A Slovenian apiculture enthusiast has claimed beekeeping is “a diagnosis” as she emphasised the numerous positive aspects of the activity.
Beekeeping has a long tradition in the family of Andreja Stankovič from the town of Novo Mesto in southeastern Slovenia.
Speaking to Der Standard, an Austrian newspaper, Andreja said her great-grandfather always took a nap in the wooden shed where he had kept his hives whenever he felt unwell.
Meanwhile, Andreja’s mum used to ask the other family members for nothing else but to talk about anything but bees for once at the dinner table.
Andreja, who is in charge of 39 hives, explained with a smile: “Beekeeping is a diagnosis. I don’t need to do any yoga. I got my bees.”
The 64-year-old honey farm manager said her daughter Tjaša became her family’s sixth-generation apiarist by installing a few hives on her balcony.
Around 11,000 of the 2.1 million residents of Slovenia engage in beekeeping. No other European Union member state has a higher per capita ratio in this regard. There are more than 200 regional apiculture associations all over Slovenia.
The Carniolan honeybee (Apis mellifera carnica), which is a subspecies of the domesticated western honeybee (Apis mellifera), is the prevalent pollinator species in the small country which borders Austria, Hungary, Croatia and Italy. The bee type is popular among apiarists for being gentle and physically robust.
In recent years, Slovenian tourism officials have increasingly focused on establishing a prosperous bee-themed travel branch which features various honeybee-related features such as apitherapy and staying in hive-shaped lodgings.
