Beekeeping is becoming a very important industry. With the Varroa Mites and Colony Collapse Disorder killing billions of bees a year, there is a desperate need to provide apiaries, especially in an economically disenfranchised area such as Fort Berthold Indian Reservation.

Honey bees are big money makers for U.S. agriculture. These social and hardworking insects produce six hive products – honey, pollen, royal jelly, beeswax, propolis, and venom – all collected and used by people for various nutritional and medicinal purposes.

About one-third of the food eaten by Americans comes from crops pollinated by honey bees, including apples, melons, cranberries, pumpkins, squash, broccoli, and almonds, to name just a few. Without the industrious honey bee, American dinner plates would look quite bare.

The objective is to obtain funds to start up an Apiary, non-dependent on the oil and gas industry that has wreaked havoc at our location. The Dancing Bee business hopes to have a positive ecological and economic impact on sustainability by growing a business that will draw from a local employment pool that has been repeatedly overlooked and under-represented.

I will spearhead the business as I have been mentored by the largest commercial bee-keeper in ND that happens to live in the next town! He is excited that someone is taking an interest in the shared love of the apiary industry.