Beekeeping For Dummies

Now updated — your guide to becoming a successful backyard beekeeper. Interested in raising honey bees? This friendly, practical guide presents a step-by-step approach to starting your own beehive, along with expert tips for maintaining a healthy colony. You get the latest on honey bee medication and treatments, harvesting and marketing your honey, and the impact the sudden disappearance of the honey bee has on our environment and economy.:. To bee or not to bee? — understand the benefits of beekeeping and whether it's right for you;. Build your first hive — gather the right equipment, obtain your bees, and transfer them safely to their new home;. Get up-close and personal — see how to open and close the hive, inspect your bees at the right times, and know what to look for;. Handle common problems — from swarming to robbing to pesticide poisoning, find simple solutions;. Understand Colony Collapse Syndrome — learn what you can do to help save the honey bees;. Gear up for the golden harvest — use the tools of the trade to extract honey, store it, and sell it. Praise for Beekeeping For Dummies. "The information a beginner needs to keep bees with confidence.". — Kim Flottum, Bee Culture Magazine. "A reader-friendly guide to beekeeping for novices or beginners.". — Dewey M. Caron, Professor of Entomology, University of Delaware. Open the book and find:. The various types of honey bees and the role each plays in a colony;. Hands-on instruction in building a hive;. How to keep bees healthier and more productive;. Guidelines for all phases of honey production;. New information on raising your own queens;. Plenty of helpful, illustrative pictures to guide you;. The safest ways to inspect and enjoy your bees;. A Beekeeper's Calendar organized by climate zones

Customer Reviews:

Good for Dummies

By Paul Bridges - June 21, 2003

Keep in mind this book has a "dummies" slant. It's a great beginner book and I own a copy. I recommend it. Lots of conversational plain english, funny cartoons, photographs, etc. But, buy another book as well to round out your knowledge. For example, Howland doesn't explain *why* you need an inner cover... just says it's part of the hive. He only provides *one* technique for queen introduction (albeit a good one), when there are several others. Then he perpetuates the myth that you should scrape a bee's stinger away rather than pinch it away (Discover magazine, et. al., now dispute this), and when discussing *moving* a hive, he leaves out the "3 mile rule" and the "1 foot per day" approach, etc. He suggests using motor oil moats to prevent ants (works great), but doesn't mention that vegetable oil and Tanglefoot work great also. Like I say, great book, buy it, but get some others too.

Beekeeping for Dummies...

By Charles Andrew Wingard - January 29, 2005

... is a good spring board into the world of beekeeping. He explains the set up of the hive, insect and disease problems, tools you may or may not need, etc. But there is little explanation as to why these things are necessary. Also, if you are familiar with the state of the honey bee, you will know that colonies are dying at a rapid rate. Howland's book is slanted toward exploiting bees, and not just keeping them. Miticides, ordering of new queens each year, honey substitutes, and fungicides are the law in this book, and the beekeeping industry are not questioning these practices that are compounding a very serious problem, because they make money off of selling these products. I reccommend reading this book so you can understand hive setup, maintence, tools, etc.. but if you are concerned about your colonies overall health, and the health of the honey bee in general, supplement this reading with Gunther Hauk's "Toward saving the Honey Bee". Amazon does not offer it but you... read more

from a beginner beekeeper

By Leola L. Crosley - February 27, 2002

I've read 4 beekeeping books, I wish I would have read this one first. It's very readable and easy-to-understand, and contained information the other harder-to-understand technical books never mentioned.