Flow Hives Book of Bees & Beekeeping by Cedar and Stuart Anderson

For full disclosure, I was very excited to get my hands on this book, as my wife and I have had beehives and are fully aware of the many potential pitfalls of keeping bees. This is offset by the real pleasure and satisfaction of looking after the hives and, of course, collecting and eating the honey.

Oh, how I wish we had this book then. It covers every aspect of beekeeping. From the time you get your very first hive, your bees and most importantly, your Queen Bee and how important she is to the success of the process. There are even honey recipes that sound delicious and well worth exploring.

The writing is wonderfully engaging, and it almost feels like you are having a conversation with this father-and-son team, who seem to anticipate any questions you may have. The information provided is encyclopaedic, with such a depth of knowledge being passed on to the reader. The illustrations are clear, colourful and plentiful.

Behind all of this, they also tell their inspirational story of how Flow Hive was launched and went on to sell 130,000 units across 130 countries. The history from the early days of development through to now is fascinating and well worth knowing. Through trial and error and looking at many alternatives to arrive at where they are saves the budding beekeeper an awful lot of time and pain. We were on the cusp of getting more hives, and this has convinced us.

Reviewer: Chris Casey

Murdoch Books