonderful kingdoom to enter into and you will always find it interesting, and let me tell you, you will never be bored.  Greatest of days.  Cindi

[Michael Bush]

"No one teaches beekeeping quite as well as bees"  Michael Bush with apologies to C.S. Lewis

When in doubt, leave them alone.

[Kathyp]

When in doubt, leave them alone.

that may be the best advice yet!!  :-)


i'd say, learn all you can.  ask all the question.  apply some common sense and use what works for your situation.  i have gotten great advice here, but it is advice that will not work for me.  i have also gotten great advice that has saved my hide!  and....if no one has the answer, go on a try a thing.  sometimes that's the best way to learn.