Retiring...Try Keeping Bees
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You have to be reasonably fit when you retire if you want to try keeping bees.
I kept them for most of my life, and stopped recently. You see, I had to wheel the boxes of honeycomb through deep sand, then lift them over an electric fence into a second wheelbarrow, and drag that behind me through deep sand (it's easier than pushing ) until I got to the shed where I extracted the honey. It was the deep sand that beat me.
Before you consider beekeeping think of these things:
- Will you have somewhere to keep your bees legally, with easy access?
- Are you allergic to bee stings? If a beginner gets stung on a fingertip and the whole arm swells up, that's not allergy. That's bee venom, and your body will learn to fight it.
- Are you fit enough?
- Can you afford a smoker, and extractor, and a kit to make your first hive?
- Have you the confidence to catch a swarm (you might be able to pay a beekeeper to do it for you, or even to split a hive in an artificial swarm for a price.
I met someone who couldn't open his hands because of arthritis. He took up beekeeping and his hands became normal. We both believed that it was the bee stings that were responsible, but when you set yourself a goal, and ignore the problems, your body tends to adjust to let you reach your goal. So it may be that he got better because he had a new interest in life.
You are not allergic if you have never been stung. Allergy is hyper-immunity, where your body overreacts to venom. So you can't be allergic if you have never been stung. It's extremely unlikely that you are allergic if you haven't kept bees. However you only get one warning. You see spots filling up your field of vision, and your skin develops splotches of different colors. You might feel dizzy and it's difficult to concentrate.
See a doctor for anti-histamine injection, and pay a beekeeper to cart away all your hives. You must never get another bee sting. Now, that's the official answer. My Dad accidentally tipped a hive full of a hundred thousand bees over his head. He got so many stings that he couldn't walk straight even before his eyes started to swell shut. He immediately took Homeopathic apis mel and was fine in an hour or two. I dare not advise you to follow his example.
Borrow a couple of beekeeping books from the local library, and spend an evening reading them. You can amaze your friends with your expert knowledge about keeping bees, and they will be even more impressed if you start giving them little gifts of honey.
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