Like any hobby, beekeeping requires a time commitment, but you may be wondering if it’ll require more time than you have available.
On average, for one hive, you should spend around 1 hour every week or 2 (depending on the time of year), resulting in around 25-35 hours per year. However, naturally, you’ll spend more time during your first year of beekeeping while you’re learning the ropes.
Of course you can spend as much time as you like on the hobby, and the more time you spend, the better you’ll be. But we recommend only opening up your hive when you really need to for activities like inspections and collecting honey etc. This is because it can stress the bees who then need around a day to recover from the interaction. Instead, how you can spend more time on this hobby is by learning more about bees and beekeeping as well as networking with other beekeepers.
As the number of hours you’ll spend on beekeeping are split differently throughout the year, we’ll take you on a journey through the 4 seasons and what’s included in each season.
Spring
A buzz comes across the world of beekeeping as spring is the season that your bees will start to become more active after the colder months. This is one of the busier seasons for beekeepers with lots to do including checking if your colony survived the winter, locating the queen, and ensuring your colony has room to grow.
If you’ve had your colony for a while, in spring, you’ll start opening your hive up for more regular inspections, around every 2 weeks, starting with a more thorough inspection to check for disease. You may need to continue topping up the food supply for bees until flowers have bloomed and they’re able to start producing their own food again.
But if you’re a beginner, this is when you’ll introduce your new bees to their new hive. As the bees will be new into the hive, they won’t have any food supplies so will need to be fed until they’ve started producing their own food within the hive.
Summer
Summer is when your bees will be busiest so you’ll need to do more hive maintenance in this season. As the summer season goes by, you should still be performing weekly or fortnightly hive inspections. There are many reasons for these regular inspections including keeping an eye out for any signs of swarming (indicating that you’d need to split the colony), checking the honeycombs to see if the honey is ready to harvest, and testing for mite infestations in the hive.
Other things you’ll need to do in summer is protect your bees from the heat. Add some shade over your hive to keep them cool and check whether there’s a clean water supply nearby. If not, create a water supply for your bees.
In your first year of beekeeping, your bees will be busy establishing their hive, therefore, it’s unlikely that you’ll collect honey in this first year. However, in future years, summer is the time you’ll start harvesting the honey.
Autumn
When autumn comes around, your bees will be starting to slow down for the colder months, as will you as a beekeeper. By this time you’ll be making your final honey harvests, although it’s important to leave a good amount of honey for the bees to use as a food source throughout the winter. In preparation for winter, you should also complete any hive repairs, insulate your hive, and if you have multiple colonies, merge weaker colonies with stronger ones to boost their chances of survival.
Winter
Winter is the quietest season for beekeepers. But that doesn’t mean you don’t need to do anything with your hive for the whole season. Every so often you should check on your hive, ensuring the entrance isn’t covered with snow and checking the bee’s honey supply isn’t running low. However, it is important to open up your hive as little as possible during these colder months, giving you more time to relax and catch up on some beekeeping reading or taking part in a beekeeping course.
Summary
Overall, the time you spend tending to your beehive throughout the year will vary, with spring and summer being busier with weekly or fortnightly commitments, and autumn and winter being quieter. This should all come to around 26 hours spent with your hive throughout the year.
However, beekeeping isn’t just about tending to the hive. You can also spend time reading beekeeping books, taking part in educational courses about bees, and networking with other beekeepers. These activities can be done all year round and you could spend as much or as little time on them as you want.