New Brunswick beekeeper provides insight to the busy life of a honeybee

Five years ago, local beekeeper Derek Nantel jumped head-first into the life of beekeeping.

“I started with one hive. Quickly fell in love, by the end of that summer I had five hives. Then I met a great fellow that was looking to retire in that same year and by 2021 I had 179 hives,” he said.

It was something that he always hoped to get into and at his latest count, he now has 274 colonies as well as a local beekeeping supply store called “UAHoneyCo Beekeeing Supplies and More,” in Sackville, N.B., that has customers coming from across Atlantic Canada.

“You realize or you find something new every day or every time that you visit the hive or you talk to somebody else that’s in beekeeping. Bees are just so amazing,” he said.

“It’s a growing community. Now that I’m in it, it’s kind of like anything else, when you buy a red car everybody seems to have a red car, but you just notice there’s a lot more people involved than you really think.”

Nantel’s season runs from the first warm day in March until about October.

With thousands of bees to take care of in multiple different locations, they definitely keep him busy, but it’s the bees themselves that have the busiest season of all.

“There’s a medium box which obviously is a little lighter. The bees compact 40-to-45 pounds of honey in those and then there’s what we call a deep box. It’s nine and 5/8th deep, and they can pack 90-to-100 [pounds] depending on the spacing in there,” he said.

Adding, that on average in New Brunswick a hive will produce around 77lbs of honey.

“The fact is without bees, we don’t get the pollination to grow the foods that we need. In order for the bees to make one pound of honey they have to touch 2 million flowers and travel 55,000 miles, it’s really unbelievable,” he said.

Just two months ago, Nantel made new hives at one of his bee yards, and while they aren’t as strong as some of his more established ones, all of the bees are hard at work.

“There are probably 40,000 bees per hive and you get 10,000 of those bees foraging, touching probably 5,000 flowers per day. A lot gets done in the run of a day in a bee hive, that’s for sure,” he said.

While his bees are busy at home, the hives also get rented to local farms to help pollinate the crop, including for blueberries every May, as well as a strawberry u-pick up the street.

“When you have bees in there, it just makes the difference between a handful of what you’re after and a truckload,” he said.

Adding, “We literally have to thank a bee for every third bite of food that we eat.”

As for what’s next for Nantel, he says he plans to keep his number of hives under 300 since it’s a manageable number for him and his family to take care of along with the store.

He also starts harvesting honey in July to try and capture different flavours of honey throughout the entire season.

As for how it feels to finally be living what was once just a dream of his, Nantel says it’s really hard to explain, but he says the bees are good for his wellbeing.

“Beekeeping, it puts you in a sense of peace when you’re with the bees,” he said.

“They don’t tolerate anxiety and stress because if you’re in there with high blood pressure they kick you out.”

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