Helping Hives is getting ready for a summer of beekeeping at UMD

Helping Hives at UMD has recently received two hives of 10,000 honeybees to be kept on campus for the first time ever.

The environmentalist club aims to bring apiary experiences to campus. Before students would have to go off campus to get involved.

Outgoing Helping Hives President Ella Stewart says, “it was a lot more inaccessible and classes couldn’t get out there. So now that it’s on campus, we’re really hoping to get more people involved.”

In the Northland the bees have a 30% survival race, so for the students involved it’s all hands on deck to make sure the bees are satisfied until the summer.

Incoming Helping Hives President VIolet Frosteer says, “They will be producing honey, and we’re not sure what their season will look like because we just get them on Monday. But yeah, we’ll be beekeeping. That’s really like what our main mission is.”

The students have even invested in the proper bee equipment, including their bee suits used to maneuver the bees. Student beekeeper Tyler Beck says, “When you have a handful of comb, especially the one that the queen is on, there’s I mean, there’s a thousand bees in your hand. And if you drop that, you got a thousand angry bees on you.”

But for now he says the bees remain pretty calm due to the colder weather, and that they will become more active in the summer.

Helping Hives will also be hosting an upcoming pollination planting party on campus in the summer and their “What’s the Buzz” event in the fall.