The beekeeping year: what does a beekeeper do from January to December? 📅

In winter the bees rest in a cluster, and the beekeeper does not open the hives. This is the time for repairing equipment, making frames and making sure the colonies are left undisturbed. The critical period comes at the end of winter: brood rearing has already started, but nothing is in flower yet, so the colony’s stores can run low.

It is also the season for gingerbread and warm cups of tea.

In spring the colonies grow strong quickly. Rapeseed flowers in March and April – this gives the first honey of the year, creamy Rapeseed honey. Next comes the most important Hungarian nectar flow, the acacia: typically from early May to mid-June, in recent years often as early as the second half of April. This is what Acacia honey is made from.

Spring is when the bees gather the most Bee pollen, and when Royal jelly is produced too. On the table there are fresh vegetables, such as honey-roasted baby carrots.

Lime trees flower in June and July, and milkweed in midsummer – this gives fragrant Milkweed honey. The beekeeper extracts a lot at this time. At the end of summer, in August, comes the most important health task for the bees: controlling the varroa mite, because this is when mite numbers are highest and when the winter bees are being raised.

In summer a mint honey lemonade and strawberry yoghurt pots go down well.

In autumn the beekeeper prepares the colonies for overwintering: checking their stores and the condition of the hives. This is when full-flavoured Chestnut honey comes to the fore, and in the kitchen honey-roasted pumpkin.

A few rules in Hungary that many people don’t know: