Colony Setup and/or Bee Management Services

Enjoy the benefits of beekeeping with some or none of the work!

Sanctuary Farms offers customized beekeeping services for private home owners, educational organizations and businesses. Not sure where to start? Don’t worry, we can guide you on apiary placement, what kind of equipment is best for you, where to get your honey bees and provide ongoing maintenance to keep your bees healthy and productive.  Set up fees are based on equipment + stock costs and a one-time on-site charge for set up and bee installation.  After setting up your colonies, they are yours to manage as you see fit, but know that we are here to help you through the “stuck” moments that are inevitable with these dynamic little creatures!!

Typical colony management arrangements include either monthly hive inspections or yearly maintenance arrangements depending on your level of expertise.  The individual monthly visits are provided to help those who just need a little help to get through an unusual challenge and are based on time and mileage.  We also provide seasonal options, for those who would like a stress free bee season.  This option particularly supports those who are in the beginning phase of their bee journey, and would like to have a seasoned professional walk them through the first year challenges.  The service is provided with a seasonal maintenance fee to manage the health and welfare of your bees from soup to nuts; from set-up, to swarm prevention, feeding protocols and options, disease prevention, through winterization.

Diagnostics

We provide full service microbiological diagnostics in-house for quick turn around and results faster to you so you can solve your problems quickly.

Treatment Strategies –

We provide advice and education on all forms of treatment for diseases and pests including treatment free recommendations, organic options and chemical treatment solutions and their ramifications.  We let the client make the decisions about how to manage their charges, we just provide the best education so those decisions can be ones based on informed knowledge and best practices.

Forensics –

Most end stage colonies are where they are due to a complex dynamic history of multiple insults over a short period of time.  Making good management decisions and treatment strategies requires understanding the cycle of disease and potential management errors that allowed that demise to occur.  Having a veterinarian trained in bee colony diagnostics and forensics is the best, fastest and most cost effective way to get to the bottom of what happened.  Let us help you create a better world for the next colony!!

Agricultural Exemption Services

Having owned and operated an organic dairy operation and a veterinary consulting firm with numerous intensively managed animal operations throughout my veterinary career, I have developed a program for helping larger tract property owners with the information and infrastructure they need to maintain or certify their property for agricultural status.

We will consult with you (initial consultation at no charge) to investigate if your property qualifies according to your county regulations.  In that bee colonies are now registered within state statutes as a “farm” operation, we can implement appropriate placement of bee colonies on your property to ensure compliance.

We are a soup to nuts operation, furnishing equipment and stock for placement as well as arranging harvest purchasing for farm sales compliance.  Additionally, we also provide colony health and management services for you – if “beekeeping” is not your cup of tea!!