How to Use This Book

This book is a collection of stories from the field and resources for new and intermediate beekeepers interwoven with my own experience as a beekeeper over the last decade.

As much as possible in this text, we aim to avoid unnecessary jargon or lingo.  So, it doesn’t require a master’s degree to decipher. The goal is to make the beekeeping stories, tools and strategies accessible, and to share practices and examples of all the lessons we can learn from the hive.  The intention is that the resources will be adapted or inspire you to co-create new resources.

How to use this book:

• Start wherever you want! This book doesn’t require you to start at the top of the Table of Contents and linearly work your way through to the end
• Find tools and resources to start or continue on your beekeeping journey
• Learn about what small-scale beekeepers are doing in their communities
• Read and share stories of the growing landscape of beekeepers who are women, femmes and/or people of color (POC)
• Refer to it as a reference guide
• Discuss lessons learned from the hive (i.e. building consensus) in your community and how you can apply these lessons to build networks of collective care and shared power
• Or use these tools to adapt new tools with co-collaborators
• Imagine how you’d use the concepts in your life/lives
• Try a practice
• Set a goal
• Share your new ideas or practice with a friend
• And with a community member
• Use it as a strategizing tool with your team/community/friends/think tank/group
• Use it to research, honor and learn about other people’s work (see “inspirations”)

I want to travel and talk about this book and about organizing and intention setting tools I’ve adapted from the hive; share my bee zines; talk about queering bees; read a section from my Radicalize the Hive Manifesto or talk about beekeeping.  I’d love to gather the stories of beekeepers, ecologists and queer land dwellers.  If you can host me, let’s chat. Email info@theykeepbees.com or info@angelaroell.com or find me on Instagram, @theykeepbees.  Zzb zzb!