Spring is upon us and the worker bees around the area are becoming active, collecting pollen and nectar from the plants and trees that come into flower with the spring weather.

Kylie and Michael Pitt from Berrima Apiaries have been keeping bees for 12 years.  Berrimah Apiaries is a local family run Beekeeping Business that manages 600 bee hives for pollination and honey production that work around the Fleurieu Peninsula and farther locations throughout the state.  All of the honey that Berrima Apiaries produces is sent in bulk to local South Australian honey packers.

Each hive can hold from 20 to 50,000 bees and runs as a highly efficiently colony.  The Queen Bee is the mother figure of each hive, she can live up to 2 years and lay 2000 eggs a day.  She is extremely clever how she can also determine if the eggs she lays are going to be male or female. 

There are many roles that a female worker bee can carry out to ensure the smooth running of the hive. From nursing the babies, cleaning the hive, constructing the wax cells for the eggs to be laid in, to foraging and collecting pollen and nectar to bring back to the hive.  These little worker bees pack a lot of activity in to their very short lives of approximately 6 weeks .

In one day a worker bee can travel up to 5 kilometres in search of food and it can take anything from 2 weeks to 6 months to fill a hive full of honey depending on weather and environmental  conditions.

Bees are nature’s unsung heroes, they are essential to life and food production, naturally pollinating our flowers and crops. They thrive on a varied diet of flowers, even the local weed flowers help feed the  bees.

We can help our busy allies by leaving water in a quiet corner of the garden with a landing pad so they can drink and take water back to the hive. Planting flowering plants and trees, especially ones that flower in the winter help the little honey bees in the cooler months when finding food can be challenging.

As a beekeeper Kylie finds it very satisfying to open up a hive and watch these amazing creatures happily buzzing, going about their daily business.  Her favourite honey is Pink Gum honey from the Fleurieu. Mmmm, sweet and delicious! 

If you know of a special animal that lives and works on the Fleurieu Peninsula, we would love to hear about it.  Please drop a line to [email protected]