YOUNGSTOWN — Mark Wolf got into the beekeeping business for a myriad of reasons, not the least of which was his curiosity about whether bee stings might help his rheumatoid arthritis.
“I’m a physician,” he said. “There was a lot of talk about bee venom therapy being good for arthritis.”
It hasn’t worked yet, even though during one beekeeping session he was stung six or seven times, Wolf said.
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Even so, he continues to be a passionate beekeeper.
Wolf learned how to become a beekeeper through local courses, which are being offered again this month. Jamie Ellis and other state and nationally recognized experts from the University of Florida Honey Bee Research and Extension Lab will teach the classes.
L. Scott Jackson, UF/IFAS Florida Sea Grant agent, said Ellis is one of the best beekeeping teachers and researchers in the world.
“He is really sharp,” he said. “We’re going to do this through interactive video. People can ask questions. He’ll be able to answer specifics about any questions people have.”
Wolf said he enjoys the hobby for many reasons, including his fascination with the sociology of bees, the satisfaction of preserving bee colonies crucial to crop pollination that have been struggling to survive lately across the United States, and earning a little side income from selling honey and lip balm to friends and family.
“It is a pretty interesting hobby to get into,” Wolf said. “You learn a lot about the biology and the sociology of bees, and the bees get to make honey. You can’t beat fresh, local honey; there is nothing better than that.”
A beekeeper keeps bees to collect their honey and other products the hive produces, including beeswax and pollen, as well as pollinating crops or producing bees for sale to other beekeepers.
Wolf said beeswax is useful in making candles.
“I have my grandkids making candles with that, also pollen, which a lot of people like to take for allergies,” he said.
The business is more of a passion than a money maker for him.
“But you get the rewards out of it,” Wolf said. “I give a lot of my honey away as gifts instead of selling it.”
Starting out: To get the business off the ground, it cost him about $300 to $400 to get the equipment and beekeeping boxes and protective suit.
“There are a number of different catalogue warehouses,” he said. “There are people up in Marianna that sell it. I do most of my online shopping.”
Beekeeping is the maintenance of honey bee colonies in hives, which he maintains in wooden crates with holes on the bottom that allows bees to fly in. He’ll guide a bee swarm into the crate and let nature take its course. Once the queen bee is in, the rest of the bees follow.
After opening the crates, he uses a smoker to waft smoke on the bees. The smoke keeps the bees calm and less likely to sting him.
“It does two things,” Wolf said. “One is it covers up the alarm pheromone so they don’t get all worked up. And the other thing is they say that it gives the bees the thought that there might be a fire, so they think they might have to abandon their hive, so they’ll start gorging themselves with food in case they do have to take off.”
Wolf said he has enjoyed the educational aspects of beekeeping, particularly learning bee colony sociology.
“I thought the queen bee was the leader of the colony, but really she is just one of the colony that has a specific job,” he said. “The queen’s job is to lay eggs, and then there are the workers. Their job is to take care of the hive to get the pollen. Then there is the drone. His job is to take care of the queen.”
Wolf said honey production is fascinating.
“They go out and gather nectar and put it in a crop,” he said. ‘They bring it back to the hive and they transfer it to another bee. Literally, honey is modified bee vomit, and they’ll transfer it to another bee, and a bee puts it in a cell. While it goes to the other bee, it’s treated with enzymes. It basically changes from nectar to honey with the evaporation of water and effects of the enzymes.”
Wolf maintains five beekeeping hive crates on his property in Youngstown. “Next month I will have at least 10, just by splitting them,” he said.
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He enjoys the fact he is helping to preserve bee colonies.
“Our bee population in Florida is increasing, but not throughout the country,” he said. “We’ve found that one out of three bites of food that we take come to us courtesy of the pollinators, and without bees, even Albert Einstein realized that our society would be doomed.”
Want To Go?
The IFAS Extension Panhandle Agriculture Team is offering a beekeeping short-course in March via interactive video at extension offices across the Panhandle. In Bay County, the classes will be held at the Cooperative Extension Office at 2728 E. 14th St., Panama City, and will be Monday evenings from 6-8 p.m. with a Saturday morning bee-yard field day. Each presentation will be followed by an interactive question and answer period. The class schedule is:
- March 9: Honey bee biology, anatomy and hive structure
- March 16: Bee nutrition and bee botany (identification of nectar plants)
- March 21: Bee-yard field-day — A hands-on learning opportunity
- March 23: Important pest and diseases — identification and management
Registration for all four classes is $20 per person, or $30 for a family. This fee covers course materials and refreshments.