The Importance of Beekeepers & How They Keep Honeybees Safe

The Importance of Beekeepers & How They Keep Honeybees Safe

Honeybees are crucial to our ecosystem as they play a vital role in pollinating crops and other plants. Without honeybees, many of our favorite fruits and vegetables would become scarce, and the cost of these products could rise considerably. There have been concerns about the honeybee population and the impact their loss can have on the environment and the economy – this is where beekeepers come in! Beekeepers play a crucial role in ensuring the survival of the bee population. Let’s discuss their importance to honeybees and our community.

What Are Beekeepers?

Beekeepers raise and manage bees to collect honey, beeswax, and other products. These bee experts help maintain healthy bee colonies by providing them with proper nutrition, shelter, and even medical care. One of the essential roles of beekeepers is to help maintain the bee population by preventing the spread of diseases that can be fatal to bees. They also play a critical role in controlling pests and predators that threaten bee colonies.

Why Are Beekeepers Important?

Beekeepers are essential in maintaining balance in the ecosystem. Since honeybees play a vital role in pollinating crops, our beekeepers help ensure that their pollination happens efficiently. By maintaining healthy bee colonies, beekeepers can ensure that the bee population can continue to thrive and that the plants that rely on them for pollination can continue to grow and produce the food that we rely on.

When Should I Call a Certified Beekeeper?

Having honeybees around our flowers and plants is always beneficial to your garden, crops, and the environment around us. Unfortunately, though, honeybees can sometimes build their colony in inconvenient places, such as our walls, eaves, and roofs. Luckily, Honeybee Relocation Services provides a safe and sustainable solution to remove and relocate these insects from our homes without harming them or damaging your home. If you’ve noticed a honeybee hive, consider contacting your local pest control company for more information on relocating these pollinators.

Meet Northwest’s Honeybee Experts

Meet Northwest’s Honeybee Experts

Do you know what it takes to become a qualified beekeeper? In the state of Georgia, there are many different levels of skill and knowledge needed when it comes to beekeeping. The minimum requirements include at least one year of beekeeping experience, a written and practical test, and participating in lectures, and that’s just for the bottom tier certification. It’s a process to become someone wholly trusted to care for the honeybee population. It requires the utmost attention and care to continue their important job. Luckily, Northwest has teammates that continue to prove how important their career in pest control is to them.

Let’s meet Northwest’s Honeybee Experts:

Curt Lockhart

Curt Lockhart
Curt has been with Northwest since 2010, with his last 3 years working as the Quality Assurance Trainer and Inspector with our Learning and Technical Services team. Curt currently keeps his own honeybees, so he has extensive knowledge in making sure they are properly cared for. More recently, Curt is a Certified Beekeeper and has also received a newly required license for the State of Georgia that allows him to safely remove honeybee colonies that are in any structure or home.

Curt believes that it’s important to ensure the success of honeybees while also educating our customers and teammates on the importance of these pollinators. He continues to strive for Northwest to be the go-to for honeybee relocation services in the state of Georgia.

Rob Bounds

Rob Bounds
Rob is currently our Wildlife North Branch Manager and is also a certified Beekeeper.  He is a big advocate of the newly required Georgia license that ensures a safe removal process for honeybees and has also received that in the past year. The removal process can sometimes be stressful for the colony, so having the proper qualifications and resources to ensure their safety is key.

A fun fact about Rob is that he has his own honeybee farm and utilizes the honey that he receives from his bees. Rob began his farm as a place to take any removals performed on the job and ensure they were properly cared for after being safely relocated. He likes to think of the care for honeybees as an ever-evolving science project. The idea that you can safely and correctly remove them from their colony and into a new location and still thrive fascinated him.

Rob is proud of Northwest for making sure its teammates have access to the proper equipment and training needed to safely care for honeybees. He can’t wait to see how big of an impact we can truly make!

At Northwest, we take pride in knowing that we can bring awareness to an important topic that is near and dear to our hearts. We’re grateful for teammates like Rob and Curt who take the time to learn more about a service and how it can positively impact our local communities. If you believe you have a bee colony on your property that needs to be safely relocated, give your licensed honeybee removal company a call!

The Differences Between Bumblebees and Honeybees

The Differences Between Bumblebees and Honeybees

Bumblebees and honeybees are both important pollinators that play a critical role in our ecosystem. However, they are different in several ways, from their physical appearance to their behavior and habitat. Let’s explore the differences between bumblebees and honeybees.

Physical Appearance

One of the most obvious differences between bumblebees and honeybees is their physical appearance. Bumblebees are larger and hairier than honeybees, with rounder bodies and more robust wings. Their bodies are covered in dense hair, which makes them look fuzzy, and they have a distinct black and yellow striped pattern.

Honeybees appear smaller and have slimmer bodies. These insects have a distinctive golden color and a more pronounced abdomen. Their wings are also narrower and more translucent than bumblebees.

Behavior

Both types of bees also differ in their behavior. Bumblebees are social insects that live in small colonies with a few hundred bees. They are active during the day and prefer to forage on flowers that are close to the ground. They are also excellent pollinators for plants that require a buzz pollination technique, such as tomatoes and blueberries.

Honeybees, on the other hand, are highly social insects that live in large colonies with tens of thousands of bees. They are active during the day and prefer to forage on flowers located higher up. They are also known for their ability to communicate with each other using a complex system of dances, which helps them find food sources.

Habitat

Honeybees and bumblebees have different habitat preferences due to their distinct nesting behaviors. Honeybees prefer to nest in cavities such as hollow trees or rock crevices; whereas bumblebees prefer to nest in underground burrows, such as abandoned rodent holes, or in above ground areas like abandoned bird nests.

If you believe you have found a honeybee or bumblebee nest on your property, give our team a call today for a safe bee relocation and removal.

How to Attract Honeybees & Other Pollinators to Your Yard

How to Attract Honeybees & Other Pollinators to Your Yard

It’s a little-known fact that every good garden needs a pollinator and bee. Without the help of these friendly pollinators, there would be fewer flowers and vegetables. If you want more visits from honeybees, follow these simple tips.

Bees are interested in two things when visiting your garden:

  • Nectar: loaded with sugars and a bee’s main source of energy
  • Pollen: provides a balanced diet of protein and fats

An effective way to attract bees into your garden is to plant flowers that offer these two main food sources. Try to plant non-hybridized flowers in your garden, as they typically do not produce enough pollen or nectar for our helpful pollinators.

Here are some other helpful tips to keep the bees around:

  • Don’t use pesticides
  • Use local, native plants
  • Choose a variety of colors to plant
  • Have a diversity of plants flowering all season
  • Plant where it’s safe for bees to visit

We hope these tips help bring the honeybees back to your garden, so they can do what they do best: pollinate! If you discover an active colony near or around your garden, then reach out to your local certified honeybee removal company to safely remove these colonies and relocate them to a safer location.

The Importance of Honeybees and Their Honey

The Importance of Honeybees and Their Honey

Honeybees have a significant role within our environment, the food we eat, the flowers we plant, and so much more. They are extremely hardworking and support so much of the sustenance of life. There are many reasons why honeybees and their honey are so important to humans; find out why below!

They Pollinate Our Food

To look for pollen, honeybees will travel long distances. Through these trips, fertilization takes place between food crops. They do this by using the hairs on their bodies to carry large grains of pollen between plants, helping crops produce better. In the US alone, honeybees are known to pollinate more than 100 crops! Because of their pollination, we can enjoy foods like cucumbers, cherries, apples, limes, and lemons. These insects also pollinate our wild plants, helping provide food to a wide variety of insects, birds, and animals, and overall, playing a major component in our biodiversity.

The Importance of Their Honey

Honeybees carry nectar extracted from plants and taken back to their hive. They create honey by mixing this nectar with their saliva in a cell within their hive. Honey is known to provide immense benefits to humans and our health. It’s been found that honey can prevent cancer, heart disease, and diabetes, heal wounds, and fight bacteria! There are also several products made from honey that can support us overall. The most common products we often see come from honey, including bee pollen for health benefits and bee wax for skin care products, candles, and even furniture polish!

Caring for Honeybees

The importance of honeybees is significant to our environment and overall well-being. At Northwest, we are proud to offer our honeybee relocation and protection services to continue keeping honeybees active and alive! Our Certified Honeybee Keepers are trained to safely remove, relocate, and care for the honeybees that have found their home in yours! If you’re interested in Northwest’s Honeybee Relocation & Protection Service, call our team today for a free inspection!

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