A duo from Detroit have taken action in combating the neighborhood blight by transforming ugly abandoned vacant lots in their city into honeybee sanctuaries.
In 2017 the nonprofit organization “Detroit Hives” was founded by Timothy Paule and Nicole Lindsey. The organization purchases vacant properties and remodels them into fully functional bee farms.
Paule explains:
These properties are left abandoned and serve as a dumping ground in most cases. The area can be a breeding ground for environmental hazards, which creates a stigma around the city.
Paule is a photographer and Lindsey is a staff member for the health care provider Henry Ford OptimEyes. The couple had been dating for sometime before they decided to launch the nonprofit. It wasn’t until Paule had a cold that he couldn’t get rid of that the inspiration to make Detroit Hives came to life. “I went to the local market that I normally go to, and he suggested that I try some local honey for my cough. He said you consume local honey because it has medicinal properties,” Paule said.
When he started to feel better, the couple realized how urban blight might have contributed to the allergies due to overgrown ragweed in abandoned areas. That’s when Detroit Hives was born, by joining these two factors together – producing local honey and erasing urban blight.
Paule and Lindsey became certified beekeepers by taking two courses at Green Toe Gardens and Keep Growing Detroit. They also wanted to educate the community about bees so these courses were quite necessary.
Paule said:
We want to educate people about bees and spread the knowledge of medicinal properties of honey, and to preserve the bee population, all while removing blight.
The duo purchased their first vacant space for only $340 with the help of the Detroit Land Bank Authority, which is an agency that works to redevelop abandoned properties. “The land bank offers a community partnership program for nonprofits and faith-based organizations to purchase structures or vacant land from the land bank to put back to productive use. We encourage them to bring their visions and their proposals to the land bank so that we can give them access to land to implement them,” said Darnell Adams, director of inventory at the land bank. Detroit Hives currently owns one farm, but they plan to expand to more in the future.
“Work hard, stay bumble” – Detroit Hives
The nonprofit spreads awareness about bees by hosting public tours of the farm and traveling to schools in the Detroit area to speak with students. “It was a little hard at first because most high-schoolers are afraid of bees or they really don’t care. So I had to find a unique way to introduce bees to them. One thing they found intriguing is how each honeybee had a unique job,” said Paule.
Additionally, Detroit Hives sells honey to the public and to local vendors that use it to create products such as handcrafted beer and sauces. On top of it all, they’ve even created an emoji sticker app called Bee Moji.
Lindsey explains how the local community love the bee farm:
The neighbors love it. They say they wish we were there 10, 20 years ago. That area has always been a place where people dump trash, so when we came there, we gave that area a sense of purpose. The neighbors keep an eye on the area to make sure that people aren’t dumping anymore.
Detroit Hives’ motto is “Work Hard, Stay Bumble,” which is fitting for the city because they know all about perseverance. Paul said that bees work really hard while staying humble and if people act the same in Detroit, it will take them very far. Actually, people all around the world should follow this way of thinking.
Check out the video below for an inside look at Detroit Hives.
