Not many elementary schoolers have their own bee suit — or a desire to care for honey bees.
But donning a kid-sized white jacket and mesh veil is just a part of life for 8-year-old Charlotte Schrader of Lakeville. Yes, she knows bees can sting, so she isn’t without fear. However, she loves honey and is so intrigued by honey bees that she’ll put on her kit whenever she gets the chance. After all, getting a good view of the bees — and honey to drizzle on everything — is worth the risk.
“I like them because they give us honey, and I love looking inside their home,” she says, standing in her backyard, which is home to two of her family’s eight hives in Dakota County.
Charlotte is the daughter of Brandon Schrader, a squadron commander with the U.S. Air Force Reserve, and one of Minnesota’s newest Bee Veterans participants.
Uniquely suited to veterans
“What exactly is a Bee Veteran?”
Schrader found himself asking this question when he spotted an informational flier about the University of Minnesota Bee Veterans program at the Minnesota State Fair. He looked online and discovered he could learn beekeeping from experts through the Bee Squad, a collaboration between Extension and the University’s Bee Lab.
He learned that beekeeping resonates uniquely with military veterans: It’s a way to continue serving before or after retirement from active service. It can be a path toward empowerment in a new civilian life and maybe even bee-related entrepreneurship. In some cases, it can be a step toward better wellness. Working with venomous insects demands that beekeepers be fully present, so the process can boost mindfulness in therapeutic ways.
Starting small, then expanding
For Schrader, getting into beekeeping was more about connecting with other vets, boosting his daughter’s love of honey and satisfying his own curiosity, which was piqued when he saw backyard beekeeping at a friend’s yard in Chicago. So he took the leap and registered for the Bee Veterans workshops about three years ago.
“I wanted to teach my daughter that we can generate our own honey — and work to provide a better environment for the bees by growing more flowers and vegetables,” Schrader says, adding that his 5-year-old daughter, Alice, is still tentative about the bees, but definitely curious. “I am hoping someday she will want her own suit to help get into the hives.”
Schrader, in addition to Bee Veterans workshops, also took the nine-month online Heroes to Hives course with Michigan Food and Farming Systems’ Veterans in Agriculture Network. He is a member of the Minnesota Hobby Beekeepers Association.
In 2024, Schrader started two hives in his backyard at a relatively low initial cost (with Minnesota Vikings colors added for flair). In the spring of 2025, he added six more hives, three at two different farms near Lakeville that needed pollinators for their crops. His 2025 honey crop was 3.5 gallons, taken mostly from his first two hives.
Charlotte is involved with hive inspections, harvesting and bottling the honey. Schrader’s wife, Christine, who also works in the U.S. Air Force Reserve, helps too and works with the girls on packaging their honey with custom-designed labels. She’s also a skilled clothing designer and seamstress, having produced state-fair award-winning honey and bee-themed apparel for the girls.
Going beyond YouTube
Mr. Schrader appreciates the ability to learn beekeeping hands-on at the Bee Veterans’ apiary near the Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport.
“You can learn only so much watching YouTube videos or reading about beekeeping,” he says, adding that he’s astonished by the knowledge the program instructors offer — all specific to Minnesota beekeeping. “Their work and research at the U Bee Lab provide insights into improving our beekeeping practices. They walk you through the process and show you what you should be looking for and doing at that point in the season.”
He says he’ll continue attending the monthly Bee Veterans workshops and will take advantage of the end-of-season Bee Lab visit.
Next up for Schrader? He wants to start more colonies, maybe as many as 20, in the next few years.
“I’d like to find some land where I can set up the hives all in one spot and plant bee-friendly wildflowers and sunflowers,” he says. “My daughters have visions of setting up a stand at the corner of our yard and selling honey to help generate some money. I’d like to support their entrepreneurism and generate honey to gift to family and friends.”
The Bee Veterans program is just part of the University’s resources for beekeepers and others who are interested in a variety of pollinators. The Bee Lab recently published a 100-page Guide to Beekeeping in Northern Climates, available for free as a PDF download, an interactive Flipbook, and a printed guide. It can be combined with a new, 144-page, third-edition “Beekeeping in Northern Climates” manual used in the university’s online and in-person courses of the same name.
“Our new guide was designed to help beekeepers across the entire north central region of the United States,” says Extension Educator Katie Lee, who led the creation of the guide and the third-edition manual. “We’re excited to get the guide into the world and hope that it helps beekeepers keep their colonies healthy.”
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