About Us and Honey For Sale
It's been over 10 years now since I started to keep bees, but in the words of Indiana Jones..."it's not the years, it's the mileage"! I started off helping an old beekeeper with his bees, and quickly learned that the problem with old beekeepers is that they still want things to be how they were before Varroa Mites changed the game of beekeeping. I didn't like the approach of let's poison the hive just enough to kill the small bug...and pretend it's not part of why the larger bug keeps dying off over winter!
My first year of keeping bees, was also my first year of building boxes for the bees, and doing bee removals. The two really went hand in hand, because you learn so much about how bees live without the direction of humans, and when building a box you can use what you see in how bees live...to build a better bee box for them to live in. The way I saw it, the bees should do better because of the relationship with beekeeper, than they could do without them.
Over the years I became pretty well known in my area for bees, and with that I get a lot of swarm calls from all around Indiana PA, and surrounding counties. This has allowed me to bring in new genetics to my bee yards, and to start building bee yards with exceptional bees by each year moving the best colonies that came out of winter to 1 apiary. From doing this process, and taking new queens to better locations for mating, I now have bee yards that have 100% survival, and each year the other bee yards are improving to near 100%.!
My first year of keeping bees, was also my first year of building boxes for the bees, and doing bee removals. The two really went hand in hand, because you learn so much about how bees live without the direction of humans, and when building a box you can use what you see in how bees live...to build a better bee box for them to live in. The way I saw it, the bees should do better because of the relationship with beekeeper, than they could do without them.
Over the years I became pretty well known in my area for bees, and with that I get a lot of swarm calls from all around Indiana PA, and surrounding counties. This has allowed me to bring in new genetics to my bee yards, and to start building bee yards with exceptional bees by each year moving the best colonies that came out of winter to 1 apiary. From doing this process, and taking new queens to better locations for mating, I now have bee yards that have 100% survival, and each year the other bee yards are improving to near 100%.!
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Most of the honey that we sale either comes for trees or from weeds. People like to believe the bees are going to flowers, but really those aren't the sources the bees look for. We pull some honey in the spring, but most of what we pull is from the bees produce from summer and fall. It might surprise people to know that the bees really don't need that much honey to survive the winter, but most of this is because the boxes we keep the bees in are efficient, and keep the bees from using up too much energy over the winter. Less work, means less honey used; in fact, in our First-Year Swarm Box, the average honey used over winter is generally around only 6 pounds!
Our hives are managed in a sustainable manner, and we don't use chemical or organic poisons in the hive--as so many other beekeepers do! We manage the colonies by following the same trajectory that the feral bee colonies use to survive, and work hard to build up the best bee stock we can. Another practice to mention is that we don't "feed" our bees. Many beekeepers feed their bees sugar solution--that often times becomes part of the honey that they sell--instead of nectar that's converted into honey. This means that the honey you get from us is what honey is supposed to be...pure honey! We also don't feed our bees Pollen Substitutes, as both types of feedings seem to disturb the gut microbiome of the bees, and can contribute to the colony failing over winter.
Our hives are managed in a sustainable manner, and we don't use chemical or organic poisons in the hive--as so many other beekeepers do! We manage the colonies by following the same trajectory that the feral bee colonies use to survive, and work hard to build up the best bee stock we can. Another practice to mention is that we don't "feed" our bees. Many beekeepers feed their bees sugar solution--that often times becomes part of the honey that they sell--instead of nectar that's converted into honey. This means that the honey you get from us is what honey is supposed to be...pure honey! We also don't feed our bees Pollen Substitutes, as both types of feedings seem to disturb the gut microbiome of the bees, and can contribute to the colony failing over winter.
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Our honey is extracted by hand, and is often a blend of different types of honey that we bottle as a batch. Occasionally we will have individual honey's from specific sources, like Apple, Tulip Poplar, Linden Tree, or Knotweed, but this is much harder to accomplish with hives that stay in the same apiary and cannot be moved. Our honey is never warmed above 104 degrees--which can damage the enzymes of the honey, and make it of lesser quality. After extracted the honey goes into a warming tank for about 24 hours to let all impurities that slip through the filter to either sink to the bottom or float to the top. After the honey is put in jars, another 24 hours is needed in the heat tank to let all of the air bubbles float to the top, to produce a honey that is crystal clear, delicious, and healthy for the body! We only sale our honey in 16 ounce Mason Jars, which because honey is heavier than water comes out to about 20.5 ounces. The price per jar is $17.00. Specialty honey we sell in smaller jars and at prices based on the type of honey being sold.
The Thriving Hive Apiary/The Renaissance Beekeeper
417 N 5th St.
Indiana PA 15701
724.471.2281
417 N 5th St.
Indiana PA 15701
724.471.2281