We all make mistakes. And if you think you don’t, you’re a liar, ignorant, delusional or all three.

In fact, if we’re honest with ourselves, we make lots of them, especially when we’re new at something.

It’s not whether you’ll make a mistake; it’s when. You can let it disillusion you, or you can learn from it. I choose the latter.

That’s why I started my beekeeping blog – to log all my errors and mistakes and learn from them.

You might even say this Blog of Blunders is my gateway to success.

My blog is called The Hive Mind. I called it that because of the obvious connection between bees, hives and working together as a team, and also as a nod to Star Trek, since I’m a hardcore fan.

The address is beehivemind.com because hivemind was taken.

Why a beekeeping blog

Why did I decide to do a blog in the first place?

First, my initial reason was as a place to keep my hive inspection logbook. Paper gets lost, and I wanted a platform that I could access from anywhere.

Second, I like new stuff, electronic stuff, social media stuff, etc., and I like learning about them. So why not combine them. In addition, I really need to have more than a passing knowledge about social media as part of my day job, and the blog provided me a way to learn more.

Third, I’ve never been real disciplined when it comes to keeping a journal. I knew my intensions were good to keep regular beekeeping notes and blog them regularly. I also knew my track record didn’t necessarily indicate future success. Frankly, I thought long periods of inactivity looked bad. Still do.

Fourth, even though I initially thought of this blog as a place to document my hive inspections, it turned out I was more interested in learning new things. I wanted to talk about that, too.

Yesterday also marks the first day I attached my name to my blog. Before, I was always simply “beehivemind.”

Why the change? Mostly because I’m going to a WordPress conference at the end of the October. I also signed up for an online blogging fundamentals workshop from WordPress’ Blogging University, both of which required a name.

Past blog subjects

As indicated, my blog soon became an eclectic mix of beekeeping subjects ranging from how my hives were doing on a particular inspection, to a book review, to how I dealt with finding out I was deathly allergic to bees.

My posts have been pretty varied.

They’ve also been pretty infrequent. The main reason is that I write for a living. By the time I get home, I’m all written out, and there are plenty of things I need to be doing around the house.

Subject and audience for future posts

I’d like to continue presenting a mix of materials that interest me as a relatively new beekeeper. The more I know, the more I have to learn. I suppose many other beekeepers – novice and experienced alike – are the same.

In addition to myself, this blog is for them.

Beekeeping is as much art as it is science. As such, there are multiple opinions on how to do any one thing, depending on who you ask. Personally, I like seeing different opinions and learning enough about them to pick the one I think will be most effective for my situation.

In return, I want to connect with other beekeepers to learn from their inevitable mistakes. If they’re anything like me, I’ll be learning LOTS from them.