Beekeeping is a fascinating area of study, a very good starting place is at beeginners and Somerset beekeepers these cover all the basics of bee keeping and more.  

We can help with personal tuition, guidance and support and can help with provision of equipment both new and second hand and when available, bees!  The association is active in encouraging and helping beginners through the learning curve of beekeeping, from what equipment to choose and who from, how many hives, and where to site them.

It's usual to start off small with one or two hives, more than one is preferable as unfortunately like all all living organisms, a colony can die out.  Siting the hives is an important choice as they should be situated in such a way as to minimise nuisance to yourself and neighbours (who can be mellowed with offers of and actual gifts of honey).

Bees can be obtained by various routes each with their own merits and pitfalls:

• You can purchase a complete hive with bees, expensive but quick!
• Obtaining a swarm (often via the association, though there are other sources)
• Buy a nucleus (or nuc), this can be via the association when available.

The absolute minimum you will require to keep bees is of course a hive, available from many sources either as a flat pack or ready made, this consists of the following:

• Floor
• Brood chamber
• Crown board
• Roof

When the colony starts to expand a queen excluder and one or two supers will be required, the queen excluder stops the queen laying eggs in the supers, which will then just contain honey courtesy of the workers.  There are many types of hive available, but by far the most widely used in Britain is the National, using one of these will mean access to (usually) cheaper new equipment, second hand equipment, and the ability to exchange with most people should the need arise.

Another piece of equipment needed is a smoker, this is used to keep the bees under control.  A hive tool is also useful as bees manufacture their own glue - propolis which they use to stick everything together.

Clothing can consist of various items but is usually a zipped up boiler suit, a head and face veil, gloves can be washing up gloves and a pair of wellies completes the outfit.  Note clothing should be white or a light colour, bees associate darker colours with trouble, namely bears but obviously not polar bears!




The forest of Dean Beekeeping Association has an apiary situated in Blakeney in the Forest of Dean and meets regularly both at the apiary and at Soudley Hall for lectures.