Honey is in great demand, and very good for our children especially our HIV+ widows and orphans.
After our families have been provided, the surplus honey can be sold to boost funds in Bumala, another vital and encouraging step towards self-sufficiency.
Cost Of The Bee Keeping Project:
We now have 23 bee hives most of them have bees in them, we have a mixture of Langstroth and K.T.B.H. hives.
Langstroth Hives are the best for pure honey.
K.T.B.H Hives are the best for beeswax, Royal Jelly, and Propolis.
Equipment bought with kind donation from The Babbacombe and St Marychurch Lion Club :
- Smoker - £8
- Gloves x2 - £4 each
- Suit - £24
- Gumboots x2 - £10 each
- Spotlights x2 - £3 each
- Hive Tools x2 - £3 each
- Bee Brush x2 - £3 each
Three workers have now been trained in bee keeping.
Every Harvest should produce up to 20 Kilograms from 1 box.
Each hive can be harvested twice a year.
The Langstroth Hive is a Box frame, The KTBH is a suspended long box.
Total size of area for bee hives 45 metres by 30 metres, can take in excess of 50 hives.
Our bee hives are now situated within the farm complex, and are fenced in.
We have had to remove them from the mountain where they were first introduced as cows that had strayed on to the land were disturbing them.
Most of our hives now have bees. We have had several harvests and these harvests have produced enough honey for our children to eat, by next year we may be able to sell the surplus.
The Torbay branch of the Devon Beekeeping Association are now supporting us, they are raising funds to buy equipment to help harvest the honey more efficiently. Two of the members of the association are hoping to visit Bumala later this year to take out the equipment, show the local people how to build the bee hives and productively produce more honey by inserting a starter kit in the hives, so that the bees do not have to spend time building their own.
