Target reached!
Any additional funds up to £4000 will be spent on building additional apiaries and h...
Honeybee Apiary Re-build
Hayling Island
Aim
On 27th March 2016, storm Katie struck the UK; it tore through my apiary killing 11 colonies of honeybees and damaging hives and fencing.
On sunday 27th March 2016, storm Katie struck the southern coast of the UK; winds estimated to be over 107 mph battered the coastline and destroyed all but one of my beehives located in it's path.
I am a small scale bee farmer and my heart was broken when I visited my honeybee apiary located on Sinah Common in Hayling Island and found that all 12 of my beehives together with all of the protective fencing had been blown away by the wind. It killed all but one of the 12 colonies of honeybees that were located in the apiary. The tears were rolling down my cheeks as I swept up piles and piles of dead honeybees, that had been soaked and chilled to the point of death, when their wooden hives had been blown from their stands.
I am John Geden, I set up my bee-farming business 'Sinah Common Honey' after I retired from a combined 32 year career in HM Forces and Hampshire Police. I invested a large amount of my retirement fund to set-up the business and spent hours patiently building the apiary that was swept away in the course of a few hours. I have been a hobbyist beekeeper for many years, maintaining a few hives of bees in my rear garden and giving away my honey to friends, neighbours & family. After retirement and a desire for a slower and less traumatic way of life (I spent that last 6 years of my service investigating child deaths and child abuse) I decided to turn that hobby into a small business to support my pension.
This project seeks to replace the bee colonies that were destroyed by the storm and to bring my producion level back to where it would have been pre storm Katie. I want to purchase 12 colonies at a cost of £120 per colony and replace the broken bee hives and fencing.
The honey bee is such an amzing creature providing us with honey and beeswax which have been used by mankind in many different ways for centuries. Honey and wax products, cosmetics, medicines and food products have been identified by archeologists in the remanants of the most ancient of civilisations across the globe. But of course that is just a bi-product of the real benefit the honeybee provides. They pollinate all of our food crops and ensure the survivability of mankind by doing so. Most of what you see on your dinner plate, the humble honeybee will have had a part in it's growth. Sadly the honeybee is in massive decline and so we simply cannot afford to loose too many more.
This project successfully funded on 15th May 2016