Before we start, please read this warning. - Honey should never be given to children under a year old. As honey can contain the Botulinum endospores and children under the age of one do not have a developed enough digestive system to destroy these spores. Children over a year old should be fine.                                                                                                                                                                         Now I have that out the way -

Welcome to the Hatton Bees website.

First jar of Hatton Bees Honey - look how clear it is compared to shop bought honey. I didn't sell any of this first batch. A few lucky members of my family received a jar in with thier Christmas.

The use of bold and/or larger text is to allow people with sight difficulties to see the text better, I understand it might not look professional but I don't really care to be honest. 

Me in my protective bee suit.

Hi my name is William Hatton (Willie) and I have just started keeping bees and thought I would share the information I have had to learn with you.

Me and my youngest daughter Sarah up at Daddy's bees for her 1st time - afterwards she said "that was fun". A future beekeeper maybe - that would be really nice.

We were lucky enough to witness a new bee emerging from her cell, Sarah was really interested watching that.

I hope as Sarah grows she will continue to be as interested in daddy's bees and joins me at the hive often.

My two other older children Louise and Andrew who are now young adults have also joined me at the hive. I'm pleased to also say so has my lovely partner Kathryn, who has supported me in my unusual hobby and took the photo of me and Sarah next to the hive.

THANK YOU DARLING!

Kathryn also has pointed out the spelling mistakes on here as so I can correct them.

One of my frames from the brood box sitting on a frame rest while I look for the queen and to allow me to take photos of it. Frame rests are great, allowing you to take photos and do things you need both hands for.

An adult Drone bee (the male bee) note the huge eyes that almost touch each other. These help the Drone find a Virgin Queen which is on her maiden flight in order that between 10 and 15 Drones will find and mate with her before returning to the hive to start egg laying. The Queen will never need to mate again before she dies at about 4 years of age.

This is where people I know or people just interested in bees and beekeeping can follow me in me during my learning curve into becoming (hopefully a successful beekeeper).

This is a work in progress site so please be patient as I'm updating it as I go along.

I bought my bees the same week my dad died which gave me something to keep me from thinking too much about it, of course I still thought about my dad but it helped me from overthinking about it. I was glad of the distraction.

My dad was very keen on me becoming a beekeeper to the point he insisted on paying half the cost of the bees and was very much looking forward to visiting my hive with me. Sadly this was not to be.

Apparently my dad thought about becoming a beekeeper when he was a young man, then he met my mum and the rest is history.
 

I went to collect my bees from Mike the Bee Man near Castle Douglas along with my son Andrew who was a fantastic help as with everything that was going on with my dad at the time I still hadn't finished getting the site for my bees fully ready.

Andrew is a big lad and has hands like bulldozers and super human strength so he basically prepared the site in about an hour once we arrived back with the bees.

Thanks Andrew.

My bees - My bees are a very rare bee which were the native bee to Scotland which were thought to have vanished from our planet back in the 1930s however a colony was discovered in the roof space of a old church in Northumbria in 2009 and I along with about 40 other beekeepers are helping to reintroduce it back into the UK.

The bees I now keep are The British Black Bee and as I’m helping to reintroduce this bee back into the UK I may be able to get some funding from the Scottish Office, wish me luck with that.

My partner Kathryn and I have a little girl Sarah who will soon be 3 years old so Kathryn was not too keen on me keeping my bees in our garden with Sarah playing in the garden. We have also just got a new puppy, Storm an Alaskan Malamute.

With this in mind I understand Kathryn's feelings as I would not want to put Sarah in any danger while playing in our garden. 

So I approached a local farmer to ask his permission to keep a hive or two on his land, he was very happy for me to do so. 

I now keep my bees on land owned by John Sinclair who owns a family run farm, Craigies farm shop and deli just off the Burnshot Road on the outskirts of Kirkliston where we live.

If you have not yet visited Craigies it is really worth a visit and a great place to take the kids - they will love the outdoor play area as well as the activites for children. 

The hive is about 3 miles away from our house and is protected by about 30,000 bees.

As I also work in the security sector my hive is protected from theft (yes people steal bee hives) by Smartwater. I have also branded Hatton Bees on each separate section on the inside and onto several places on the outside of the hive.

Call me paranoid but if that wasn't enough I have also marked every piece with paint that only shows up under ultra-violet light.

Some family members laughed at me for doing this until someone stole the water bottle I had next to the hive so the bees didn't need to fly too far if they needed a drink.

7 poor wee bees gave up their lives trying to protect the bottle from being stolen.

So it just shows you if it's not nailed down some bugger will pinch it and if it's nailed down don't be surprised if they pinch the nails as well.