Independence man follows family bees-ness

At age 50, Les Miller is living his second childhood.

“I just play with bugs,” he said Thursday afternoon in his western Independence backyard, a big grin stretched across his face.

Near the corner of 14th Street and Northern Boulevard, not too far from the Englewood Post Office, stands a modest white house with a porch swing.

But in the yard is one man’s life, his way of living, as a hobby and financially speaking.

Millions of bees call Les Miller’s residence of 27 years “home.”

–––

Having bees is a lifelong dream for Les, he says. His father had bees when Les was about 8 years old.

“I’d get out there and kind of get in the way whenever he was working on them – or even if he wasn’t,” Les says, laughing, about growing up on Sterling Avenue in Sugar Creek.

Fear of the insect wasn’t an option for Les. Again, he laughs at his childhood memories.

“I had five sisters, and it was more like I’d get critters and stuff to see what kind of reaction I could get out of them,” Les says. “I had a tarantula when I was about 11 – a great big, hairy, brown tarantula.”

He’s raised butterflies since the second grade. Nature “was just kind of my knack,” Les says, adding that he always did better in science courses, especially biology, than history and English in high school.

“My teacher actually accused me of teaching,” he recalls. “He said, ‘You’re using your sister Toni’s notes,’ but she learned everything she knew from me.”

But Les didn’t study entomology or biology in higher education. Instead, he worked as a mechanic for several decades. Today, Les sells his honey at Independence Farmers Market on Saturdays and at BADSEED Farmers Market in Kansas City. He has the proper state licensing and is a member of AgriMissouri.

The bees are his full-time job. “No, I’m just tired,” Les replies as to whether he’s retired.

–––

So, how does one go about starting a bee farm, especially in a semi-urban environment?

Les Miller did things his own way. He read up on bee farms for more than a year.

Inspiration also came in the most unlikely of places.

One winter, he was chopping wood for his fireplace, and upon splitting a chunk of wood in half, he discovered an ant farm.

“I thought, ‘I’m going to save these,’ because it was real cold, and they could barely move,” Les says. “I picked every single ant up, put them in a jar, and I kept those for about a year.”

He fed the ants honey in the wintertime, since other insects were scarce.

Then, one spring, he walked outside, barefoot, and stepped on a bee.

“My back stopped hurting for three months,” Les says, smiling. Bee sting therapy is a well-known yet sometimes controversial treatment for multiple sclerosis.

Life as a car mechanic had taken its toll. Les had gotten so sick he couldn’t pick up a glass of water. In his late 30s, he had severe arthritis. Breathing in multiple chemicals daily, along with the repetitive nature of a mechanic’s work, was placing stress on his body.

That was in 1999. He tried to get bees the same year, “but it’s hard to get bees,” Les says. “They won’t just sell them to you, especially if it’s late in the year.”

They don’t just show up, he says. You can either catch a swarm or buy bees from an actual beekeeper. There’s also the option of extracting bees from a wall or a tree.

Beekeeping also is a lot of trial and error. In one group of bees that Les is selling to someone else, he tried and failed twice this year in getting them established, but he thinks they’re finally setting up.

“If you’re afraid of failure, whatever you do, don’t become a beekeeper,” Les says. “That’s the nature of farming.”

The spring of 2000 proved more successful. Les got his first hive from Osage Honey Farm in Sibley, and the second hive came from Kansas.

But the first hive died on him throughout the winter. Eventually, some lived, and now, Les builds a lot of his own beekeeper boxes, which form a horseshoe shape around his backyard.

Les Miller doesn’t look the part of a beekeeper. Instead of wearing the usual white garb and face protection, on Thursday afternoon, Les was barefoot and wore a gray T-shirt and jean shorts. Sometimes, he adds, he’ll work without a shirt on.

And, he’ll go an entire day, working among hundreds of thousands of bees, and not get stung.

–––

Les estimates that his property contains between 4 million and 5 million bees, their gentle buzzing sound evident on Thursday afternoon. His neighbors’ thoughts on the bees are mixed, Les says.

“Oh, some of them are fascinated,” he says, “and other ones don’t care for them because they’re scary.”

But scary to Les? Nah. He did get stung a few days ago, however. He was in a hurry, “goofing around and banging around,” and one got him. He gets stung on the tips of his fingers often because he doesn’t wear gloves when pulling out the combs.

It doesn’t bother Les now, but he once was allergic to bees.

They do know and recognize Les. He credits them as being “really intelligent,” adding, “a lot more than people.”

“I don’t know if you’d call it trust, but I guess it’s more familiarity,” Les says. “I guess I’m one of the hive. ‘Don’t worry about him – he’s one of us.’”

–––

Near the back of Les’ house sits a stainless steel bucket filled with water. Bees swarm around the bucket, drinking between 3 to 4 gallons of water daily.

The bees also take water droplets back to their hives and then fan their wings. As the water evaporates, it cools off the insect, Les says, adding that the bees keep their hives at 95 degrees year-round, regardless of the outside temperature.

They seem active on Thursday afternoon, but Les says the bees aren’t really doing much work. It’s too hot, too dry.

“When they’re active, you’ll know it,” he says, pointing to a space in his yard where the trees part and the sky is visible. “There will just be clouds of bees. They take off and go straight up.”

Just one good day of a soaking rain, and they’d be happy, Les says.

“There’d be 10 times as many of them coming out of there,” he says.

They’re still out in the wintertime, too.

“They’re wild animals, so you really leave them alone,” Les says. “I just kind of leave them to their own devices, and what makes it, makes it, and what doesn’t, well, they didn’t make it.”

Les Miller finally made it with his bee farm dreams, but his father died in 1995 and never got to see Les’ dream come to fruition.

But he still uses his dad’s old bee smoker, which Les thinks was bought before he was even born.

“He missed it, but he kept bees,” Les says of his father, “so, he’d probably be real interested in everything I’m doing. I guess I’m carrying on the Miller orneriness.”