Hundreds of thousands of bees buzz around the BPRC grounds

Between the green hedges at the back of the BPRC grounds, beekeeper Maarten calmly walks from one beehive to another. While thousands of honeybees fly back and forth, he effortlessly lifts a frame full of buzzing insects. Speaking calmly, he points out glistening honeycombs, fresh pollen, and bees busy sealing certain openings with “propolis.” For him, it is all part of everyday life. “I could talk about this for hours,” he says with a laugh. “Yes, I’m definitely a bee nerd.”

That turns out to be no exaggeration. As soon as Maarten starts talking about bees, bumblebees, queens, honey, or insect behavior, one story naturally follows another. On the BPRC grounds, he manages several bee colonies. A single large hive can house as many as 40,000 to 50,000 bees. In total, a few hundred thousand honeybees are flying around the research institute’s grounds.

Yet the area appears surprisingly calm. The bees come and go along the tall hedges, disappear among the trees further away, or settle among the wildflowers growing in the grass. Afterward, they return to their hive. According to Maarten, honeybees are generally gentle by nature. “Besides, they’re not bothering anyone here,” he explains. “And likewise, no one can really disturb the bees.”

A paradise for bees

He carefully chooses the locations for his hives. Using Google Maps, he searches for green, sheltered areas with plenty of food sources nearby. The BPRC grounds turned out to be almost ideal. “When I arrived here, it turned out to be even greener than I had expected.” The long hedges in particular make it a paradise for bees. “Once those are fully in bloom again, the bees will have an enormous amount of food available here.”

Maarten’s fascination with buzzing insects began at an early age. He grew up in the Dutch polder landscape and spent countless hours outdoors as a child. “I was always playing around ditches and looking at insects,” he recalls. Small animals especially captured his attention. “I always found little creatures fascinating.”

Later, his focus shifted toward sports. He became an avid trail runner, participated in off-road triathlons, and spent hours running through nature reserves. At the same time, he became increasingly interested in healthy nutrition and natural products. “I used to make my own sports gels from organic honey,” he says enthusiastically. During that period, the idea of becoming a beekeeper gradually started to take shape. When back problems developed, those plans accelerated. “I always said that if I ever couldn’t run anymore, I’d become a beekeeper and start a large vegetable garden.”

Royal jelly

When Maarten opens a hive, it immediately becomes clear what attracts him so much to beekeeping. He is fascinated by everything that happens within a bee colony. Tens of thousands of bees live together in a single hive, yet each bee seems to know exactly what it has to do. Throughout their lives, the insects continuously take on different roles within the colony. “People often think only about honey,” he says, “but what happens inside a hive is much more complex than that.”

According to him, honey is only a small part of what bees produce. Bees build entire combs from wax, protect their hive with propolis, care for larvae with royal jelly, and constantly communicate with one another. “Bees actually produce five useful products,” he explains. In addition to honey, they also produce beeswax, propolis, royal jelly, and bee venom. Each product has its own unique properties and applications.

Most people are familiar with beeswax through candles or skincare products. Bees produce the wax themselves through small glands in their bodies. They use it to build the well-known hexagonal honeycombs. Propolis is much less familiar. Bees use this resin-like substance to seal cracks and openings in their hive. “It has antiseptic properties,” he explains. The bees use it to protect their colony from fungi and bacteria.

It almost sounds like science fiction

Maarten harvests propolis himself using special mats placed on top of the hive. He then processes it into tinctures and experiments with a propolis ointment. “I’ve been working on product development for two years now,” he says with a laugh. “It’s actually quite complicated.”

Royal jelly also continues to fascinate him. It almost sounds like science fiction when he explains how a queen bee is created. A young queen goes on a mating flight and is fertilized high in the air by multiple drones. She then stores that sperm for the rest of her life. Even more remarkable is that exactly the same egg can develop into either an ordinary worker bee or a queen. The difference lies entirely in the food the larva receives. “We call that royal jelly,” he explains. “Apparently, it triggers something in the DNA that causes it to become a queen.”

Anyone who talks with Maarten quickly notices that his interest extends far beyond honeybees alone. At home, he also keeps mason bees and bumblebees. Special bee hotels hang in his garden where mason bees nest. They build small chambers from mud or leaves, filling them with pollen and eggs. He also regularly rescues bumblebee nests. He clearly enjoys the enormous differences between all these species. “People sometimes call me in a complete panic because they think they have a swarm of bees,” he says with a laugh. “And then it turns out to be bumblebees or mason bees.”

A stray bee

By now, Maarten hardly notices a stray bee in the house or the car anymore. He regularly discovers a bee in his bag at home or finds that one has flown indoors after he removes his beekeeping suit. His wife tends to experience these situations somewhat differently. “I’m not too concerned about one extra bee here or there,” he says with a laugh. “My wife finds that a little less pleasant.”

Still, his wife now understands his enthusiasm. After all, she also experienced his highly dedicated running years. “I probably spent even more time on that,” he says with a smile.

Meanwhile, he continues to discover new things. He experiments with selling honeycomb, processes propolis into tinctures and ointments, and explores ways to get even more out of a beehive. “If I’m already keeping them in a hive, I want to make full use of everything they have to offer,” he says.

At the same time, he emphasizes that beekeeping exists somewhere between nature and livestock farming. “I’m a farmer with bees. It’s not one hundred percent nature. But it comes very close.”