East of Scotland Beekeepers

East of Scotland Beekeepers Association - Beginners Course 2026

(photo above: four beginners on their first day at the bees, performing 'nucleus splits' on colonies preparing to swarm)

** payment for the course is outside of this booking system - see details later **

** here we collect your details and intentions **

Welcome to the booking site for our Beginners Course in 2026!

Here we will collect your details, lay out our plans, and indicate how you can see our four recorded lessons, our freshly updated slides for each session and come to our Saturday morning discussion meetings to go through all the issues for that session. Each of our four sessions covers some of the important aspects required to get going in beekeeping and participants appreciate the informal, interactive and highly experienced tuition on offer. We will then take you to handle bees in small groups and give you support for your continuing beekeeping education.

Interested? Pop your details in the forms below and you'll be on our list. We'll tell you how to pay our modest fee to secure a place on our course. £47 for non-members (includes our association membership fee and access to all our events this year) or £35 for those who are already ESBA members.

We will make available our recorded lessons and the slides for the sessions about a week before we meet. The informal discussion sessions around each set of topics will be held on Saturday mornings in the Tayside Deaf Hub in central Dundee. This approach is greatly appreciated by participants, with these informal sessions led by an expert beekeeper plus additional home learning prior to the day. You can keep the slides and videos for reference but the best experience is gained by taking part in the discussion sessions. We often have people in the class who are already beginner beekeepers and their perspective is helpful to those about to take the plunge.

Who is this course for? Prospective beekeepers in our area and also for those who have started beekeeping and want to improve their knowledge and skills. We don't hide the difficulties of managing bees successfully and regard it as a success if some people decide not to proceed with beekeeping for now. However we do offer you excellent advice and continuing support if you need it.

What area does ESBA cover? We are the long-established beekeeping association covering east Perthshire, Dundee and Angus. You will be invited to visit apiaries from Errol to Arbroath. We also have members from some areas of Fife and we have trained beekeepers from Aberdeenshire to the Lothians.

What is good about this course? It is for people keeping bees in our area, along with all its challenges. The course has continually evolved over the 15 years or so we've been delivering it. We cover such issues as queen failures and what to do about them (where else can you find out about that?!), local bee forage and local honeys, disease risks in our area, plus swarm control methods that actually work and are based on knowing what the bees are trying to do.

Indoor sessions:

Saturday 28th February 10:00-12:00: Introduction to beekeeping; equipment; setting up an apiary; costs commitments and risks; obtaining bees and advice. Queens 1 - what can go wrong?

Saturday 7th March 10:00-12:00: The annual cycle; critical points; honey bee biology; Queens 2 - fixing problems.

Saturday 14th March 10:00-12:00: How to approach a hive; beekeeping issues; swarms and swarm control; Queens 3 - managing changes.

Saturday 21th March 10:00-12:00: Pests, diseases and veterinary medicines; honey harvesting and processing; Queens 4 - making your beekeeping resilient.

Provisional dates for hands-on apiary visits:

(small group visits, numbers will be restricted. Dates, when offered, are provisional and are very weather-dependent. Suits and gloves can be provided. Booking opportunities will be offered nearer the time.)

Saturday in May 14:00-16:00: Introduction to the bees at the apiary run by the course leader near Errol. Possible early swarm control.

Saturday or Sunday later in May: Additional opportunities to see other beekeepers and participate in swarm control.

Saturday or Sunday in June: Additional opportunities to see other beekeepers and participate in swarm control.

Erica handling, marking and clipping a queen on her first day at the bees. Be more Erica! Join our course with the ESBA.

What you should expect to have achieved at the end of the course:

• an appreciation of the costs, the difficulties and the delights of beekeeping
• an understanding of how beekeeping changes through the seasons, and how your management has to adjust to follow that
• an understanding of what the bees are trying to do when they swarm, of your responsibilities to your neighbours, and what you can do to prevent swarming. Usually.
• an appreciation of the honeys the bees collect and how you need to extract and prepare them
• an understanding of the diseases and pests that might be found locally and what you can do to avoid, treat, manage and report them.
• who to turn to when you meet some situation you don't understand (and you will!)
• sourcing of bees and how to do this without risking importing new diseases (we preach sustainable behaviours)

All this for just £47! (or £35 if already an ESBA member) We ask you to pay separately and use this Corsizio page to tell us that you wish to join our Beginners Course.