Photo courtesy of Hemera/Thinkstock
Urban beekeeping satisfies anyone looking for a new hobby that also helps Mother Nature.
- Honey: Honey is sweet and delicious; we can almost all agree on that. But store-bought honey can be expensive and doesn’t even include bee pollen, which legitimizes the honey’s source. When you collect your bees’ honey, you’re saving money and you know exactly what ingredients it holds.
- Pollination: Flowers, fruit trees and crops in your neighborhood won’t grow without bee pollination, so help your street blossom by providing a full supply of natural pollinators.
- Learning Experience: Almost everything is new and exciting to children, especially when it comes to nature. Offering a chance for children in your community to help nurture their own bees gives them an opportunity to not only become more knowledgeable about how food grows, but also creates a sense of pride in taking care of a living creature while reaping the reward (honey).
- Homemade Gifts: A jar of fresh, local, organic honey can’t bee beat as a great gift to your family members and friends.
- Inexpensive Hobby: Once you’ve spent the initial, fairly inexpensive investment on beekeeping materials and protective clothing, like any other hobby, all that’s needed is your time.
- Connection with Nature: Make that farm-to-table connection with nature by observing how your food is grown.
- Help Stop Colony Collapse Disorder: Honeybees and other pollinators pollinate one-third of food we consume, but colony collapse disorder is causing a large number of honeybees to disappear. Help Mother Nature out by acting as a “safe house” for bees by providing a pesticide- and herbicide-free landscape for bees to pollinate.
- Relaxing: The lull of a buzzing swarm of bees can be relaxing, just like sleeping with white noise or with a blowing fan. Watching the dance of your bees flying in and out of their hive can be meditative.
- Beeswax: Beeswax is a free byproduct of hives. It can be heated and mixed with fragrant oils when making candles, made into lip balm and coated over cheese for protection.
- Health: Honey has antiseptic and antibacterial properties; manuka honey contains the antibacterial methylglyoxal and the acidity in honey keeps bacteria from growing. Lower-glycemic honeys, such as locust and box honey, slowly release carbohydrates into your system, allowing you to sweeten food or drinks without immediately raising your blood sugar, which often results in a “sugar crash.”
