BACK--YARD BUZZ : Beekeepers Pursue Sweet Life With the Help of Happily Humming Hives

To the untrained eye, the plant-covered boxes in Judy Rosen’s Northridge back yard are nothing but uninspired compilations of wood and nails.

But to Rosen, the boxes are much more. Within them, she says, are all the makings of a best-selling novel: Royalty, sex, high society.

“They’re magical,” Rosen said. “You can see this perfect socialist society, with everything done for the queen. It’s completely inspiring.”

Rosen actually is less interested in politics than in honey. Like dozens of other San Fernando Valley residents, Rosen is a back-yard beekeeper. After a few bees strayed into her yard 11 years ago and didn’t want to leave, she began caring for three hives and now runs a small honey business from her house. She is one of 135 Valley beekeepers who are registered with the Los Angeles County Department of Agriculture.

“Some people like dogs or cats,” she said. “I just happen to be hooked on bees.”

Today, Rosen knows what it takes to keep her hives humming happily. Dressed in a protective veil and gloves, she extracts honey from the hives a few times a year and sells about 1,000 jars a year to stores and shops for as much as $15 each. But back when she was starting out, she said, she needed expert advice.

She found it through the Los Angeles County Beekeepers Assn.

“There are doctors and lawyers and gas station attendants, but the one thing we all know about is bees,” said Harriet Lyle, vice president of the association, a group of about 65 beekeepers that meets once a month in the basement of Glendale Federal Bank in Glendale. “That’s all we ever really talk about.”

In addition to catching up on bees, members exchange information and discuss problems involving their beehives. The group takes care of a hive on display at the California Museum of Science and Industry in Los Angeles and runs an educational exhibit at the Los Angeles County Fair.

Most members are hobbyists, producing enough honey for their own use or to give as gifts, said Ernest Shockley, association treasurer and an attorney. But some have taken their hobby a bit farther from home.

“A lot of beekeepers rent their hives to farmers, who use the bees to pollinate their crops and increase their yield,” said John Goit, association president. “It benefits the farmers and the beekeepers too. The bees make a lot more honey.”

Goit, a repair shop supervisor who lives in Palmdale, said the bulk of his 150 hives--each with 60,000 bees--are in the Owens Valley near Bishop. When the bees have completed their work in the fields, he said, he will load the hives onto a truck and bring them home. He will be 6,000 to 17,000 pounds richer in clover and alfalfa honey.

The type of honey produced depends on where the hives have been placed, Goit said. Orange honey comes from hives that have been in a citrus area. Wildflower honey, which is light-bodied and flowery in flavor, results from hives placed among button willows. Much of the buckwheat honey--a thick, dark honey popular in baking and exported in large quantities to Germany--produced in the Los Angeles area comes from hives near Saugus and Newhall, Goit said.

“Honey buyers can tell by one taste where hives have been,” Goit said.

In California, 900,000 beehives a year are trucked to San Joaquin Valley fields, each hive rented for about $25 per six-week season. That makes beekeeping a multimillion-dollar segment of the state’s agricultural industry, said Michael Pearson, a Los Angeles County bee inspector.

But hobbyists often complain that their own bees get no respect. Convincing neighbors that the hives are not a threat is a common problem.

“Part of my job is to investigate any multiple-sting episodes, and it’s rare that honeybees are involved,” Pearson said. “Still, a lot of beekeepers say that people are nervous about the hives.”

One association member said her homeowner’s insurance was canceled after more than 20 years because the company learned that she kept hives in her yard. Pearson said he “knew of no instances where insurance was canceled” because of hives.

But even more stinging than the bad rap their bees receive, members say, is that beekeepers are often viewed as, well, a bit flighty.

“A lot of my best friends don’t understand why I do this. They think it’s eccentric,” Rosen said. “Sometimes I feel like a public relations person for Mother Nature.”

Association members take their hobby seriously. At one recent meeting, they discussed a dreaded parasitic mite that makes bees shun work and consume honey reserves, and aggressive Africanized bees that are heading up through Mexico and are expected to arrive in Southern California within the next few years.

If hives become infested with the Africanized bees, which are known to swarm and attack, beekeeping throughout the state could be threatened, Pearson said.

“But please, don’t call them killer bees,” Shockley said. “It’s just a buzzword with the media, and it makes people panic. We have a hard enough time as it is convincing people that bees are our friends.”

If the public had a better understanding of the important role bees play in agriculture, members say, they would encounter fewer negative responses.

“People have seen too many horror movies,” said Dale Gardner, a longtime beekeeper whose 15 hives are in an undeveloped area of Chatsworth. “People are just plain prejudiced against insects. Bees can be domesticated just like other animals.”

To prove his point, Gardner gave a recent visitor a tour of his hives. Not only does he know his bees, Gardner said, but his bees know him as well.

As he walked along a dirt path in the direction of a faint humming sound not far away, a single bee appeared and hovered momentarily in the air. Seconds later, the scout was gone. Once news of his arrival got back to the hive, Gardner said, he would be free to do his work in peace.

“Bees are smart, and they know your scent,” he said, “They can recognize you.”

Pearson, whose job is to visit beekeepers throughout the county and spot-check some of their 40,000 hives for such things as the parasitic mite, agreed. “I try to be mindful that the bees don’t know me,” he said, glancing toward the protective canvas suit he keeps in his pickup truck.

To any skeptic who doubts the intelligence of bees, association members are only too happy to present evidence to the contrary.

When one bee finds a source of pollen or nectar, for example, it lets the other bees know where the source is by dancing while they touch her antennae. If the food source is near, she dances in a straight line; if it is far, she dances in circles.

And then there are the social aspects of hives that enchant so many beekeepers. Some say it is the way drones--the only males in the hives--are doted on by the female worker bees, who do all the gathering of pollen and nectar. Other beekeepers, their feminist sensibilities perhaps offended by such a sight, point to the way bees mimic some humans, literally working themselves to death in their single-minded pursuit of the sweet life.

“I’ve seen them in the evenings when they’ve been working hard all day, and they still fly back to the hive with their legs covered with pollen. They’ll belly-flop in front of the hive with the weight and have to crawl up the side because they’re so exhausted,” Gardner said.

Rosen, who said she once lived in a convent and considered becoming a nun, has taken a different kind of veil. Beekeeping isn’t so much just a hobby or interest as a way of life, she said.

“In church, everyone talks about the miracles of God. The only difference in our case,” she said, pausing for a moment, “is that we just happen to talk about bees.”