Bees have arrived at Omavaraniemi

From the day we decided to move to Finland, it was clear to us:

Bees should also return to the peninsula and enrich the land. However, over the past two years, we've had so many projects and so much to learn that we simply didn't have the capacity to take care of bees as well.

Last winter, after a difficult time, I realized that I needed a passion project for this year.

And I immediately felt: I want to keep bees.

I wanted to approach it properly and as professionally as possible from the start. So, in the winter, I started a beekeeping course focused on organic beekeeping with natural honeycomb construction. I found it incredibly exciting and am still convinced today that it's a very good, natural way to keep bees.

Before the course began, I thought I already had everything from the previous owner of the farm: hives, materials, tools, so there was hardly any preparation required. But as soon as the course began, I felt that I wanted to build my own hive. It would have been different in size than the ones we already had. Since I wanted to practice natural comb construction, it seemed more sensible to work with just one frame and regulate it with a so-called "separation." This wouldn't have been possible with the existing hives. Furthermore, stripping the colony naked (removing the hive and comb) leaves pollutants, parasites, and diseases behind at the old location.

So I was able to convince Patrick that I should let one of the two bee colonies I wanted to get in the summer go into a hive I had built myself.

Well, that meant a new hive, a new base, a new lid. And, of course, matching frames. As the first hive was slowly being finished, and Patrick was already hoping my "hive-building" project was finally over, I spontaneously decided to let the second colony move into a homemade hive as well.

Why? I can't really say. It was just a feeling that told me:

This is the right way.

I knew I wanted to collect my bees in mid-to-late May, and from then on, things got stressful. I checked the weather daily, and as soon as it became clear that temperatures would stay above 15 degrees Celsius for several days, I spontaneously decided to collect the bees.

The morning before pickup, I had to quickly build a second transport box. I had only ordered one, as I originally only wanted to buy a colony without a hive. The excitement was immense, and of course, so was the fear of doing something wrong.

Upon arriving at the seller's, the first thing we did was search for queens. Once the queens were found, the remaining bees were packed into transport boxes. Then the journey back to Valtimo began, with two queen bees and their colonies in the back seat.

"Nackt" machen des Volkes. Ohne Beute und Waben werden sie nach Valtimo transportiert.

The bees stayed in the boxes overnight until the next evening. When it got cooler, I let the first colony move into the hive, and it worked amazingly well!

It was fascinating to watch them voluntarily move into my homemade hive. Of course, I was also a little proud that they accepted it.

Since the initial incubation took longer than expected (about two hours), and I had barely slept the night before due to the excitement, I decided to place the second colony directly into the hive. This also worked wonderfully.

Einlauf des Bienenvolkes in die neue Beute

From that day on, my journey as a beekeeper began. Since then, I've been continually excited, overwhelmed, worried, and at the same time full of joy and gratitude for being able to host these two colonies.

It gives me great joy to watch them at the entrance, flying out and returning with pollen and nectar. It makes me happy to see them exploring the property, pollinating the flowers, and how they bring Omavaraniemi to life even more.

If you are interested in my journey as a beekeeper, please write it in the comments.

Then I'll take you along a little more during my first year of beekeeping and explain to you in more detail how I do things and why.