Florida’s favorite 2024 hobby has some buzz, and it isn’t surfing, hunting or fishing
If you’ve ever given any thought to how Floridians spend their free time, you might have landed on something like swimming, hunting, fishing, surfing, shelling, boating or sunbathing.
And while all of those things are very popular hobbies for those who live in the Sunshine State, Floridians are nothing if not a little … strange. Some of us have hobbies that others might consider unconventional or weird.
A recent study from ModestFish.com, a website that provides care tips for keeping an aquarium, found that there’s a growing interest nationwide in eclectic hobbies like beekeeping, home-brewed beer and mushroom cultivation.
Here are which unconventional hobbies Floridians are the most obsessed with heading into the New Year.
What do people do for fun in Florida?
ModestFish conducted a five-year Google search analysis to determine what hobbies are most popular in each state and found that unconventional hobbies are growing in popularity. After sorting out which hobbies were the most-Googled, the company surveyed 3,000 Americans to determine each hobby’s popularity.
The results showed that Floridians have a growing obsession with beekeeping, which ranked as the most popular unconventional hobby in the state. Aquascaping, or aquarium keeping, ranked as the second-most popular hobby among Floridians, followed by falconry in third place.
Here’s ModestFish’s list of Florida’s top 10 most-popular eclectic hobbies:
Beekeeping: Caring for and managing honeybee colonies, usually in man-made hives
Aquascaping/Aquarium keeping: Creating and maintaining an aquatic environment for different kinds of fish and aquatic plants.
Falconry: The art and sport of training birds of prey, usually falcons, hawks and eagles, to hunt wild animals in their natural habitat.
Lapidary: The art of cutting and polishing stones.
Metal detecting: Using a metal detector to search for metallic objects buried underground, most commonly done on the beach.
Homebrewing: The craft of making your own beer at home.
Astrophotography: A specialized form of photography dedicated to taking high-quality photos of the stars, planets, galaxies, nebulae and other celestial phenomena.
Toy Voyaging: Sending your favorite toys, by mail, on adventures around the world.
Foraging: Wandering local forests, fields and riverbanks to identify and collect your own wild edible plants to cook with (examples: wild berries, mushrooms, herbs or greens).
Urban Exploration (Urbex): Exploring abandoned or hidden urban structures, like old buildings, factories, tunnels and other man-made places.
Can you raise honey bees in Florida?
Yes, you can! But you do have to register with the state as a beekeeper, even if you’re just keeping one or two colonies in your backyard.
Registering or renewing your beekeeper’s registration with the state does cost some money, but it costs much less than any fines you could get by breaking Florida’s honeybee law.
Here’s how much a beekeeping registration costs in Florida, according to the Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services:
1-5 colonies: $10
6-40 colonies: $20
41-200 colonies: $40
201-500 colonies: $70
501 or more colonies: $100
Florida is actually one of the best states for beekeeping, which is probably why it’s so popular. There are around 5,000 registered beekeepers in the state and more than 600,000 colonies, according to the University of Florida. According to an article on the best states for beekeepers from Inhabitat – a website dedicated to environmentally friendly living and green innovation – Florida is the third-best state for beekeepers.
This article originally appeared on Treasure Coast Newspapers: Florida's favorite 2024 hobbies on this list includes beekeeping
