Beekeeping

With a combination of hands-on experience, expert guidance and instruction this one-day course will give you the confidence and essentials skills to establish your own bee colony at home plus inspiration and ideas of how to use your honey.

You may know that bees are essential to food production and the environment but may not realise how much pleasure these creatures are to look after. This course will introduce you to the fundamentals of beekeeping and help you to understand the whole process before you commit to keeping bees yourself. Your tutor, Dave Chambers has kept bees for over 30 years and is responsible for looking after the River Cottage hives.

Your morning will be spent at River Cottage, learning some essential theory before donning your protective suit and gaining some hands-on experience with our hives.

After an insightful morning you will enjoy a delicious two-course lunch prepared by the River Cottage chefs.

For the afternoon practical session, you will visit Dave’s own apiary at his home and observe Dave at work and learn about safety measures and bee-keeping etiquette.

The day will end with further theory lessons and the chance to enjoy some tasty honey treats.