Beekeeping legalized, students embrace hobby

Even though beekeeping is now legal in New York City, the bees may not be buzzing at Columbia anytime soon.

The city’s Board of Health voted unanimously on March 16 to end the ban on keeping honeybee hives, but amateur student beekeepers are looking outside the gates of campus, for now.

Scott Wright, vice president of Campus Services, said he hasn’t heard of any recent requests from students to keep bees. Even with the city’s lift of the ban on the hobby, Wright said beekeeping is not presently allowed—in line with the Guide to Living policy that prohibits dorm pets.

Columbia’s Food Sustainability Project, a student group that organizes composting on campus and tends a garden, has expressed interest in beekeeping, but president Kristina Gsell, SEAS ’12, said the group will hold off until at least next semester to determine whether or not the plan could be viable.

“Beekeeping is a potential endeavor for next year, but we’re unsure about how the University feels in terms of safety, like if we had a box and bees were to come out of it,” Gsell said.

For now, the group is busy with its on-campus garden, and Gsell said it will be adding plants to attract honeybees.

But some students have not waited for on-campus opportunities to harvest honey.

Sam Elchert, GS, has been a beekeeping enthusiast for more than a year. But the most difficult aspect of the hobby has been locating a home for his hives in the city, he said.

Now, he inspects his hives, with at least 10,000 bees, once a week in a Harlem garden, but it took time to find a place with enough space and where the property owners weren’t afraid of the legal consequences.

“I had a community garden in Brooklyn that agreed to host my hives, but because of the legal issue, they wanted to store them under some bushes,” Elchert said. This would have been problematic, however, since beekeepers need room to let the bees take off and land in front the hive, and room to walk around the hive to do inspection, he added.

But then a Columbia professor helped Elchert out. “I was very lucky to have a professor who lives on a farm in Connecticut … She agreed to let me keep my hives there, which was a huge help.” But, Elchert explained, the weekly trip to Connecticut to inspect the hives got pretty demanding.

Health Code Article 161 originally banned honeybees, deeming them dangerous because they can sting. A group of beekeepers then presented the Board of Health with a petition to promote honeybee keeping as sustainable agriculture and ultimately succeeded in getting bees removed from the list of banned animals, which included poisonous snakes and crocodiles.

Now, as long as beekeepers register their hives with the city, they won’t face legal trouble. Elchert said he appreciated the change, since bees are not harmful insects.

“Particularly in New York, people are very removed from nature, so there are many misconceptions about honeybees,” Elchert said. “Honeybees are not aggressive.”

Still, he hasn’t been able to formally join up with other on-campus beekeepers. “I approached Columbia last year about my interest in the hobby, and a number of people were very supportive, but because it was illegal, they couldn’t help me [create a group].”

But for Elchert, the hobby remains a fun, relaxing activity—with the added bonus of honey. “They’re all really good at what they do. It’s incredibly interesting.”

Taking care of bees also serves an important purpose of pollination, he said. “Being a small-time beekeeper, you can take some pride in it.”

It’s unclear whether bees would actually be feasible to keep on campus, and Elchert said it might be difficult in crowded areas.

Then, there is also the challenge for some of overcoming fear.

Gsell said, “I’m kind of a little scared of bees, but I’m open to new things. I have a worm bin in my room, and if I can do worms, I can probably do bees.”

Sarah Darville contributed reporting.

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