At the Beekeeper Business Retreat, we got to hear from people with a lot of experience, and one key takeaway was “more bees, more problems.” The other takeaway was “patience, or panic.” This month, I have been a living testimony for both.
Two years ago, I knew that I wanted my weekends back, and that meant leaving the flower farm. In Dec. 2024, I moved four very full, heavy hives in to town – two were placed in Des Moines, where bees are exempt from regulation but the site had a very limited footprint, and two were placed in West Des Moines, where there is a limit of two hives per lot. Patience mode.
When March 2025 rolled around, I was still in patience mode. I knew all four colonies would survive, and waited to unwrap them from their Hive Hugger treatment. Once I felt comfortable with the overnight air temperatures, I removed the winter lids and tape, and then panic mode arrived as I inspected them. The bees would need some hard splitting, and splitting meant that I’d be over the limits of both sites! Soon I had more bees and more problems.
Managing resources such as land, woodenware, my network, and creativity kicked in to high gear. Making nucs and placing them at sites in cities without restrictive bee laws, getting mated queens, selling excess bees in mediums when deeps are the convention — I still don’t have my weekends back!