No one can tell you of the first time someone thought about collecting the honey from hives.
What we know is that this practice has been around for a very long time. Cave drawing s have been discovered by Archaeologist showing honey collection drawings. These caves were found in Africa and Spain's eastern regions. Archaeologists believe that the cave drawings were created in 7000BC. Some of the pictures that were discovered show people scooping honey out of rocks and trees but a few of them depict images of unstung people standing in swarms of honey bees These cave dwellers are believed by scientist to some how learned that smoke had an interesting affect on bees.
The earliest artificial bee hives were made out of pottery, clay vases and bowls, and trees were resembled by straw baskets, and rock crevices that the bees were drawn to in nature. Early beekeepers learned how to capture swarms of bees in these containers. Once the bees where trapped the bees made honey in the containers.
There is also evidence that many ancient civilizations such as the Myans were into beekeeping and honey production.
Aficionados of Roman history know that bees and honey played a role in the Roman culture. The Goddess Mellona, was the protector of the bees.
Honey bees were respected by the Greeks. On Mt. Olympus, the home of Zeus, the people sipped the sweet nectar (experts believe that the nectar that the Greeks referred to was honey). Greek mythology claims that bees were responsible for building Apollo's second temple. When he wrote his book, The History of Animals, Aristotle disclosed how flowers were located by bees.
In the period of time between the 1500's and 1851 was when beekeeping turned evolutionary. The 1500's were the first big change in beekeeping. It was during this time that guidelines were assembled about bee's lifestyle. Once beekeepers understood the way that bees lived, they then carefully cared for bees.
Adaptations to artificial hives started taking place. As beekeepers, agricultural enthusiast, and scientists yearned to learn more about the life cycle of bees, beekeepers looked for ways to design a hive that would allow them to easily see inside the hive.
An American, Lorenzo Langstroth, designed the first mobile bee hive.
By the time the 1850's got here the European California was introduced to honey bees. After California the honey bees were introduced to Oregon and Canada.
It is believed that in the United States there are over 210, 00 beekeepers. Collectively these beekeepers keep and maintain over three million active bee hives.
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