Logan has taught himself to ‘graft’ queen bees to breed his own hives. He has had mixed success but knows the skill will be perfected with practice.
As far as beekeepers go, Logan Kempinski has surpassed all challenges nature has served up, slowly nurturing his bee business.
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But there is one last frontier that only time can fix.
“I can’t really have any more hives until I turn 18 and get my own driver’s licence,” 15-year-old Logan said.
“Mum and Dad spend enough time getting me to the seven or eight properties my hives are on and that’s pretty much the limit.
“I simply have to wait before I can grow it any further.”
However, Logan will not be spending the next 26 months with idle hands, as he spends every spare hour nurturing and building up his 90 hives.
Logan’s mother Ros said that Logan was ‘quite vigilant’ with how he managed his hives.
“He is constantly researching stuff to improve his production,” she says from the family’s sprawling Mooroopna garden that is ringed by peaceful hives.
“The persistence and determination that he has to succeed is far more worthwhile to us than the cost to his hobby.
“He’s such a quiet achiever that he doesn’t let on at school, but at TAFE they absolutely love him and his bee stories.”
Logan sees the cost involved in his business as a worthwhile reinvestment in a passion that will be a lifelong vocation.
“Nothing’s cheap in beekeeping and when some queen bees that I bought died, I taught myself how to breed my own,” he said.
“I am not yet confident with saying I am a queen breeder but that will come.”
Logan has been busy with developing hive nuclei — known as ‘nucs’ — to sell during the year as well as being responsible with regular testing of his brood for the invasive varroa mite.
“If we do get varroa here in Victoria, it will be pretty terrible.
“You need to be vigilant.”
Varroa mites infest hives by laying eggs inside bee larvae on which they feed after hatching, and weaken adult bees by devouring their body fat.
“I also number all my frames and make sure I put them back in the correct order to also prevent American foul brood, which I haven’t had.”
As Logan waits to reach his 18th birthday, he is focusing on selling more nucs to other beekeepers and providing pollinating hives to orchardists, while 700kg of honey awaits bottling in the family kitchen.
Last year’s floods in Victoria had a significant impact on Logan’s business for which he has hives relying on both native trees and orchards.
“Last year was disappointing because of there being too much rain so trees did not flower enough.
“And kiwi fruit farms were flooded so my hives for pollinating them dropped from 50 down to 20.
“There was enough pollen from the kiwi fruit flowers but not enough nectar.”
Logan is not without his sense of humour as he bats away each challenge nature brings.
“Do I name all of them?” he asks with a broad grin.
“I have 90 hives of about 60,000 each.
“That’s a lot of pets.
“And I don’t name them all because if I did, I’d forget them all soon after anyway.
“And because they only live for six weeks, I’d have to go rename all their replacements.”
Logan is very diligent with checking his hives for their overall health. Breeding new queens can help a hive become more placid. "Sometimes it works, but you can come back next time and they could still be angry," he said.
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