Austin Honey Company Urban Farm Bee Hive Tours
ABOUT US:
Local beekeepers Raul Vergara and his son-in-law Mark Bradley are on a mission to help boost local organic farm pollination and production in the Austin area by placing our organically managed beehives on the farms year round and maintaining them at full pollination strength. Our costs are substantial to achieve this and our only forms of funding are sales of honey and beeswax products which are climate and rainfall sensitive and vary from year to year. We do not charge the farms to place our bees as it is a mutually beneficial win-win. Our costs are especially high the first half of each year, as our first harvests of honey and beeswax in a typical year are not until June.
OUR GOAL:
Our funding goal of $5,000 will help defray our upfront costs of ramping up production and boosting our bees to pollinate and make honey. That money will go to replacing some of our bees that have died over the winter, and fully managing them and the apiaries on the local farms where they reside through to the summer. The summer is when we can expect to harvest honey and beeswax and have a new crop to sell at the farmer's markets.
For a $25 contribution your funds will be pooled together with others to help us accomplish our organic food pollination goals on 10 local organic farms where we have our bees right now. This includes Green Gate Farms, Tecolote Farms, Springdale Farm, Milberg Farm, Bernhardt Farm, Sunrise Farm, Fruitful Hill Farm, Agua Dulce Farm, Carlson Farm, and Yegua Creek Farm. We feel that $25 is a reasonable amount that most folks can manage to help get us to our goal. It actually takes about $750 to start up one new bee hive, build to full strength and maintain it for the year.
THE PERKS OF CONTRIBUTING:
For only $25 you will get:
1. An 12 oz. honey bear of our raw wildflower honey.
2. Two hours with us for a "Live & Hands-On Beekeeping Experience" suited up in a bee suit to learn about the bees on an urban organic farm beehive tour! We will provide the bee suits and all your protective gear and we welcome ages 5 and up. All bee suits and protective gear will be clean and ready for your use. You will:
A. Learn the life cycle of the honeybee
B. See and learn about all the equipment and tools of the beekeeper
C. Hands on in the beehive seeing the bees in action and learning what they are doing and holding a frame of bees and getting your picture taken by us as well! Each contributor will learn how to carefully remove and re-install a frame of live honeybees within the beehive and then do it!
The first hour we will learn about the bees and the tools and then take a short break and then put the bee suits on for the hands on remaining hour of the tour! Expect to be at the farm for about 2 hours total!
We intend to offer these bee hive tours at Agua Dulce Farm, just southeast of downtown Austin located at 5015 Maufrais Ln, Austin, TX 78744. We will have the tours on Saturday's starting April 15th and running through June. We will have a morning and afternoon time option each Saturday through May and mornings only in June (because afternoons are typically too hot). We will accommodate 10 people maximum per tour session. Children 5-13 years of age must be accompanied by their parent/guardian who joins them on the tour as a contributor. For example, parent/guardian joins their children and pays $25 for themselves plus $25 for each child and each of you will get a honey bear as well. Although we will do everything we can to ensure the bees remain calm and docile, sometimes they do get agitated. The bee suits and protective gear work really well at preventing bee stings. Each person ages 14 and up must sign a liability release waiver prior to the start of the tour, as we cannot be held responsible for possible allergic reactions should you be stung. Adults will sign for their children under 14. You need to wear boots or sturdy shoes that cover your ankles and we will provide the rest. Groups of less than 5 people will be combined with other tour groups, as we need a minimum of 5 people to hold a tour. We will make every effort to accommodate. Inclement weather may delay and/or cancel our tours which will require rescheduling to future days/times. We assure you that we will work with you to make sure you get on your tour as soon as possible.
Thank you and we look forward to having you join us on the farm and in the bee yard! If you are not able to join us then please pass along to someone who may be interested as well!
Bee Well,
Mark & Raul