beekeeper
Americannoun
noun
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Etymology
Origin of beekeeper
Explanation
A beekeeper is someone who manages bee hives and extracts honey. If you see a person wearing a white jumpsuit and a hat with a veil — and they're covered in buzzing insects — it's probably a beekeeper. If you want to get really fancy, you can call a beekeeper an apiarist. Beekeepers manage apiaries, or networks of honey bee hives. They care for the hives, making sure they are an ideal environment for the bees to live and make honey. It's also the beekeeper's job to carefully extract honeycomb without harming the bees. Many people keep bees as a hobby, yielding just a little bit of honey each year.
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
Funkhouser, a veteran commercial beekeeper, should have around 1,200 hives under his care.
From Barron's ● May 19, 2026
There are even bees and a beekeeper, who harvests honey for employees to take home.
From Barron's ● Nov. 15, 2025
Teddy, a hobbyist beekeeper, opens the film alarmed that now the bees have disappeared, too.
From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 23, 2025
The locals say Agnes is the “child of a forest witch” and she is indeed extraordinary: an able herbalist, beekeeper and falconer.
From Los Angeles Times ● Sep. 2, 2025
“Oh, yes, Aristaeus. Every beekeeper should know that story.”
From "The Secret Life of Bees" by Sue Monk Kidd
Brandon Teller, one of the county’s most prominent beekeepers, saw a Watch Duty fire notification on May 19 and headed straight to his apiary.
From Los Angeles Times ● May 29, 2026
In a lot behind a disused West Virginia gas station at the foot of the Appalachian Mountains, Roy Funkhouser is surrounded by about a dozen beekeepers and countless buzzing bees.
From Barron's ● May 19, 2026
Lamas and his colleagues then formulate advice to share with beekeepers around the nation.
From Barron's ● May 19, 2026
"This question did not start in the lab. It started in conversations with beekeepers," Baer said.
From Science Daily ● Apr. 20, 2026
New beekeepers are told that the way to find the elusive queen is by first locating her circle of attendants.
From "The Secret Life of Bees" by Sue Monk Kidd
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
