by Cori Hilsgen
news@thenewsleaders.com
The Tri-County Beekeepers Association is buzzing with activity and new memberships. The association, which teaches and studies beekeeping, currently has 120 members.
About 50 percent of the association’s members are new members.
The group loves honey bees and welcomes anyone with an interest in bees to attend its monthly meetings. Because pollinator numbers have decreased greatly in recent years, the association is encouraging membership to help create awareness and educate people.
Paul Theis, Sartell, has been a member of the association for four years. He joined as soon as he ordered his first hive and strongly recommends anyone who is keeping honey bees should join their local bee club. Especially beginners.
Theis has served as club treasurer. He said it was the first office he ever held and learned much from the experience. His son, Mitch Theis, is now the treasurer.
He started with one hive, thinking beekeeping would keep him busy if he ever decided to retire. Somehow beekeeping has turned into a second full-time job for him.
He and his son will manage more than 100 hives this summer. Their bees are located in bee yards in the Sartell, St. Stephen and St. Joseph areas.
Theis said it has been a fast growth rate with long hours building bee boxes in the garage during cold winters and splitting hives to increase his number of hives in the summer.
“I enjoy being around the bees, and it doesn’t seem like work when you enjoy what you are doing,” Theis said. “We had to learn fast, to move from hobby beekeepers to starting a business, selling honey, pollen, bees’ wax and bees. Our business, Beau’s Bee Yards, is named after our dog Beau. None of this could have been accomplished in such a short time without the knowledge gained by participating as a member of a local bee club.”
He said the learning curve is steep for first-time beekeepers. There are many questions about when and how and a lot about timing. He joined the Tri-County Beekeepers Association to have a place to ask those questions. Now he is answering many of those questions and sharing information with other beekeepers.
Theis said the honey bee is a very interesting bug. As he learns more about them, he realizes there is so much more yet to learn.
Theis works in information technology services at the College of St. Benedict and has several bee yards he checks on his way home after work. His goal is to become a full-time beekeeper after retiring from the college.
Mikenzie Gessell, 17, Sartell, and her aunt, Wendy Gessell, St. Cloud, recently joined the Tri-County Beekeepers Association because they thought it seemed like a great way to gain more information about how to take care of bees.
They have been with the association less than a year. Mikenzie said she has learned so much already.
They started working together as beekeepers on their first three-pound package of Carniolan bees. Jonathan Schmitt, from the association, was their mentor.
Mikenzie said he helped them with the many questions they had.
“Now that we are comfortable with working with bees, we both have our own hives and they made it through the winter,” Mikenzie said. “I am very excited to see my bee colony grow this summer.”
Mikenzie said people with years and years of experience with bees still do not know everything about them, so everyone is constantly learning new ways of how to take care of their bees.
“The very first hive I took care of, they swarmed, which is not a good thing at all, but it was an amazing experience,” Mikenzie said. “Thousands and thousands of bees were flying through the air. Thankfully they gathered on a branch in a nearby tree, and Jonathan came and helped me get them back into a new deep brood box and by the end of the day I ended up with two hives.”
President Vern Heise of Clearwater said the association draws members from Stearns, Benton and Sherburne counties, as well as other places such as Buffalo, Delano, Glenwood, Little Falls, Long Prairie, Mora, St. Michael, Spicer and more.
He said meetings are open to anyone with an interest in honey bees. Some members do not have bees of their own.
Heise has been a member of the association for nine years. Ten years ago, he noticed there were absolutely no bees working his apple trees when they bloomed in the spring. He had kept honey bees when he was in high school and the entire orchard of trees his parents had at the time were full of bees with trees sounding like they could take off at any moment.
“I realized I needed to start keeping bees again just for the pollination they provide,” Heise said.
The main purpose of the non-profit association is to help educate fellow beekeepers. Monthly meetings often include presentations/demonstrations on topics such as hiving packages of bees, inspecting hives, checking and treating for Varroa mites, swarming, overwintering, making splits, helping native pollinators, candle-making, diseases and more. The club invites speakers twice each year on special topics.
The association has a demonstration yard on the southeast side of St Cloud. It’s a bee yard with three colonies of honey bees where members can demonstrate management techniques for members that haven’t experienced them yet. Things such as hiving a package of bees, splitting a colony of bees, doing a Varroa sugar roll to count Varroa mites, to show what the different things the bees do and store in a hive and more.
Vice president Jason Nyholm, Kimball, has been a member of the association for three years. He joined the Tri-county Beekeepers Association for the wealth of knowledge and experience the members have.
“We are passionate about our honey bees,” he said.
Nyholm said four problems bees and beekeepers are experiencing include the following:
- Nutrition: There is a lack of forage because there are bigger fields with less hedge rows between them where weeds used to grow. Many herbicides kill all the blooming “weeds” in farm fields. Fields are mainly planted with corn and beans, and they are not of any value to honey bees. Road ditches are mowed where sweet clover grows. Bees need good floral diversity to get different pollen types.
- Pesticides
- Pests and parasites: This is a major problem. The worst one is the Varroa mite because of the diseases they vector or spread. A major disease they spread is the deformed wing virus.
- Stress on the bees from being moved for wintering, pollination and honey production. Also, stress from pests and diseases.
“The association is growing by leaps and bounds with all the information about pollinators struggling,” he said. “This has drawn a lot of interest in honey bees and pollinators.”
Heise, who has six hives of bees, said at this time of year members are busy preparing bee hives and getting packaged bees and putting them in hives. To establish the hives, they release a queen bee and check the hive in about a week to make sure the queen is laying eggs.
They are also giving bees who survived the winter a sugar-syrup solution and pollen patties. The bees need pollen for protein and to raise their young. They get carbohydrates from nectar. Most bees, if they survived the winter, will have depleted most of their food supply.
The winter hives have about 10,000-15,000 bees in them. By late June, beekeepers try to have about 50,000-60,000 bees in one hive to create major honey flow.
Each year, the Tri-County Beekeepers Association awards a Youth Beekeeping scholarship to a child between the ages of 12-17. The scholarship includes all the protective clothing and tools they need, a package of bees, a class on beekeeping and they also provide a mentor to the student. This year the association awarded two scholarships.
The association also has a display at the Benton County Fair to help educate people about the association and beekeeping, and also to sell honey.
The Tri-County Beekeepers Association meets at 7 p.m. the first Tuesday of every month at Holy Cross Lutheran Church located at 2555 Clearwater Road, St Cloud. Membership costs $10/year for a family.
To contact the association, email president@tricountbeekeeepers.com or attend a meeting.
For additional information, visit the tricountybeekeepers.com website. The website includes many informational tips about bee basics, beekeeping lessons, beekeeping supplies, bee-hive plans, selling honey and more.

Cheyenne, 9, Hawkins, 7, and Brogan Nyholm, 5, (left to right) children of Leslie and Jason Nyholm, visit the Tri-County Beekeepers Association display at the Benton County Fair.

Tri-County Beekeepers Association member Roger Doroff and his son, Jacob, check out the association’s observation hive at a Benton County Fair display.

Tri-County Beekeepers Association members Conrad Legatt and Roger Doroff demonstrate a honey extraction at the Benton County Fair.