He is not retired yet so good thing I love doing this stuff. He does all he can when he's off. He even helped me peel tomatoes for canning this year. 
I'm wanting goats, too.Hubby's been talking about it lately. We have a lot to learn first. I told him some folks here at BYC kept bees. When ever we attempt some new project he always wants me to look into it first then tell him what I've learned. Then we decide if we want to do it. Just like with our chickens.
He is diabetic so natural sugars in moderation are best for him. He loves honey. I'm always on the lookout for local but hard to find sometime and $$$.
I made some low sugar jam this year. It is really good not so sugary sweet. Still has sugar in it so moderation of course. The fruit flavor really comes through.
Did blueberry this year. Next year hope to do strawberry too.
So many projects! He has been talking about a couple goats for a few years too.
That IS a good deal.Spring is the time to get started with bees, so you have some time to check into this project. There is a LOT of info online, and you can find some tailored to your locale.
Some costs that are $$$:
The hive boxes (sometimes refered to as "woodware") are probably the biggest. We got our stuff second hand, so we saved a lot of money that way. As long as the former hive didn't have American or European Foul Brood, you can be pretty sure it's safe to use. I would hope someone who had Foul Brood wouldn't sell their hive. Kind of like knowingly selling someone with chickens who have Mareks and not disclosing the fact.
We got 2 deep boxes, and 2 mediums, with frames for both. Ours are 8 frame, which is smaller than the more common 10 frame size. This works in my favor, specifically: the boxes are lighter. The frames are probably NOT included when you buy the boxes.
The bees are another expense. We paid $165 for a "nuc" of bees. Nuc is short for nucleus hive, and includes a mated queen in with the bees. A "package" of bees from the same place was $125 (?), and a little cheaper, but the difference is worth the higher cost. The nuc we bought had 5 frames of bees. They'd been working on those frames, so there was drawn comb, and developing brood. The bees were "used to" each other and the queen.
Installing a nuc is easy. Open your hive box. Take out a frame, and replace it with a frame from the nuc. Repeat 4 more times. Close up the hive, leave the (nearly empty) open nuc box on the ground -- any stragglers will find the hive -- and walk away. Get the empty nuc box the next day.
A "package" is a box of bees. The mated queen is in her own special little box. Worker bees need to get used to the queen, or they will see her as a foreigner and kill her. There is a piece of sugar candy blocking the exit. To install package bees, you literally open the box and dump the bees on the open hive. Uncover the candy on the queen box, hang her box on one of the frames. The workers will eat it away. By then, the queen's pheromones will be known to the worker bees.
For $40 difference in price, we went with the easier nuc.
We bought bee jackets that have hoods. They were $80 each. A hive tool is around $10, a smoker is $60-70. A bee brush is about $15 (?), I think.
That was enough to get us well on our way. Our total cost was: $160 for the jackets, $165 for the bees, and $400 for the hive (used). $725 total, so not petty cash. The hive came with 4 boxes, all the frames (some with drawn comb, a BIG plus!), the smoker, the brush, a "feeder box," a queen excluder, and a varroa mite treatment. My bee guy said we got a good deal.
We have all of those, too, and nope, no other critters bothered them. They do get mites, though, just way different and much more costly to deal with than the kind chickens get.Thanks for the info!
What about coyotes, raccoons, possum, fox? Would these bother a hive?
That's what I need something else to get attached to.
The kids are too cute! Bet they can be mischievous.
Oh yeah. Varroa mites. They came on the scene in the US in 1987, and you can just assume that you have them. The question is, are there enough to cause damage to the bees to threaten the existence of the hive? Plan on treating for them, and trying to keep the numbers below the critical threshold.
