15 Years of Beekeeping Failures and Successes I can't say it has been an easy hobby, but it has been interesting and rewarding. I started out with a one foot square wooden planter box that I converted into a top bar hive. Our fruit trees had not produced any fruit the previous year and I thought maybe if I could keep some bees in my backyard, it would help the trees. I purchased a "bee lure" online and put it in the makeshift hive. It only took less that a day for a colony to take it over. I wasn't educated about beekeeping at all, which is not a good way to start. I didn't even know if I could tolerate being up close with bees. I had a veil and a pair of thin worker's overhauls on when I opened up the hive and pulled up one of the top bars, I was amazed at the pale yellow comb the bees had built that hung down in a half moon from that bar. The bees were all over it and I was fascinated by their beauty. I was...