[Animals] Beekeeping - How to keep bees

Welcome to your next "Animal 101" lesson of the Farming Simulator Academy! Today, we’re focusing on Bees. We'll show you how to buy and take care of the little buzzers and how to make money from them. They produce honey and in some cases increase the yield of your fields. 

What you need for Bees

Let's take a look at everything you need to keep and take care of bees. 

• You need a beehive. You can choose between five versions in the construction menu. You can find the hives under "Animals" in the "Bees" tab. They differ in size. The larger the hive, the more honey they produce. Their yield increase radius differs, too (see image above).
• You need a pallet station. Position the pallet station near the hives to get honey ready for sale. Pallets of honey will automatically appear when your bees produced enough of it. 
• You need a tractor with a front loader attacher and a pallet fork. To be able to use the front loader on the tractor, you must first purchase the necessary attachment from the dealer. Use the pallet fork to transport the honey.
  • Tip! You can find a matching beekeeper's outfit on the characters screen. You don't have to put it on - but you might want to. Equip it in the "Others" category of the shop screen!

Equipment Selection (recommendation) 

We chose the following equipment. We just need a tractor with a front loader attachment. Make sure, your tractor has the corresponding configuration, so you can attach it. To do this, drive the tractor to the dealership, park the machine in the vehicle options field and select the appropriate configuration on the right side of the screen. Only if your tractor got the configuration, you can actually attach a front loader attacher.  

• Tractor: John Deere 7810
• Front Loader Attacher: Hauer XB190
• Pallet Fork: albutt

Let’s go to work!

Got everything you need? Let's get to work! We recommend starting with the hive with 33 frames, if you are financially able to. This costs a little more, but it houses more bees and thus ensures bigger honey production. It holds a good return of investment and increases the yield of your fields (if growing the right crops) with the biggest radius. 

Unlike the other animals, you do not have to buy the bees themselves. When you buy and place a hive, the bees are already in there - buzzing and working to produce some honey.

Step 1: Animal husbandry & placement

You don't have to worry about anything with the bees. Place the hive next to a field and the bees will increase the yield of some crops. For example, the yield of sunflowers increases by 5%. For potatoes and canola, the yield increases by 2.5% each. Place the pallet station somewhere on your farm. 

Tip! You can only place one pallet station. The honey for all the Beehives on the map collected at this point. Place it wherever it fits your farm layout. 

Tip! Make sure you also place the beehives near fields. In case, you are (planning to) grow potatoes, sunflowers or canola at some point. 

Step 2: Sell the products

Sell the honey at the Fast Food Restaurant, the Farmers Market or the Cereal Factory. if you own a cereal factory yourself, the honey can be processed into cereal which you can sell to make even more money.

Well done!

Congratulations, you have successfully kept bees! Take some time and start the next lesson when you are ready. Keep at it and you'll be a top-notch virtual farmer in no time with Farming Simulator Academy!