Mind if I hijack here?
Would there be any issues with keeping a hive in a suburban area - with residential lots averaging around 65’x150’?
My father kept one of our hives in our suburban home, and it worked OK.
However, I got stung once on my forehead when I accidentally wandered into the flight path in front of the hive. (Never did that again!) And we quickly learned to never go outside barefoot, because sick/dying bees would still sting. I think I got stung twice that way.
I don’t think the neighbors even noticed the hive, though. If you don’t have kids and are careful around the hive, then it should work fine.
I kept some in a residential area years ago. My immediate neighbors knew about it, and I made sure they got free honey. One neighbor thought it was funny that I was keeping an EYE-talian (Italian) Queen. AFAIK, I was the only one who got stung. And that was about the size of my lot.
I had no problem with the bees finding food, although this was not an inner-city with 100 story skyscrapers on each block. There were many lawns, gardens and a few fields within flying distance.
However, I’d check zoning regulations before trying it nowadays. I once inquired about this in suburban Los Angeles, and was told that it was not legal to keep bees ANYWHERE in the city without a variance, as they were classified as agricultural industries.
Most places it’s legal to keep bees, but do check local laws.
Your area probably has a beekeeping club. When I took the class they offer in my area a much discussed topic was what to do about neighbors and how to keep your bees from bothering them. I am surprised by some of the small areas I’ve seen people keeping bees, on rooftops, tiny sideyards, even one guy who kept them inside the house. He had a viewing hive (made out of glass) in a dedicated room (temperature control) with a tube leading outside.
One issue is water. If your neighbors have a pool for instance, you have to make an effort to provide water close by so the bees won’t hang around the pool.
Another issue is swarming. Beekeepers have to work at avoiding them else the neighbors can be freaked out, even though swarming bees don’t bother anyone. I had a hive swarm in my smallish yard and was fortunate that my bad neighbors were away. The sound is like a spaceship landing and bees are everywhere, in the air and waddling drunkenly on every surface.
I’ve always found bees fascinating, and have thought of it - tho I doubt my wife is at all interested.
Thanks.
No reason not to take a class. A lot of people take the class then just assist others or they keep their hives somewhere else or they let someone else keep a hive on their property but only participate whe they feel like it.
Maybe if you explained to your wife about how you can keep bees inside the house…?
I know people who have kept bees in suburban areas. The trick some of them used was not painting the hives white. Neighbors recognize white boxes as beehives, but not yellow, blue, green or brown boxes.
So far as whether it is it safe to keep bees in a suburban setting, although I live in a rural area, I used to have one of my beehives on my front porch. No one ever got stung sitting or walking across the porch. When I kept bees, however, I always did keep an epi-pen on hand in case someone got stung and really was allergic, although that never happened. (Far more people claim to be allergic than really are, but if someone really is allergic, a sting can be life threatening.)
I no longer keep bees. It has gotten very expensive to control for the mites and diseases.
Oh, I’ve wondered about this. My local park has one in a visitor center and I had instant Bee Envy.
I could put the exit tube out under the roof and just pretend it’s a natural feature.
The community garden I volunteer at has an agreement with a local bee keeper. He provides the hives, we provide the plants. He does the work. I think he gets 2/3 of the honey, and we get 1/3, plus the bees to help with pollination.
We sell it as a fundraiser. You can’t beat fresh, raw honey. Seasonal tastes, too. I like it when the citrus is in bloom. 
That might be the saddest username/post combo I’ve ever seen. 
Like, medicines for bees? fascinated face
Unlike some, bees aren’t eligible for Medicare. Yet.
As their employer, you must provide Obamacare for 40,000 bees then? 
yeah, I’ve heard various stories about what does or does not cause the current epidemic of hive collapse. it seems every few weeks they come out with a new explanation - mites, pesticides, etc.
As long as the experts are here, maybe I could ask a question of my own. I recently discovered that I have a beehive in a tree in my front yard, hanging over my driveway. I discovered this when a piece of it came down.
Now, one problem is that it is something like 30’ up, so it would take some major equipment to reach it and do anything with it–ie, $$$. My concern is that the whole thing will come down, resulting in a bunch of angry bees in my front yard.
Is it important/necessary/worth it to hire someone to remove it, or can I just ignore it and let the bees continue their lives? One person who supposedly knows the topic said these were honey-making bees, not pollinating bees, if that means anything.
Plus commercial bees have a narrow genetic profile, so any pest or poison that comes along can affect the entire population.
Adding in new gene lines to standard bee populations was how the killer bee/Africanized bee situation happened.
Re yard bees: if I really thought it was going to crash down I’d remove it, otherwise my preference would be to leave them. I’m a gardener, bees are my friends.
When we got ours, the instructions said to feed them before putting them in the hive. You do that by mixing up sugar water and painting it on the screens for them to eat. Their little tongues will poke out of the screens, slightly, as they lick it up. It makes the screens look like rippling velvet.
Oh, and we discovered that when a two pound box of bees comes into a suburban post office, the post master will personally drive it out to the house to get it the heck out of his building . . . even on a Sunday.
My dad put our hive up on the garage roof, to keep the flight path high enough that no one could walk through it. It seemed to work. It made looking after the hive more difficult, but it also kept it up and away from any visiting children or dogs.
Reno - there may be a keeper in your area who would be willing to collect the bees just to have them. You could try contacting county ag or 4-H.
It probably got there from swarming. Often, swarming bees cannot find an ideal home right away, and settle for second or third best, making it hard to survive. If the comb is in the open, they are not well protected from many dangers.
As suggested elsewhere, it would be best if you found a local beekeeper to remove them to a conventional hive. The beekeeper will be glad to get free bees and you will have a problem fixed.
I know of no such distinction. Apis mellifera saves both honey and pollen as food, and accomplishes pollination by accident.
There’s two types of mites you have to treat for. Varroa mites are treated by hanging commercially prepared plastic strips impregnated with miticide between the frames of the beehive so the bees rub against them. There’s also tracheal mites, which you treat mostly by putting menthol in the hives. Some bees are more resistant to tracheal mites than others. Varroa mites, an external parasite, are a more serious problem and transmit viruses. I’m suspicious Varroa mites are the major factor in colony collapse disorder, which I don’t think is itself a specific disease.
There are also various diseases that you treat for, the most common being a bacterial disease called foulbrood. Back when I kept bees you treated every spring and fall by opening the hive and dusting the bees several times with a mixture of powered sugar and oxytetracycline, which the bees would then lick off of themselves. Some new drug has been approved for foulbrood, but I don’t remember what.
You have to get these treatments into and out of the hives early enough in the spring that it honey is not contaminated when the honey flow starts, and then again in the fall after you harvest the honey. The strips for Varroa mites are expensive.
I loved to keep bees. They are remarkable creatures. Hives show an intelligence that is quite surprising. But it’s an expensive hobby, and one that is complicated to do right. On top of that, I found that friends, family, and coworkers all expected free honey.
This thread is so fascinating. I have never once thought about what beekeeping entails.
Another great threadearlier this year about bees. Great stuff!