Karma Honey Project - Fajardo Bee School

On our latest trip to Escuela de Apicultura del este in Fajardo we got a chance to catch up with Hermes Conde and his team.

The school is one of the main training places in Puerto Rico for beekeepers to receive certification and we currently have three of our junior beekeepers attending. This 12 week course teaches not only the basics of beekeeping but more importantly the different types of flora and fauna that is native and needed in Puerto Rico.

In addition to this course our beekeepers will also be doing the University of Montana master beekeeping courses.

Hermes giving some instructions on the types of plants and trees that we will need to focus on replanting and cultivating in order to support both the honey bees as well as the native bees.

An observation hive that is used to teach beginning beekeepers as well as students the intricacies of building and maintaining a beehive. 

Finding the queen is a fun game to play and definitely not easy!

uBeekeepers maintaining the 50+ hives that are currently in different stages at the Fajardo bee school.

Definitely an interesting day, we talked about lots, learned lots and built some more relationships with other scientists and beekeepers.

Lucky for us the bees in this area of the school were not aggressive at all. The biggest take away from today was talking with Hermes and his focus on us focusing on creating more flora and fauna around the island. His list of plants and trees that were were the best source of food for bees was completely invaluable.