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Our Story
Listen to the bees, and let them guide you - Brother Adam
Hello and welcome to Arms Apiaries, let me introduce myself, I am Jason Arms and this is my daughter and my little beekeepeing helper Amelie.
I have always loved the outdoors and admired the natural world, especially the birds and the bees and all manner of animals.
In 2019 I decided to book a beekeeping course to see what it would be like keeping bees.
Half way through the course, Covid threw a spanner in the works, but after only 4 weeks I was hooked, and i hadn't even got to open a hive yet, it was fascinating learning more and more about bees and to be involved so closely with them set off a spark, that ignited a deeper passion within me.
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This was me transferring my first Nuc of bees into their new home, a British Standard National Beehive.
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Ever since that first Nuc transfer I havent regretted a single sting (and I have had a few), but to be able to look after these fantastic and fascinating little insects, that we depend so much upon is a wonderful experience.
Amelie became more involved as our first season progressed, and she still helps out from time to time, but I felt that having her experience such a wonder at a young age, will be something that I hope she wont forget.
By the end of the first season, I had increased our colonies to 2, and managed to harvest 20lb of fresh honey from them, which was another brilliant moment.
I have always loved honey, so to have honey produced by my own bees and to experience the whole process, was just fascinating.
I started to feel a degree of emotional attachment with the bees by this stage, aswell as the enormous satisfaction I felt about the impact we were having on the environment, and inevitably our own survival, and importantly helping the bees thrive.
In 2021, I had the opportunity to start a beekeeping project with the Royal British Legion Industries, as part of a welfare and outreach project which involves ex service personnel.
I setup an apiary on the Royal British Legion Village in Aylesford, Kent, where we currently manage 2 hives as well as a wild life area.
2021, has became a very busy season for me and beekeeping, I found my self recieving many calls for swarm collections in the area, aswell as answering many bee related questions from the public and not just about honeybees, but from bumblebees to solitary bees.
Through all this I soon came to learn about live honeybee removals too, and I started to gain expeirence in removing colonies from walls, ceilings, chimneys and where ever thay had taken up residency.
The bees find a nice space to set up home, but unfortunately it isnt always covnenient for the property owner.
By the end of my second season, I had increased the number of colonies to 10, with a further 4 colonies that I help manage for others.
Moving our small business forward, from 2022 we will be increasing our colonies for crop pollination, to help our farmers increase the quality and yield of the food we eat.
Helping our struggling bee population is the main purpose of starting up beekeeping, as without the bees and other important pollinators we would eventually be at risk of dieing out ourselves.
An estimated one third of our food depends on pollination, and there is a considerable amount of food that would disappear from our shelves completely should bees die out.
It would cost UK farmers £1.8 billion a year to pollinate our crops artifically.
Due to pesticides, insecticides, the loss of natural habitat and human nature, there are just 270,000 active hives in the UK compared with around 1,000,000 hives over 100 years ago.
To find out how Both businesses and individuals can help stop the decline in bees, and to show an appreciation for all their hard work.
Please click on the links below to find out more -
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If the bee disappears from the surface of the Earth, man would have no more than four years left to live. - Albert Einstein
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