Honeybees come to MCCC Community Farm

Dan Pederson, co-owner of Farm House Honey LLC, pried the top off of the beehive, which was installed on the MCCC Community Farm in late April.

The beehive, located in a small clearing in the woods behind the farm plots, was surrounded by honeybees illuminated by the morning sun. It is composed of several wooden boxes stacked on top of each other, all of which are on cement bricks to reduce rodents and insects entering the hive and to prevent the wood from rotting. The bees’ entrance is a small hole in the side of the lowest box.

In the top box, there were a few dead bees which had been crushed by the lid. Pederson explained that putting the lid on while so many are swarming on it, leads to a few of the 50,000 to 60,000 bees getting crushed.

The only other object in the box was an empty upside-down Mason jar with holes poked in the lid. He explained that once the bees’ main food sources are out of season, he supplements them with food in the jar.

In the center of the box is a hole, approximately the same width as the lid of the jar, in which many bees crawled. Pederson pried off the top box and revealed the inside of the box beneath it. Bees flew out of it and hovered around the hive while others crawled within it.

Eight vertical frames, which contain the bees’ cells, fill the second box. Pederson carefully returned the first box and the lid, replacing a stone on top of the lid to keep it in place.

The MCCC Community Farm is run by community volunteers and members of the Agriculture Club, MCCC President Kojo Quartey said.

Nearly all of the produce from the farm is donated to the community, Quartey said.

“We have approximately two tons of produce that is donated to the community on an annual basis,” he said.

Josh Myers, executive director of The Foundation, wrote in an email, “We are proud of our MCCC Farm,and its contribution to feeding our community with fresh produce.”

Ned Birkey, a former Michigan State University employee, is a volunteer at the farm. Birkey and other volunteers plant the farm’s crops, Quartey said.

“They continue to sustain and maintain the Ag Program and the farm which serves our community,” Quartey said about Birkey and Kristen Brown, agriculture program coordinator.

Pederson said the beehive was paid for by the Agriculture Club, and he installed it.

He said the honeybeesvcame from a package of bees, which contained 8,000-10,000 bees and one queen, and was installed in early May.

“It was installed and is maintained by Farm House Honey for the benefit of the college,” Pederson said. “So it’s owned by the college because the college owns the boxes, but it’s managed by Farm House.”

Farm House Honey LLC is run by Pederson and Dan Longenbarger.Dan Pederson, beekeeper, manages the Farm House Honey LLC stand at the Monroe Farmer’s Market. The company is run by Pederson, who tends the MCCC hive, and his partner, Dan Longenbarger. (Photo by Dana Willi)

Pederson said the bees have been doing their thing, pollinating the farm’s produce all summer.

He checks all the boxes and frames in the hive once every 10-14 days, he said.

One of the challenges with having a beehive on a college campus versus on a farm is that on a farm he is only working with one farmer, he said, but at a college there are several different levels of interest in the beehive.

It is important to ask, “Is there something else with students that we should be doing or can be doing?” in relation to the beehive, said Pederson.

He suggested that tours of the hive and beekeeping classes are options for fulfilling that question.

Pederson’s goal, as a beekeeper, is to help others learn about beekeeping and to help future generations to become beekeepers, he said.

Pederson said he became interested in beekeeping after he bought honey from his coworker which was harvested hy her husband, a beekeeper.

“He encouraged me to start with one hive,” Pederson said. “And once you start with one hive, it’s pretty fascinating and can become addictive in terms of the wonder of the bees and how they work together.”

It is important for bees to be in a plant-friendly environment. He said people need to consider the potential harm crop treatments can cause pollinators.