ARCATA -- More than 280,000 bees made their way to the North Coast last weekend, creating quite a buzz.
As the culmination of a 12-week course through the Humboldt State University Office of Extended Education, students in Dick LaForge and Chris Witt's beekeeping class had ordered three-pound boxes of bees from Glenn County and, upon their arrival, learned how to install the insects in their hives.
Though beekeeping is declining nationwide, it is alive and well in Humboldt County. The HSU class turns out new crops of beekeepers almost annually, and the Humboldt Beekeepers, a club open to the public, provides a support network and place for keepers to talk about successes and problems associated with the ancient practice. While most beekeepers start with a keen eye on harvesting honey, many quickly develop an immense respect for the bees and come to love caring for them.
According to C.P. Dadant's book, “First Lessons in Beekeeping,” the practice of keeping bees is described in the early recording of the Vedas in India and is heralded in the Koran and the Bible. Dadant also noted that beekeeping attracted the attentions of Aristotle and Greek mythology.
LaForge, who lives in a cabin-style home he designed and built, is a naturally curious man who said he frequently becomes interested in things for several years before he moves on to the next pursuit. He started keeping bees at his home more than 15 years ago when he took over a friend's hives.
Beekeeping, which has been called agriculture for intellectuals, has held LaForge's interest because it is an intricate art, he said, that takes time to become adept at. Well, that and because of a little peer pressure.
”After you do it for a while,” he said, “your friends come to expect (the honey).”
LaForge began teaching the Extended Education course about eight years ago and now team teaches with Witt. He said the class is filled with a mix of community members and students of all ages and backgrounds. Some are led to the class by a love of honey and others by a love of insects.
Babette and Russ Rose of Smith River committed to making the two-hour drive to and from class every week because they wanted good, natural honey. Babette Rose said the class was well worth the drive and, while she was picking up two boxes of bees, added that she couldn't wait for their first batch of honey.
LaForge said the course gives students a firm foundation to start from, but he was careful to point out that beekeepers will run into problems and need to do some outside research to hone their craft. “Basically, this is a thing people make their livings at,” he said. “You couldn't expect to take a night class and be a bone surgeon.”
Students who took the class said it was a wonderful introduction, and left them well-prepared to venture into the world of bees. Sarah Coleman, who completed the course last year, said she was mostly drawn by the promise of all-you-can-harvest honey, but walked away with an appreciation for the complexities of bee societies and now loves working with her two hives.
”When I go into my hives, it's like I get high almost,” she said. “It makes me really calm to work with them. I love the smell and I love that I can recognize the different parts of their society.”
These societies are incredibly complex, LaForge said, with thousands of bees using hundreds of pheromones to communicate and function in an intricate society. The population of a honey bee hive can be broken into three basic groups; workers, drones and the queen. Worker bees, the vast majority of the hive population, are all infertile females that do all the work of the hive. They secrete the wax, build the comb, feed and care for the young, gather pollen and nectar and guard the hive. The drones are the hive's only males and serve the sole purpose of copulating with the queen, after which they die instantly. The queen is the reproductive force of the hive, laying her own body weight in eggs a day (more than 1,000) during her peak season.
The fact that bee societies are matriarchal was not lost on Coleman.
”I like that all the ones that work are girls,” she said. “I just think it's amazing that they take turns being nurse bees, the ones that gather nectar and the ones that scout. It's like everyone has their own place, and because of that they all thrive.”
Kathleen Olson, president of the Humboldt Beekeepers, took the HSU class along with her husband, John. The Humboldt Beekeepers, which was formed three decades ago, meets at 7 p.m. the first Thursday of every month at the Adorni Center in Eureka. On average, about 20 members attend the meetings, said Olson, adding that the sense of community is the best part of the group.
”Beekeepers are some of the most generous people I've ever met in my life,” she said. “We watch each other's hives when we go on holiday. And, when there's a crisis, as new beekeepers, we panic and call somebody and they just come right over.”
Member Bob Chaves has been keeping bees for eight years since being inspired by a beekeeping exhibit at the Humboldt County Fair.
”I just walked in there and started talking to the guy and, hell, two weeks later I was in the bee business,” Chaves said. He said club members frequently talk about problems posed by bears, deer, skunks and city neighbors and also enjoy comparing stings.
While it may seem like an inevitable part of the process, most beekeepers said stings are infrequent and LaForge said a good bee suit will prevent them as long as it is used correctly.
”I get stung a handful of times a year and it's almost always because I was sloppy about putting on my suit,” he said. “They have a way of teaching you how to put your clothes on right.”
The occasional welt aside, most said the rewards of beekeeping are quite sweet. LaForge estimates that he harvests an average of a couple of hundred pounds of honey a year depending on weather and hive conditions. All keepers seem to agree that the honey they harvest has a taste of its own and is far superior to anything that can be found in a grocery store.
”It's so much better,” Coleman said. “I don't even know how to explain it; it's just alive.”
For more information about the beekeeping class, call the HSU Office of Extended Education at 826-3731. For more information about Humboldt Beekeepers, call 825-9654. Those interested in learning more about bee hives can also visit the honey bee exhibit at the HSU Natural History Museum, located at 1315 G St. in Arcata.