(Editor’s note: Nicole Cook serves as an environmental and agricultural faculty legal specialist with UMES. This information should not be considered legal or financial guidance for readers.)
Winter’s chill has many people dreaming of warmer days ahead: gentle winds, blooming gardens, and for prospective beekeepers, purchasing their first “nuc!”
Honeybees play a crucial role in supporting Maryland’s farming sector, and beekeeping operations that produce honey and beeswax while providing crop pollination services offer farmers an extra revenue stream.
However, due to their agricultural significance, Maryland enforces detailed regulations designed to protect honeybee populations, and state officials treat these requirements with utmost seriousness.
Breaking Maryland’s beekeeping regulations constitutes a misdemeanor offense.
Therefore, prospective beekeepers should familiarize themselves with Maryland’s legal requirements before purchasing their first colony.
Maryland’s Department of Agriculture oversees approval processes for bringing honeybee colonies into the state.
State law prohibits shipping or bringing any colony or previously used beekeeping equipment into Maryland without proper documentation from an authorized apiary inspector from the equipment’s or colony’s origin state.
Colonies or bees entering Maryland without required paperwork face quarantine in MDA-designated locations, and the department may eliminate them at the owner’s cost if they’re not removed within 24 hours of official notification.
All beekeepers must allow MDA access for colony inspections and register each colony within 30 days of acquisition, then annually by January 1st.
While inspection and registration services are provided free of charge, registration certificates cannot be transferred between owners.
Registration forms are available at http://mda.maryland.gov/plants-pests/Pages/apiary_inspection.aspx.
MDA inspections verify that honey processing facilities maintain cleanliness and sanitation standards, proper ventilation, adequate lighting with protective covers over food areas to prevent contamination.
Inspectors also confirm accessible water supplies for honey processing areas, and ensure honey houses are used exclusively for extracting, processing, packaging, or handling honey during extraction periods. External openings in extraction and packaging areas must have screens in good condition.
Each colony requires moveable frames that can be removed without damaging other combs, and honey extraction is limited to capped combs free of bee brood, larvae, wax moth, or small hive beetle contamination.
Transporting bee colonies through Maryland requires constant screening or covering, and vehicle operators must keep engines running continuously except during refueling to prevent bee agitation, unless bees are stored in refrigerated compartments maintained at 45 degrees Fahrenheit.
Vehicles carrying bees cannot travel more than one mile from interstate highways.
Beyond state regulations, beekeepers should research local county and municipal restrictions.
Frederick County’s zoning rules, for instance, mandate apiaries be positioned at least 10 feet from property boundaries, require on-site water sources to discourage bees from seeking water elsewhere, and require apiaries to be situated behind solid barriers at least six feet high that run parallel to property lines and extend 10 feet past the apiary in both directions.
Beekeepers employing workers must submit either a Certificate of Compliance with State Workmen’s Compensation Laws or provide MDA with workers’ compensation policy or binder numbers as insurance proof.
Additional information about Maryland’s beekeeping regulations and details about how beekeeping qualifies as an agricultural activity for reduced property tax assessments under Maryland’s Tax-Property Article can be found at https://www.agrisk.umd.edu by searching for “bee.”
