Ever thought of beekeeping?

Recently my love and I were strolling through a book store and I don’t know why, but a book from Luke Dixon “Keeping bees in towns and cities” caught my attention. Bought it, read it and then thought, well, let’s start a new career!

Unfortunately it is not that easy-peasy. Beekeepers deal with wild(!) animals and they have to have some knowledge about bees in order to keep the bees successfully. And of course, not every person living in the city is super-fond of having one or more swarms of bees close to their homes. Besides that, we simply do not have the space in the garden for a bee hive and I am also not so sure about what our two dogs would think.

Nevertheless, I am still interested in the whole subject and do also have every support from my personal chef as the whole subject is about food and potentially having our own honey supply at some time in future is worth something. To improve my knowledge and get some “hands-on” information I visited a monthly beekeeping meeting of the Southerns Beekeeping Association (www.beekeepers.co.za) in Johannesburg. At that meeting, a professional beekeeper mentioned honey badgers and the problems he is having with them. I never heard this English word before, so did some research later at home and here are some amazing facts about the “Honig Dachs” (extract from Wikipedia):

• Honey badgers are intelligent animals and are one of a few species known to be capable of using tools
• Honey badgers favour bee honey
• They also eat insects, frogs, tortoises, rodents, turtles, lizards, eggs, and birds
• Honey badgers have even been known to chase away young lions and take their kills!
• Honey badgers have very powerful jaws
• They kill and eat snakes, even highly venomous or large ones such as cobras
• Their skin is hard to penetrate, and its looseness allows them to twist and turn on their attackers when held. The skin is also tough enough to resist several machete blows

Wohooooo! Seems like having problems with honey badgers basically means you do have really serious problems!

And last thing to think about: Please support your local bee keepers and don’t buy imported honey. Potential diseases for the local bees can be imported with honey!!!