The Kenyan Beehive

There are a few common misconceptions out there when it comes to beekeeping. They most center around things that are based off of the “perception” of bees in the United States, and not the reality of bees. For those of us that love bees and want to incorporate them into our background schema, there are a whole lot of amazing benefits to adding these beautiful, inspiring, and exceptionally useful creatures to our gardens. In order to illustrate this point, let’s destroy some of these stupid misconceptions, shall we?

First of all, it’s a very common mistake to look at bees and think to yourself “they want to sting me”. The reality is that bees are exceptionally docile and they rarely ever sting humans. In fact, even beekeepers that regularly mess with their hives without smoking them barely EVER get stung. A lot of this bad press is because of the faulty notion that hornets, wasps, and bees are the same thing. They’re not. In fact, hornets and wasps will generally sting you as much as look at you. Bees, however, are exceptionally docile and you REALLY have to go out of your way to get stung by a honey bee.

Second, a lot of people just assume that it is illegal to keep bees in an urban garden. This is sadly true in some places, but most cities either explicitly allow beekeeping or simply don’t have any laws to regulate it in a backyard setting. The truth is that you’ll never really know if it’s legal in your area until you search online for the regulations around your area. Different countries, counties, and cities will have different “departments” that these regulations fall under, so I can’t really help you there.

For anyone that decides to take on beekeeping as their next big project, a great way to get started is by getting a Top Bar Beehive. These are sometimes called “Kenyan Hives” due to their popularity in the African nation. They are easy to clean and very easy to maintain, while also being very modular. This means that you’re able to put the thing just about anywhere, and you can easily clean it out when you need to.

jareds | My Bio & Articles

Jared Skye is an environmental scientist and author of sustainability and self-sufficiency themed media.