Our plan to set up stingless bees hives at our backyard finally materialized on 25.04.2024 after we brought back two units of the bee huts all the way from a kampong farm in Beaufort. The plan to acquire the hives was mooted soon after we joined the "Nature's Little Buzzers Educational Tour" at Shangi-lah Rasa Ria Hotel together with Sam's family in March this year (Read here).
With the contractor currently doing some repair work in our house, it was perfect timing to get him to help to set up the poles and platforms to hold up the bee hives.
It's no small feat to transport these hives all the way from their original habitat to our backyard. Beside travelling 100Km to the farm, we spent another four hours from the time of our arrival at 2.30pm until 6.30pm just to wait for the bees to return back to their bee hives at sunset. Inside the car, the bees had to endure another two and half hours of driving. The bee hives were finally set up under our mango tree just before 10pm.
Talking about stingless bees farming, the seller of the bee hives told us that at one time he had two hundred units of bee hives. Initially, he was able to sell a bottle of 150ml capacity for RM150. Over the years, the price dropped to RM100 and now at RM60. According to him, too many people are now into stingless bees farming. He had decided to stop this business and disposed off most the hives. We bought two of the last three bee hives which he still possesses.
In fact, this farmer who becomes a bee hives seller had not been harvesting the honey for the last two years. Because of that, we are the beneficiary of the bee hives with all the pots filled with honey!
Unlike the seller, we are green horn hobby farmers of stingless bees who are unsure of the success or failure of this endeavour.
So far, the bees appear to have settled down well and are going on with their routine as if in their original habitat! We are keeping our fingers crossed!
