Heal with bee beds: Ireland’s new wellness experience draws on an eastern European tradition

02.01.2025 - 06:11 / euronews.com

As Paul O’Neil was tending to his new beehives one day, a family with three young children walked by. 

There was nothing unusual in this, except that this was a remote patch of Valentia Island in Ireland, that few people stumbled upon.  

The father spotted Paul dressed up in his bee suit and immediately started waving eagerly. This was Anton Tovarnitskyi, a Ukrainian man who had just escaped the war and relocated with his family to the island, which is tucked away in one of Ireland's most westerly points in County Kerry.

As it turns out, despite having little shared language at the time, he managed to explain to Paul that he, too, had been a beekeeper. 

Immediately, the pair bonded. Over time, as his English improved, Anton started telling Paul about how, in Ukraine, they used to fashion beds over beehives for therapeutic benefits. 

As they researched together, they discovered that bee beds were as ancient as beekeeping in Eastern Europe.

“We said let’s partner up and build the first bee beds in Ireland,” explains Paul, “and we managed to build our first one in just a few months.” 

Due to demand, they quickly built a second.

Valentia Island is no stranger to tourists, as it’s on the Wild Atlantic Way, a breathtaking 2,500 km coastal route along the west coast of Ireland. 

The island, which is reachable by car ferry and road, or bus or train from Killarney, receives around 20,000 visitors annually. 

Most tourists come to the island to see the picturesque lighthouse, which has been keeping ships safe for 180 years. But since the bee beds were launched in summer 2023, visitors have been drawn to the island for a unique ‘hive healing’ experience.

“We’ve created a whole experience around the bee beds,” explains Paul. 

“You start in a converted bus where we will give you a drink of propolis (a natural liquid collected by honey bees from buds and trees), then we will help you into your beekeeping suits, which you’ll need to protect against the free-flying bees before you get inside our bee houses.”

Each wooden house has two beds, each with five hives underneath it. You’re very close to the bees but protected by a fine mesh. 

There are also observation hives built into the wall of the house where you can observe all the bees - from walkers and drones to even the queen - in a way that “you can’t even do through traditional beekeeping,” says Paul.

“You’re then free to just lie down and experience this unique moment as you take in the microvibrations of the bees.”

With a total of 15 hives, each boasting 50,000 bees in the wooden house, it feels like you are in the heart of a beehive.

Guests usually linger for about half an hour, breathing in the smell of fanning bees, which releases a unique ‘come here’ pheromone. 

It’s common to