About Us

We are a small family owned and operated farm with horses, chickens, and of course honey bees.  We are located in a small rural area known as McGee's Crossroads about 25 miles south of Raleigh, North Carolina in Johnston County.  Our family has been here for 5 generations (with a sixth hoping to take over some day) and we love to play in the dirt, smell the new mown fields, and care for our animals.  We became interested in the bees when we noticed one year there had been not a single honey bee in any of our flowers nor on any of our fruit trees.  We were afraid they had been killed by nearby spraying or had just gone the way of many of the birds, and even the frogs, that were becoming more scarce on our land every season.  We knew it could not be anything we had done, as we no longer grow crops nor need to use pesticides, but whatever the cause, all the bees had disappeared. So we decided to help them out and bring them back,  if we could, and from that was born our love of bees and our passion to keep them alive and well and active.  We don't consider ourselves farmers.  We are caretakers ... of the land and the animals.  In return they provide us with endless hours of fascination ...  and good things to eat, as well!

I am Keith O. Noles and my wife is Sharon.    We are Journeyman certified beekeepers and have many years of experience in the field.  Even so, the bees are always teaching us new things about how they operate and produce their honey.

Swarm Removal:l

We are  happy to remove external swarms for you within 25 miles of our home location here in Johnston County (see the map on our "contact us" page).  Call us if you see a large swarm and let us know where you are.  Do it QUICKLY, though, because honey bees do not stay exposed for very long and will either fly away or enter a nearby structure where they will setup home making it MUCH harder to remove them.  If they are already in the walls of your home you will need to call a builder as some demolition and repair will be required.

We do not remove wasps or hornets.  They are mean critters!   You will need to call an exterminator for that job!

How to tell if you have honey bees  ... or something else:

Honey bees are round and fat looking but wasps and hornets have a very slim waist and a longer thinner body.  Honey bees are FUZZY and look like they are covered with hair on their "chest" (because they are!).  Wasps and hornets are hard and shiny.  Honey bees can only sting once and then die, but wasps and hornets can sting many times.  Bees cluster in groups when they swarm and although they may hang on a branch or under the eaves of a building, they do not often build combs there.  Paper wasps build the familiar plate-shaped paper nests under your eaves.  Hornets build large egg-shaped paper nests in trees and bushes. Yellow jackets are wasps and will nest in the ground. They eat meat and will attack  bee hives to eat the baby bees.  They are attracted to picnics and are real pests whereas honey bees would rather have flower nectar. Wasps and hornets can be almost the same colors as honey bees and it is important to know the other differences so you can tell them apart.  Call us if you know you have honey bees and perhaps we can save them and give them a good home!  Our number is 919-902-2114.

Above is a honey bee swarm.  They conveniently gathered in the mass you see (it's all bees!) on a low hanging branch where it was easy to photograph and remove them.