Dominican University’s first two bee hives arrived in spring 2015 and has since expanded to four hives, or roughly 200,000 honey bees. A few weeks ago, at the beginning of August, the university harvested about 60 pounds of honey and plans to expand its educational beekeeping opportunities.
The university’s four hives, which are managed by student workers, in collaboration with faculty, are used in classes and research projects in a variety of disciplines, including environmental science, biology and chemistry but also political science, business and, soon, nutrition.
“The hives are healthy. There are plenty of bees,” Tama Weisman, an associate professor of philosophy at Dominican, who helps maintain the hives, said Aug. 28. “We don’t have any diseases. They are strong, healthy colonies.”
Aside from straightforward environmental and natural science applications, some students have worked on designing labels for honey jars. Other students in political science courses study hive dynamics, such as how a colony makes decisions.
But Dominican’s beekeeping project may change, depending on what the River Forest Sustainability Commission recommends, if anything, to the River Forest Village Board in the coming weeks. At its June 12 meeting, the board tasked the commission with researching regulation of non-domesticated animals, including bees.
The Sustainability Commission discussed a possible draft ordinance, including limiting the number of hives and beekeeping permits, at its Aug. 8 meeting. They plan to meet again Sept. 12. A few residents at the Aug. 8 meeting argued against any ordinance, questioning what problem it would solve. Others, including Scott Kreher, an assistant professor of biology at Dominican, tried to recommend language in the ordinance.
“We have a larger area than most houses,” Kreher said, referring to the university’s campus. “We have security, we also have a camera on the bee yard. We have certain things in place that would I think allow us to manage that larger number of hives and bees. Maybe treating everything the same is not the best approach.”
The draft ordinance also reportedly includes an annual permitting process, inspections by a village employee and an opt-out for neighbors adjacent to proposed hives who have allergic reactions to bee stings.
Weisman, and her colleague Ellen McManus, a Dominican English professor, said they are not against an ordinance but maintained it should be “reasonable” and treat beekeepers less as a danger to be regulated and more as an educational and community benefit.
“Many of us reading it get this feeling that it seems unnecessarily punitive or framing beekeepers doing something undesirable that was going to be tolerated,” McManus said at the Aug. 8 meeting. “Beekeeping is not just a hobby; it is a service to the community. It is a service in at least two ways. It provides pollination for the beautiful landscaping that people have. And it also educates. It makes people aware of the nature of an ecosystem.”
McManus later acknowledged it was clear whoever drafted the ordinance had done extensive research and understood beekeeping terminology and procedures.
Some regulations, McManus said, are helpful, like processes for eradicating diseases. That’s something the state of Illinois already does, Weisman added. Other aspects of the ordinance, like a limit on hives makes less sense, they said.
At the Aug. 8 meeting, commission members did acknowledge Dominican would be in violation if the draft, which limits the number of hives to two, is adopted.
Commission member Sue Crothers said. “I really just couldn’t figure out wrapping my head around making that fair. Other beekeepers may want to say, ‘How come they can have four and we can only have two?'”
Crothers did suggest possibly “grandfathering” Dominican’s setup into the ordinance, but McManus said Aug. 28 there could be issues later on. For instance, if a colony withers or dies, would that mean Dominican couldn’t reconstitute the hives and get back up to four? Or if there was an educational opportunity that necessitates expanding the number of hives, would that be possible?
Hive comparisons, McManus said, are beneficial to students, who can study differences between colonies and results of, for instance, honey harvests.
A hive of bees sometimes becomes too large and unsustainable, and can initiate a so-called “swarm,” where a slice of the hive population goes off in search of a new home. If a beekeeper forecasts a possible swarm, they can take steps to build another hive structure and accommodate the expanding population. The ordinance’s limit of two hives, however, would prevent that.
Both Weisman and McManus acknowledged fears of allergic reactions are real but added geographic restrictions can only do some much. Honeybees, for instance, typically forage for food in a three-mile radius, which could mean bees from outside River Forest end up in the village.
The pair added that honeybees — which are not wasps or yellowjackets — are not aggressive and usually only sting when provoked or feeling threatened.