Doing Life With…: Bee Keeping Started As a Hobby For Fauzziyah Isiak But It’s Now Something More

Doing Existence With… is a BellaNaija Aspects sequence that aims to showcase how persons are living, working, travelling, journalling, caring for their families and… the whole lot in between. We fair to yarn the lives of all americans and make certain all americans is properly-represented at BN through storytelling.

Final week, we had a conversation with Olanike Okunlola. Did you leave out it? Read it right here.

This day, we are doing lifestyles with Fauzziyah Isiak, a bee keeper and founder of Fauzziyah’s Honey. She gives us a breakdown of extract honey and the qualities of appropriate honey. Dig in!

Hi Fauzziyah. How are you doing?

Hi. I am good enough and properly.

Abundant! Expose us about your self 

I’m a creator and beekeeper. I’m conservative, more in most cases than no longer. I read, peer movies, or work in the backyard for stress-free. I revel in making things with my hands, like place-it-yourself drinks or soaps. I am consistently easy and proper.

Truly cool. Give us a peep into your background

I am from Abeokuta, Ogun Enlighten. I was born and raised in Lagos. My most attention-grabbing childhood memory is when my dad helped me harvest the groundnut I planted at our location. It used to be a bucket stout when harvested. I was 9 years primitive and my dad used to be so proud of me.

Aww, that will deserve to contain made you might well presumably well be feeling so appropriate

Ha, it did o.

So, why beekeeping? 

Beekeeping is a ardour for me.

Hol’ up, leisure pursuits are like singing, chilling… you know, something soft 

Haha, I quit two jobs to point of interest on beekeeping.

So, no longer a ardour nevertheless a profession?

Reality is, I’ll aloof call it a ardour because I revel in doing it. It doesn’t if truth be told feel like work. I began beekeeping because I cherish agriculture. I was into poultry and crop farming at the time, and since I wished to discover something with a low mortality price, so I went into beekeeping. This technique, I also discover to assist the world and my atmosphere quit alive when I present refuge for bees.

Pretty bright. Gallop us throughout the strategy of extracting honey from bees

I attach on a bee swimsuit for security, then I harvest the honey with a knife. After harvesting, I spend an extractor to rob the honey out from the comb and I equipment it as I harvest it. I promote the honey uncooked and unprocessed.

So this honey is no longer diluted

No, it’s 100% current.

How in most cases discover you discover stung by the bees?

The bee swimsuit is no longer 100% stringproof so I discover stung almost every time I am going to a beehive. There are over 20,000 bees in one beehive/colony so one or two of them might presumably enter my clothes. The stings weaken me most frequently, nevertheless I’m getting old to them and I revel in the hotfoot.

What discover bees delight in?

Honey is their major source of meals. Bees non-public honey from vegetation to allow them to thrill in it. Each time I harvest honey, I don’t rob your whole honey so I can leave some for the bees to thrill in.

That’s very attention-grabbing. What are your day-to-day actions like as a bee farmer?  

I leave the condo around 5 a.m. day-after-day to droop to the wooded space. Most of my work is handiest finished earlier than the sun comes up. Each time I am no longer on the area, I peer a movie or work on a writing venture. I also read plenty. I cherish intensive finding out on any area. Moreover, nothing is as attention-grabbing as movies and meals. I cherish appropriate meals. I delight in every appropriate delicacy in Nigeria. My most as a lot as the moment popular song is “Lonely at the Top” by Àṣàkẹ́.

Let’s discuss the challenges you face running this business 

My major area is insecurity. There were hundreds of theft and destruction of hives in the previous one year. This makes me very jumpy to divulge the placement of my apiary.

One gorgeous or loopy memory you might well presumably under no circumstances neglect all the procedure in which through your work?

I can’t neglect one time a bee stung me in my vein and I almost handed out because the venom went into my bloodstream. I sat appropriate down to discover consciousness as other bees hovered above me to sting me. I believed I was going to die in the wooded space because I went on my own that day. After my eyes cleared, I laughed stressful with sizzling tears in my eyes. I will under no circumstances neglect that day because the sting fashioned a darkish scar on my hand.

Ouch! Sorry about that

Thanks. I correct remind myself that I cherish doing this and nothing can deter me.

Attention-grabbing perspective! One bright ingredient about bees you’ve observed for your farm? 

Now now not all bees sting. Some bees discover no longer contain the flexibility to sting, even when they are now not current in Nigeria. One ingredient that fascinates me about bees is how they explain through dancing.

Bees… dance?

Haha, bees discover a circle and then discover a waggle dance to discuss.

Wow, so cool. Let’s discuss honey and how americans can differentiate the distinctive from the mistaken

The major ingredient americans contain to understand is that there are over 300 kinds of honey they in most cases’ve different taste, colours and textures. The excellent system to understand the distinctive honey is to habits a lab take a look at or to buy from a depended on source, most especially from a beekeeper.

Smartly, it might well truly be stressful to understand a depended on source

True, nevertheless they exist.

One ingredient that makes you proud of your self?

I can shield the honey I promote anywhere. I am very sure about what I discover.

One lifestyles motivationmthat retains you going?

With ardour, you might well presumably conquer the world. One ingredient that retains me going is that this might occasionally consistently determine as soon as I contain ardour for it. As soon as I lose ardour in something, I quit doing it.

Thanks for being on Doing Existence With…, Fauzziyah

Thanks for having me, BellaNaija.

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Many thanks to Fauzziyah for having this conversation with us. Enact you cherish this divulge, contain any solutions for us, desire to be a BellaNaija Aspects contributor or desire to be featured on Doing Existence With…? We’d cherish to hear from you. Shoot us an electronic mail: [email protected]

Be a part of us on Saturday for the following episode!