How a Rock Hill business is trying to save the food supply one bee hive at a time

Two beehives illuminated by the sun greeted Karen Avetisyan as he entered the driveway of his client Zan Maddox’s home. It was as if nature intended to highlight it.

“Isn’t it beautiful?” Maddox said while Avetisyan put on his beekeeping suit and gloves to inspect the hives.

Maddox is a client of Bee & Comb, a beekeeping supplies company that offers education and its one-year-old Host A Hive program geared towards sustainable beekeeping.

Host A Hive allows clients — both businesses and homeowners — to place honeybee hives on their property. Avetisyan inspects and maintains the hive throughout the year and, so far, has 10 clients.

As a bonus, the client keeps the honey and Avetisyan bottles and labels it all. They also can take over hive management after one year. Avetisyan offers online classes as well that focus on how bees are important for the environment. He launched his business in 2021 to support honey bee conservation through education, consultations, classes and to sell beekeeping supplies.

Bee & Comb has locations in Rock Hill and North Carolina.

Avetisyan worked for a research center in Armenia as head of the honeybee selection and breeding department, with the United Nations and the U.S. Agency for International Development as a honeybee expert. He’s also worked for colleges in the U.S.

Bee colonies dwindle

Avetisyan’s big focus is on how honeybee colony loss negatively affects the food chain and the economy. Bee colonies have dwindled over the past couple of decades, according to the Environmental Protection Agency, with losses occurring from colony collapse disorder.

Other factors in honeybee loss comes from poisoning of the hives by pesticides, invasive pests, disease, inadequate nutrition and stress, the EPA reported.

Honeybee losses can disrupt pollination, which is critical to that world’s food supply, the U.S. Department of Agriculture reported. Fruit and seed yields increase when bees are present. Climate change is also a significant factor to the decline, it said.

Avetisyan wants his business to contribute to biodiversity and the food chain, he said.

“This program gives a unique market proposition, also for businesses, they can attract more customers who respect businesses that are environmentally oriented, and besides taking from the environment, they give something back,” Avetisyan said.

Giving back is what Maddox is looking to do. The honey yield is just a bonus for him

“It’s for the bees,” he said about his interest in hosting hives. He plans to add more in the future.

Avetisyan said Maddox is like a lot of people who host a hive.

“If your garden doesn’t have enough bees, you’ll hardly get quality food,” he said. “Many people nowadays, they want to have their own garden and produce their own food, but owning a garden is just not enough to produce quality and sustainable food.”

Thirty-three percent of food we eat depends mostly on honeybees, he said.

Queen bee breeding

Queen bee breeding is another program Avetisyan is starting this year. Charlotte and South Carolina need quality queens, he said, which is a big issue in the area. The queen bee is usually the mother of most bees in a hive and the largest in the colony.

The program can take decades to improve, so it’s a continuous project.

This year, Avetisyan plans to extend the Host A Hive program to local elementary schools for educational purposes. Bee & Comb will maintain the hives, but the children will keep the honey for their school, he said.

In addition, Avetisyan maintains hives atop a hotel and plans to extend the Host A Hive program to other local hotels.

To learn more information about Bee & Comb and the Host A Hive program, visit beekeepingservices.com.

Tracy Kimball

The Herald

Tracy Kimball has been a visual journalist for The Herald since 2016