i have been a beekeeper for 4 yrs and have 8 hives.most recommend that you have 2 hives. just so that if there is a problem with one the other can be divided to get 2 again. otherwise the bees really take care of themselves. most beeginers look in on the hives weekly. then as the newness wears off they look in monthly. i look in once during the winter on a warm sunny day just to see how they are making out. then in the spring to see if they need another box of frames, if they get tooo crowded they will swarm. then in september i like to see how much honey is in the hive and maybe take out a frame or 2.
that is not too much of a bother.
david

So, How many years do you think a hive could go with out looking in on it? I'm not going to recomend that she get two hives, because I know that shes not going to reenforce the weaker hive, it would just leave the hive open to robbery.

It's cheaper for the lady to pay a beekeeper $75 per year per hive to keep bees on her property, and better for the bees. Plus the beekeeper might even give her some honey.

Don't even think of putting hives out on the property and just leaving them alone. That's like sending typhoid Mary to work at the day care. It's not good for all bees, let alone the ones placed on the property.

isn't leaving a hive out sort of like a feral hive? I thought they were a good thing.

SteveInNC, is $75 the going rate for renting a hive for the season? The reason I ask is because a couple in the area who have a small apple orchard have inquired about renting a hive from me. This is my first year keeping bees, so I didn't want to commit to something like that. But apparently they can't find anyone around here (Massachusetts' South Shore) to rent them a hive. So I'm reconsidering, provided I can get some more bees. Seventy-five dollars won't cover my expenses, but it will give me another shot at some honey and a third more experience than I'll get with my two hives. Just wondering....

George

the going rate here is $45 per crop. apples take 3 weeks. the whole season... I don't know.

but leaving a hive of bees unattended without inspections is irresponsible, and will infest and infect hives all around. Feral hives everywhere crashed and died. That's why we have a problem. Why would you want to emulate that?

$75 isn't the going rate, but ask for it anyway in this special situation. It'll cost them $250 or more to put a hive out and ignore it, and then it'll be dead by next spring. It's an easy sales job.

The New York Times recently carried an article pointing out that the rate for bees is going up, especially in California, because of all the varroa problems, the lack of hives.

My father was a beekeeper and kept a hive at our house. He passed away three years ago and my husband attempted to take of the hive and then discovered he was highly allergic to bee stings. Since then no one has taken care of the hive. We figured that it would only last a short while. But to our amazement, it is still going strong. It actually had a swarm last week. Any insight as to why these bees have survived? We live in a suburb of Louisville, Kentucky and we are on the outskirts of a park.

I hope they live. Maybe that hive will start the repopulation of feral hives in Kentucky. Cross your fingers.