Home Care In Smyrna, SC

YORK COUNTY — In just a few years, Cameron Spath developed a start-up beekeeping company and saw it become the largest one in South Carolina.

“The growth kind of came to us really,” said Spath, owner of Honeystrong, in the rural community of Smyrna in York County. “It started with bee removal, then we realized people needed more services.”

Now the challenge isn’t just keeping the business going in the U.S. It’s keeping the industry alive, as threats on multiple fronts plague the honeybee population.

“It is a fact that they're dying fast,” Spath said. “With the amount of losses in the last two years, there's going to be a lot of people going out of business.”

It’s more than just a business concern. Much of U.S. agriculture relies on honeybees for pollination, said Ben Powell, coordinator of the Clemson University Apiculture and Pollinator Program. Almonds, blueberries, cherries and a variety of other crops rely heavily on beekeepers who bring them honeybees for pollination, he said.

Honeybees also make, well, honey. But the demand for the sticky sweetness has led to 70 percent of all honey being imported to the U.S., Spath said.

“As we got into the 1980s and 90s, we started seeing significant declines in the population,” Powell said. “There were several pests that were introduced over the last 40 or 50 years which have really caused the most significant declines in honeybees nationwide.”

A couple of mites have posed threats by transferring diseases to hive workers.

One direct threat arrived in South Carolina a couple of years ago in the form of the yellow-legged hornet. Scientists had been monitoring its path from Georgia into the Lowcountry. Then, someone found a nest for the invasive insect in York County in early December. Powell calls the hornet the top enemy for honeybees.

For the mites, scientists have developed treatment and management strategies for beekeepers, Powell said.

“That means it's a whole lot more expensive and time consuming to keep bees now than it was just 40 years ago,” he said. “When you see that bottle of honey on the shelf, you’ve got to think about how much goes into it and how much must offset the cost for the beekeepers, who are finding ways to diversify their income.”

Diversification is what prompted Honeystrong’s growth, plus the demand that Spath’s business could fill. He was working at Wells Fargo as a software developer when he discovered a swarm of bees at his previous home in Monroe, N.C. He couldn’t get good professional help for removing them, which led to he and his wife purchasing a bee suit so they could relocate the colony themselves.

The Spaths then started collecting more colonies and realized there were other needs for beekeeping resources in the area. They started selling and making supplies, and saw an opportunity for a retail store. They opened Honeystrong in Smyrna. It’s where they also hold beekeeping classes.

One of the other ways beekeepers supplement their income is providing pollinators to farmers. For Honeystrong, that involves toting hundreds of bee colonies on a flatbed truck to California each February for the almond crop. It’s a reciprocal business deal, as pollination helps a colony grow substantially, Spath said.

There’s also a federal safety net for beekeepers involved in pollination. The U.S. Department of Agriculture provides money if a keeper loses a colony. Federal officials recognize the population crisis, which it coined Colony Collapse Disorder.

Spath is hoping he and his bees have a busy future despite the challenges. In 2025, Honeystrong went from his family side job to full-time.

“I once said I love software engineering and I love beekeeping,” Spath said, “but the only way I would do beekeeping full-time is if Wells Fargo let me go.”

Wells Fargo laid off Spath in spring, amid a series of layoffs through the bank this year and an overall 23 percent workforce cut since 2019.

“It was pretty easy just to jump right over,” Spath said.

And in general, the bees likely have a future in South Carolina, be it with resident beekeepers or those traveling out-of-state for climates to grow their colonies.

“Most of those big migratory beekeepers go to Florida, southern Georgia, Mississippi, Texas, but what I have heard from them is that they really like the forages and the food resources that we have here,” Powell said. “South Carolina is one of the lower population states, there's less development, and it also has a history of small farms. There’s a great mosaic of plants across the state, and a good diversity of food resources.”