World Ark Magazine - January/February 2009 - (Page 23)

The hives are made up of boxes hewn from local pine and painted to attract the bees. each box contains between 15,000 and 20,000 bees, with one queen bee per hive. The boxes house beeswax sheets called laminates. The laminates are placed in pine frames and inserted into the box. Most important, these laminates are a place for the bees to make their honey. Ramon Amaya and Jacinta Leonila Amaya are participants in the Honduras beekeeping partnership between Heifer International and the Cooperativa Apicola Pionera de Honduras Limitada. L New SkillS, Better BuSiNeSS ike many in Santiago de Puringla, bautista was in business for himself, growing coffee for the family’s main source of income. Santos was also self-employed. as a seamstress, she brought in money by making clothes to sell in town. over the years, bautista experienced what many coffee growers did: fluctuating prices that left income unpredictable. So when a friend told him and his wife about heifer international through Cooperativa Apicola Pionera de Honduras Limitada, they were interested. in 2003, bautista attended heifer training and says he liked what he heard. The same year, he received 10 hives—a number that heifer and the co-op determined was enough to be financially viable. Santos became involved as well. She helps with the bees and is also a member of the women’s group Grupo de Mujeres w w w. h e i f e r . o rg Agropecuarias de Santiago Puringla that creates the beeswax sheets for the bee producers in the field. bautista says they knew nothing about beekeeping before 2003. “[Coffee] wasn’t extremely lucrative, but it was enough to pay the bills,” bautista says through a translator. “heifer originally appealed to me more than anything for the financial reasons. over time, i learned that i liked beekeeping.” he was taught everything about raising bees, from where to place the hives and how often they should be moved, to reproducing queen bees and collecting honey. now, bautista owns 70 hives that he tends about once a week for four to five hours. he prefers to go on sunny days when there is little wind so the bees are calm. and having the bees remain calm is a necessity. Most heifer bee recipients raise a hybrid bee—a cross between the africanized bees that made their way into Central america in the 1980s and the local honeybees. Though he spends just a few hours with his bees each week, the januar y/f e bruar y 2009 | wor ld a r k 23 http://www.heifer.org

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of World Ark Magazine - January/February 2009

World Ark Magazine - January/February 2009 Contents Letters For the Record The Good Life Asked and Answered Microfinance: A Lot for a Little Business is Buzzing in Honduras The World Grows Smaller Mixed Media Heifer Spirit Heifer Bulletin Calendar First Person

World Ark Magazine - January/February 2009

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