Bradley Whittaker, aka The Humble Apiarists, believes the key to mindfulness and good mental health can be found inside a hive.
Beers and bees might not be the secret to happiness but for people like Brad Whittaker they’re a big step in the right direction.
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Brad Whittaker loves bees.
He loves their tasty honey, their tireless work pollinating our food and flowers, and he loves the way they make him feel when he works with them.
The bees, he says, give him a sense of calm and wellbeing. So much so that he’s launched his own “beers and bees” classes, with a little help from sponsor Pirate Life, where budding apiarists can crack a tinny, learn the basics of keeping a backyard hive and perhaps discover a little mindfulness along the way.
Whittaker isn’t alone in his idea that bees could be a key to good mental health – in the US beekeeping is even used to treat PTSD in war veterans through a program called Heroes to Hives and other programs around the world are harnessing the calming qualities of our buzzy buddies. For the high-voltage powerline technician, the call to beekeeping came about six years ago. “I was working flat out on the power lines, making good money but doing six days a week,” he said.
“It was really full on, and something needed to change. That’s when bees came along. I’m actually allergic to bees, but you have to face your fears in life.”
After flying to Sydney to take an apiary course, Whittaker knew he’d found a new calling. “I was like, ‘This is it! I love this’,” he said.
“The bees were singing loudly to me.”
Determined to incorporate this new love into his life, Whittaker founded his website – humbleapiarist.com – and set about telling others about the magic of these incredible social insects.
He has collaborated with a number of well-known artists, including Emma Hack and Laura Mckellar, on a hive painting project that will debut during next year’s SALA festival, but it’s his backyard beekeeping classes that get him really fired up.
“A basic class will go for three hours – it’s basically a really advanced beginners’ class - and we’ll just crack a tinny and have an experience,” Whittaker said.
“And if it turns out that we can crack the lid off a tinny, crack the lid off a hive and crack the lid off any stigma that goes with mental health issues then that’s just great.”
And Whittaker has a plea for anyone who finds a bunch of bees in the backyard – call an apiarist, not a pest controller. “Bees around the world are suffering from colony collapse, damage from neonicotinoid insecticides, droughts that leave flowers without nectar – we need to do something to restore the balance,” he said.
“Apiarists are trying to provide an alternative to destroying the bees. There’s a growing awareness we need to look after them.”
It’s an ethos best summed up by Whittaker’s hive identification code – LUV.
“I was on the phone to register my first hive and I was like, BUZ – taken. BZZ – taken. LUV – available! She couldn’t believe it, she was just shouting, ‘You’ve got LUV! You’ve got LUV!’ ”