Bees and chickens: companions or not?
When starting your backyard farming journey, there are a number of activities to develop your admiration for the agrarian lifestyle, such as chicken keeping and beekeeping. If you’ve already committed to chickens or bees, but not yet both, we hope to help debunk some concerns for keeping the two together. By the end of this article, you’ll be able to confidently decide if both additions deserve a place on your backyard farm. Listed below are a number of thoughtfully guided tips and considerations to successfully integrate the two together for a harmonious backyard farm.
Benefits of keeping chickens and bees together:
Although bees are able to directly impact your garden via pollination, they simply cannot offer as much to their future companions for obvious reasons. Chickens, on the other hand, can offer protection to your current or future busy bees.
The sweetness of honey can attract a number of bugs looking for a taste. Flock members can easily find any lurking visitors and consume them prior to making an entrance to your hive. In the case that your hive is overtaken by a bug, such as wax moths, you can feed the wax worms to your flock members.
Wait, but won’t my flock eat my bees?
This highly depends on your beehive setup and the behavior of your flock. Beehives should be elevated to prevent bug infestation, and reduce the temptation of your flock members to consume your pollinators. If your flock members do develop a curiosity to consume bees, then it’s best to make separate backyard arrangements. Oftentimes you’ll find that chickens carelessly roam around the hive without looking to bees as snacks. As long as you observe a friendly cohabitation, then there is no need to make special arrangements until proven otherwise.
Backyard Arrangements:
As mentioned before, bees and chickens can easily cohabitate in your backyard together, however, if proven otherwise. Ideally, we would recommend keeping your bees closest to your garden to pollinate. If you don’t have a front and back garden to separate the two, we suggest creating an enclosure for your beehive. Although this will help keep your flock away, your hive may venture towards your coop if they find food scraps or water. Make sure to leave safe water areas inside your hive enclosure to prevent them from venturing too far. Additionally, you can use poultry nipples, much like those of our EZ-Fill Waterers to prevent visits from thirsty bees.
Overall keeping bees and chickens together can make for a greater, backyard farming experience. Not only do you receive the joy of collecting fresh eggs, but you also witness the cycle of life. Although small, bees can still thrive in your backyard space with your current or future feathered companions. Given a few simple considerations, adding one or both of these backyard farming super companions can further expand your experience & journey.
We hope you found these tips helpful for your backyard farming journey. To learn more about what we offer, check out our chicken coops for sale. Have questions or comments regarding anything mentioned in this blog post? Please feel free to contact us via email at support@roostandroot.com or give us a call at 877-741-2667.