Members of the Appalachian Beekeeping Collective inspect one of their apiaries. The collective teaches displaced coal miners in West Virginia how to keep bees as a way to supplement their income.
Credit: Kevin Johnson
Just like his grandfather and father before him, James Scyphers spent almost two decades mining coal in West Virginia.
“These were the best jobs in the area; we depended on ’em,” he recalls.
But mining jobs started disappearing, declining from 132,000 in 1990 to 53,000 in 2018, devastating the area’s economy. In a state that now has the lowest labor-force participation rate in the nation, the long-term decline of coal mining has left West Virginia residents without new options to make a living.
Scyphers was fortunate to find a construction job, but it paid two-thirds less than what he earned underground. He often took odd jobs to make ends meet. One of those odd jobs included building hives and tending bees for the Appalachian Beekeeping Collective.
“I wish this group had been here 30 years ago,” he says. “Our region needs it.”
This is a very proud vocation to be in. It saves the most precious species which we depend upon for our crops to be pollinated and our food to be sustained. I would be proud to do bee keeping and have even thought of doing it myself.