About Bees
Introduction to Responsible Beekeeping: May 11, 2024.
Beekeeping Part Two: Next Steps to Beeing a Bee Master These three courses are coming up right away: 1) Bees Eat Money; 2) Native Bees, Honey Bees, Native Bees; 3) Sweet as Honey. This link gives you the details.
About Bees is your way to learn all about bees. Whether you’ve been keeping honey bees for years or if you are just learning to enjoy the wild native bees in your yard and in the city parks, there’s so much more to know.
That’s where we can help! About Bees focuses on responsible beekeeping at all levels: reducing stings, using equipment properly, treating bees safely, keeping bees healthy. You’ll learn how to increase your honey crop while learning to gently help your bees. If native bees are your passion, they are for us, too. That’s why we also have classes in attracting them to your garden and helping them survive.
Complete our Introduction to Responsible Beekeeping course and earn the certificate required to be an urban beekeeper in the City of Calgary.
About us
The instructors for our About Bees courses are Ron Miksha and Linda Symmes.
Ron has been a commercial beekeeper, urban hobby beekeeper, bee researcher (University of Calgary), and beekeeping instructor. Ron teaches vocational beekeeping at the Drumheller Correctional Institute, and recently was honoured with a prestigious, campus-wide Teaching Excellence award at the University of Calgary. He is currently a director of the Alberta Native Bee Council and of Western Apicultural Society. Ron mentors beekeepers at Tsuut’ina Nation, led the beekeeping workshop at the University of Calgary Vet Medicine Symposium, and is published in American Bee Journal, BeesCene, and Bee Culture. Ron edits the ABee Landing Board Quarterly, has been interviewed by Global, CBC, and CTV regarding bees, and is a frequent beekeeping podcast guest. More about Ron.
Linda is an accomplished sideline-beekeeper with nine colonies. She knows what it is like to be a new beekeeper – she’s been at it for four years. She also knows how we can learn quickly and become successful at beekeeping. Linda was raised on a farm southeast of Calgary. Linda has organized training and learning sessions for beekeepers interested in entering and judging honey competitions and was a co-organizer of the 2023 Honey and Mead competition at the Western Apiculture Society International Northern Lights Beekeeping Conference. She currently has 9 hives that she hosts in four locations around the NW part of Calgary. Linda loves working with and learning about bees – and Linda has a special passion for honey: judging, understanding, and even eating it! More about Linda.
About Bees 