WBA Today

Wampiti Beekeepers' Association (WBA) was initiated in 2010 with only 30members with a common goal of modernizing beekeeping i.e. from traditional practice to modern system. A lot has happened such as learning how to use a smoker, wear protective gears, working bees during daytime, stop throwing brood combs out of the hives and many others. WBA is legally registered by the Local government of Nakasongola District.

Wampiti Beekeepers Association has over 80 members from different parts of Nakasongola and this is the smallest fraction of beekeepers in Nakasongola District. WBA benefits over 500 people in addition to 80 direct beneficiaries. The indirect beneficiaries include; family members of WBA members, friends of the WBA members and honey traders.

Most members are above 40 years of age and have families they take care of. Women are more active and focused compared to men. Youths are fewer compared to number of men and women in WBA.

Currently, the total number of hives possessed by WBA members is over 1300 hives where 90% are log hives.

Team work and comradeship was achieved; members now talk and share freely about the happening in their apiaries without hiding anything which wasn’t possible before.

Many beekeepers have established organized bee yards unlike before where hives were randomly installed all over the large piece of land.

Members have learnt how to look for better markets and this has enabled them to benefit from beekeeping as an economic activity.

Tree-cutting for charcoal burning went down as result of securing trees for flowers (nectar) and others installed hives under the trees.

Beekeepers make some money in beekeeping when they sell honey and they keep enough honey for their family too.

Current challenges
1.Limited  nectar sources
Beekeeping is facing a challenge today particularly in Nakasongola due to limited bee forage plants which is caused by charcoal burning. Most people in Nakasongola depend on tree cutting to produce charcoal which they sale to earn money.

WBA has embarked on protecting and planting bee forage plants to restore the forest and forage base to support beekeeping. Orange and mango are considered to be vital plants since they would provide flowers for bee foraging while when the fruits are ready, can be sold for cash hence eradicating poverty.

Luckily, many beekeepers have begun to plant trees and protecting young trees from being cut down for charcoal in favor of bees. Unfortunately most local tree species take 10 to 15 years to reach flowering stage and yet these are the best nectar producing trees. Therefore some of the members are old right now but it is a good investment for their sons and grandchildren who will benefit from them sometime in the future. And these plants are the best charcoal producing trees.

Charcoal burning became a serious activity in Nakasongola in early 1990s until today but this has left many places with no trees. This is due to lack of sensitization by the government to the local people.

Nakasongola was once a hardwood producing area unlike today where it is known for best quality charcoal and this is also fading way because the trees are getting less.

2.Honey extracting machine
The honey extracting method of squeezing honey into filtering clothes as commonly used by members is not favored by traders and many of them use it as a tool for letting down the quality of honey and this forces many members to sell their honey in combs and in the end they lose the bonus income from beeswax! Many beekeepers don’t keep the hygiene standards required during squeezing and filtering of honey.
Therefore WBA members don’t have modern equipment such as a honey press to help them.

Vote of Thanks
WBA take this opportunity to thank once again everyone especially overseas friends who have helped its members to move from primitive and unproductive beekeeping system into a modern beekeeping world which is more convenient and productive. Thank you very much for donating equipments, skills and knowledge and time. WBA members are no longer bee-killers but professional beekeepers; they no longer go into bees during late dark hours, but go into bees during day time hours to inspect beehives.

More Info
Swarms decreased by 80% and wild bees reduced by 90% since wild habitants were destroyed (big trees cut) and most termite hills are poisoned while killing termites. Therefore the rate of colonization is low since there are no enough swarms. This is also due to the fact that people are now managing well their hives whereby bees are not allowed to abscond and some beekeepers don’t allow bees to swarm claiming that the colonies become weak when bees swarm.

Beekeepers are still appreciating the productivity of log hives over topbar hives and the rate of colonization is high in log hives than top bar hives and this has influenced many beekeepers to continue using log hives though employing modern skills.

Many thanks to Toni’s visit in 2015, members have started using bees wax to produce lotion. Toni taught members how to make candles, soap and lotion during her visit to Wampiti Beekeepers Association. Members before had no value for the beewax and this is the hive product which was thrown away plus propolis but now everybody knows the importance of all hive products.

Future prospects.
1.  Accessing the best markets for honey, propolis and beeswax. Currently, members are trying to find ways of selling honey at a higher price than the traders (middlemen) buy though the current price is also better than the previous prices.

2.  Producing beneficial products from honey, beeswax and propolis. Members have started on producing body lotion with contains beeswax, honey and propolis. Meanwhile the market is still competitive especially from known lotion producers both local and imported.

3.  Replanting forests in areas where trees have been cleared as a result of charcoal burning. This would involve securing the indigenous trees though they take long to reach maturity.

4.  Sensitizing non-members about the importance of keeping bees and securing trees.

5.  Make Nakasongola the best honey producing district in Uganda.

Log hives (traditional) versus modern hives (top bars and frame hives)

In a nutshell, beekeeping started with honey hunting and then moved to log, woven, pot, calabash, and box hives. All these different hives have one thing in common, the combs are permanently fixed on the bodies of the hives and that’s why they are referred to as fixed comb hives.

Well as modern innovations came up with ideas for the purposes of convenience during manipulation, moveable comb hives were introduced and these types of hives include frame, and topbar hives. Therefore these are classified as moveable comb hives simply because, one comb can easily be moved out and in without destroying anything unlike in the fixed comb type where when a comb is moved out of the hive, it can’t be moved back in!

Many beekeepers in WBA use both top bar hives and log hives. Despite of the assumed productivity of top bar hives, members are complaining about the following common problems found in top bar hives:-
-Take long to get colonized naturally
-Low production in comparison with hive size
-Swarm so often
-Abscond so easily
-Easily affected by wax moth and ants
-Rats move in (especially between the bars and the cover or eat one corner from the top to move inside the hive)

Yet the above mentioned challenges are very rear to find in log hives. Therefore the above challenges are just opposite when it comes to log hives.

Leaving the above challenges aside, members complain about the production so much whereby 80% of the members say they harvest only once a year from a top bar hive yet they can harvest two to three times a year from a log hive. The amount of honey obtained from a topbar hive is lower than the amount of honey obtained from a log hive.

Well, the log hives have drawbacks too such as:-
-Inspections are not accurate since combs can’t be observed well.
-Colonies can’t be split to obtain new hives!
-Log hive producing trees are no longer easy to obtain

Against all odds, members have come up with ideas of making rectangular boxes with fixed sides to emulate the log hives. This has attracted the attention of many beekeepers because the bees easily colonise them and behave the same way they do in the log hives. And they are cheap to make compared to topbar hives.

Many reasons have been put across as to why bees are not performing well in top bar hives in Nakasongola areas to every beekeeper’s expectations and these reasons include:
-The size of the standardized dimensions is too large in top bar hives
-Bees are cultured and costumed to live in log hives
-Bees find it convenient to move end to end on long combs
-Bees work easily by building long combs ie end to end than many combs that cut across
-African bees enjoy small nests
-Natural and race reasons

Therefore beekeeping in Wampiti especially in WBA members and non-members is taking a reverse direction to utilize the productivity of log hives over modern hives while employing modern skills and equipment while working the bees.

Stages Of Beekeeping

Beekilling, Behaving and Beekeeping

Folks know that everyone with a box with bees inside is a beekeeper! I would say NO unless that person practices the right principles of beekeeping.

Yes, here in Wampiti, we followed the three stages of beekeeping in their proper order though it causes a big damage to the ecology.
People begun as honey hunters who would go and break open the nests of bees in search for honey and this practice involved a lot of colonies getting destroyed.
They didn’t realize that keeping bees in boxes or logs was more comfortable and convenient than going into the jungle hunting them. Therefore this stage is known as the beekilling stage because it involved killing bees. This must have taken very many years until 1990’s when I also happened to be a culprit. The trick involved in honey hunting was simple but very dangerous to the environment; open the nest apart, harvest everything (clear the nest without leaving combs in), burn the nest when bees attacks aggressively or disappoints you with no or very little honey. Usually honey hunters would start wild fires during the dry season when they leave fire burning in the destroyed bee nests!

When people realized that they can hang logs (calabash, woven or pots) between the branches of trees, would help them have honey in just a close by environment, they took up the idea, hung logs [hives] and swarms colonized them. Here we see people have bees in their own hives but have no idea or skills on how to manage the bees though they knew that the bees store honey and when time come people should harvest that honey against all cost.
People had only one skill; if the bees are more aggressive you burn them. Harvesting time was the only time the hive owner would go to the hive and this must be done at night when it is dark. A flame torch must be handy otherwise no job to do at the hive! Therefore this stage was behaving stage. People were just keeping bees without any managerial skills.
Beehives could only be visited during harvesting and this means beehives were checked only 3 times a year! Brood couldn’t be left in a hive by the owner claiming that when you remove brood combs from the hive, the bees could resort to storing honey. This weakened colonies and left many hives weak. People associated this to pruning of fruit trees! At this stage, people in Wampiti had no knowledge about protective gears and smokers!

After having bees for several years, volunteers came in and taught members how to manage bees and how to keep bees for profitable honey production. Now this stage is called the beekeeping stage. This stage involves all modern practices such as using frames and bars, inspecting bees for pests and diseases, providing good sites, providing bees with water and many others.
This stage also includes colony multiplication practices as well as queen rearing. During this stage, fewer bees are destroyed or killed unlike beekilling and beehaving stages where bees are killed so often during harvesting. Protective gears and smokers are used to ease manipulations.

Like in any enterprise, seeking knowledge is very important. Please join beekeeping clubs and associations, visit other beekeepers and attend seminars to acquire more skills and knowledge in beekeeping.
Above all; bees are the best teachers!

Today, there are very few wild bees since there are very few big trees which would accommodate bees; there are no more honey hunting practices!

And above of all there is no honey stealing anymore.

Our beekeeping history is full of fun>>

Avoid contaminating honey

How to avoid honey contamination

Bees collect nectar from various flowers and use it to create honey, during this process enzymes are added and the water content is reduced to 20% and below. They store the honey in cells of honeycomb and seal these cells with beeswax when honey is ripe. Honey which has been sealed is clean, pure and of perfect quality. The low water content of ripe honey enables it to be stored for long periods without going bad.

The color and taste of the honey depend on the types of plants on which the bees have foraged.

A beekeeper who wants to sell honey into a high value market must harvest honey without reducing its quality. Bits of wax, propolis, brood, dead bees, and dirt contaminate honey.

If the water content is too high it will ferment. Honey is hygroscopic and that means it readily absorbs water. Care needs to be taken to ensure that the exposure of honey to moisture is minimized by packaging it in airtight containers after harvesting.

Too much smoke stains honey and a beekeeper should be very careful while choosing the fuel to use in the smoker. Items such as plastic, cow dung, and mango leaves give off smoke with a bad odor!

Good quality honey is:
-ripe honey from capped honeycomb
-free from scraps of wax or any other contaminants
-processed using clean equipment
-stored in a clean and dry environment

Therefore a beekeeper should do the following to avoid contaminating the honey:
-Use less smoke while harvesting to avoid staining honey.
-Never use materials which give a smelly smoke.
-Don’t mix brood combs with honey combs
-Cover honey in airtight bucket to avoid ants and dust from contaminating and avoid the honey absorbing additional moisture from the environment
-During harvesting maintain hygiene standards – clean hands and use clean buckets, knives.
Avoid crushing bees; always brush off bees from combs before adding them into the bucket
-Keep your apiary clean always to avoid contamination like weed seeds and leaves from mixing with honey during harvesting.

Harvesting honey from fixed comb hives

Honey from fixed comb hives (log hives)

Equipment for harvesting fixed comb hives usually consists of a container in which to carry away the honey and a means of making smoke to subdue the bees (like a bundle of sticks and grass [this is now replaced by smokers now days]). Wait until the flame is extinguished before gently blowing smoke into the hive.

Most local style tropical African hives are cylindrical and can be harvested without the beekeeper needing any protective clothing. As the beekeeper blows smoke into one end of the hive, the bees move down to the other end and the combs at the first end can be removed with relatively little disturbance to the bees. If the beekeeper finds the brood at the opened end, they will have to close that end and open the other end instead.

Beekeepers sometimes use too much smoke, and even fire, to harvest from fixed comb hives. This can destroy a large proportion of the colony and drastically reduce the quality of honey. The aim should be always to preserve the colony. Do not disturb the brood nest anymore than necessary.

Note: Honey is the bees’ food. Only take surplus honey and leave the rest for them. Never harvest in the rain: this would cause great stress for the honey bee colony and increase the water content of the honey.

Only One Knife

Do you wonder what it was like to live in Uganda for 5 weeks with 2 different families? I will tell you of my experience, and please remember that Uganda is a big place and so is Africa; my experience is not representative of an entire country or continent.

Boda-bodas parked in Kampala

I stayed in Mukono for most of my time in Uganda, and this is an eastern suburb of Kampala and on the road to Kenya.  The road is paved wide enough for 2 cars and there is a dirt shoulder wide enough for another 1 ½ cars on either side. The road between the airport (Entebe) and Kampala and between Kampala and Mukono is very busy at certain times and I experienced all kinds of traffic. My hosts were very courteous (and courageous) drivers and I witnessed (and was in) taxi vans passing traffic on the shoulder of the road and taxi motorcycles (called boda-bodas) freely wove between stopped vehicles. Walking street vendors sold things like car accessories, drinks, snacks, newspapers, and toilet paper as they walked between vehicles stopped in traffic!

I saw people walking everywhere I went in Uganda and I would guess that this is the most often used mode of transport, although taxi vans and cars have routes on the major roads and the fee for long distance transport seem to be reasonable.

The other place I stayed was in Nakasongola and this was a more rural location where I observed the most varied conditions of living.

Many of you will be surprised to learn that I have a culinary background and 2 things that my first Chefs used to say echoed in my head during this trip. The first was, “Get used to your chef knife because it may be the only knife you have in the kitchen.”

Cooking on a charcoal stove

 Well this turned out to be true in Uganda on more than one occasion. And the same kitchen knife was also used as a hive tool! There were no cutting boards, and the general way of cutting was to hold food in one hand and cut it with the other. I observed one lady shaving cabbage as thin as a machine could and doing it quite quickly.  That brought to mind the other saying I remembered, “Only pilots work in the air.” Well, this is obviously not true as these folks know how to use the tools and work spaces they have to get the job done.

Our food storage area in Nakasongola,
along with the 'emergency' kerosene stove

Most of the cooking was done outdoors with charcoal and having a charcoal stove is the best way to get the most efficient heat. Not everyone can afford charcoal (or a stove); some people cut down trees, use scavenged wood or other burnable items for their fire. Farming is done with water that falls from the sky in the wet season and I did not observe a lot of collection of rainfall for household or farming use. I read an agricultural article in the local paper discussing the ways for farmers to collect and store water because rainfall is not falling as abundantly as it used to. People (mostly children) pump their water from the nearest well into 3-5 gallon containers and carry them home when they do not have access to any other water. There is piped water in quite a few places, but also many places still do not have electricity or a close water source.

Bricks after they have been fired

Many houses are made of bricks, and the bricks are made from the local soil. Wood is expensive, although I did observe tree farms. Some brick houses are finished with stucco, and most have a galvanized roof. There are also houses made of mud, and these mostly have the traditional grass roof. Traditional houses of wood, mud and thatch are quite durable and last 8-9 years.

I saw solar panels for sale and in use. If you don’t have electricity, you can pay a fee and a person will charge your cell phone, lap top or other electronic device. Our house in Nakasongola was about ¼ mile from the electricity line and this is what we did. 

Mud hut with grass roof

In remote areas, these places had solar panels as their electricity source. And some residences had panels too: It makes you look twice when you see a solar panel on top of a mud and grass hut!

I found beauty everywhere, and was fortunate to go to several local and National tourist spots. I will leave you with a few pictures from Ssezibwa  Falls, which is in Mukono and the first place I went for a short hike and relaxing afternoon. 

Next time I will describe more places and show you more pictures of life in Uganda. There are so many things I experienced, I am excited to share them with you!

Dry Season - Hive Management

Hive management during the dry season

Uganda has two rain seasons and two dry seasons in a year. The first dry season start in late December to late March and again from late June to early September. The rain seasons are March to June and September to early December. These seasons suits Nakasongola very well and it is known as a dry area compared to other areas in central Uganda. It is also known as a cattle corridor due to presence of cattle keepers on a small scale and they keep local breeds which take long to mature and produce very little milk (1/2 litre a day).

During the dry season, the entire bush will dry completely. Before the government passed a law against random burning of bushes by community members, people used to set fires on the bush especially the hunters. The whole of Nakasongola would burn in 2 weeks and leave the ground bare. This could kill a lot of living things including small animals, insects and on rear occasions people.  But since 1998, bush burning became minimal and there are parts which have never been burnt again since then.

Hives are installed under tree shades to avoid heat from the sun from burning wax and inconveniencing the bees, and when the trees shade off the leaves during the dry season, the beekeepers cover hives with dry grass.

This is what happens during the dry season;

The worst dry season is December to March. The weather is too hot during day and the sun shines from morning to evening without stopping since the sky is always clear – no clouds until in the last few weeks before the rains start usually in April.

Bees cannot find enough flowers apart from flowers on banana plants and mango trees plus a very few wild plants that flower a few weeks before rainfall begins. Therefore during this time of the year, bees go into shops to collect cassava and soya flour. Bees also collect water from sunrise upto sunset and the working hours are extended too; bees begin moving at around 5:50am (during the dry season, the morning brightness starts early) and stop flying at around 7:45pm.

During the dry season, many trees drop their leaves and weeds die. Many water ponds dry up and swamps dry out too.

The beekeeper will never open his or her hives since they are vulnerable to absconding and in the real sense the bees never have honey and brood during the dry season therefore any slight disturbance to the bees, they just abscond.

Beekeepers provide water and cassava flour to their bees on a daily basis until the end of the season.

Beekeepers don’t provide sugar syrup to their bees and to your surprise, bees never abscond unless disturbed.

A lot of bees are seen at the entrances of the beehives during the dry season compared to rain season.

The bush near hives is cleared to avoid wild fires from burning the hives in case it breaks up.

However during the rainy season, the rate of absconding is higher compared to dry season because when the hive is leaking, the bees abandon it, when the hive location is damp, the bees leave it and I have never seen bees build in an open space such as on a branch of a tree like they would do in Europe or US. But they could nest in ground if they found a hole!

Beekeeping in Uganda is naturally managed. Therefore honey produced is organic!

Bees fly out of the hives everyday unless when rain falls during daytime and usually when it stops, and sun comes back, the bees resume flying until dark.