Merced County Beekeeping Regulations

Commercial apiaries are treated as an animal raising activity and allocated by zone. Non-commercial beekeeping is not separately regulated.

Hive limit: No hive count or setback is set for beekeeping itself. The control is which zone permits commercial apiaries.

Note: Merced County’s rules are aimed at commercial apiaries rather than at backyard hives. A commercial apiary is a defined use and may only be established in the zones that Table 4-3 marks for it, so the zoning of your parcel is the question to settle first. Nothing in the code sets a hive count or a setback for beekeeping as such, and non-commercial keeping is not addressed at all, which means it is unregulated rather than banned. Apiaries also fall within the county’s general definition of agriculture, which matters if your land carries an agricultural designation. Confirm your zone with the county before establishing anything at commercial scale.

• "Commercial apiaries" means a place where bees are kept for commercial purposes, a collection of beehives. 18.200.030
• Commercial apiaries are listed among the animal raising activities regulated by the chapter, alongside animal confinement facilities, horse boarding, kennels, pet stores and veterinary clinics. 18.64.020
• The raising and keeping of each listed type of animal, including commercial apiaries, is allowed only in the zones marked for it in Table 4-3. 18.64.030 Table 4-3
• Agriculture is defined as farming, dairying, pasturage, apiaries, horticulture, floriculture, viticulture and animal husbandry, excluding cannabis and the commercial feeding of waste materials to animals. Agricultural activity elsewhere includes the raising of animals, fowl or bees. 18.200.030

Keeping bees is prohibited citywide except for educational purposes conducted by a governmental agency. One annexed area, around San Augustine Drive, permits bee raising on qualifying one-acre parcels.

Hive limit: No hive count is set. Bees are prohibited citywide except in the San Augustine Drive area under Table 6.04.081B.

Note: Merced does not allow beekeeping in the city. Apart from educational purposes run by a government agency, no person may keep or maintain any stand of bees within the city, and there is no permit to apply for. There is one real exception, and it is geographic rather than procedural. When the city annexed land from the county it kept three bounded areas under their own animal keeping tables, and in one of them, the area around San Augustine Drive, bee raising is marked as allowed. The other two, around McKee Road and around Mather Road, allow birds, cattle and goats but leave bee raising blank, which under the table key means not allowed. So the question that decides your answer is which of those areas your parcel sits in, if any. The parcel must also be at least an acre, must not have been subdivided or developed further, and its animal keeping must have been lawful under county rules before annexation. Ask the city clerk to confirm your parcel and its table in writing before you buy anything. Two smaller points. Bees may not be kept in community gardens at all. And if anyone tells you bees are banned as venomous animals, that is wrong, because the code expressly excepts honey-producing bees from that rule. Our earlier card said beekeeping was simply permitted here, which was not right.

• Except for educational purposes conducted by a governmental agency, no person shall keep or maintain within the city any stand of bees. The published text reads "any sued of bees", which is a typographical error for "stand". 6.04.080(F)
• No animals, including bees and fish, may be housed in community gardens. Only produce, plants or flowers may be grown there. 20.44.050(D)(3)
• In the bounded area around San Augustine Drive, bee raising (apiaries) is marked as an allowed animal raising activity. The parcel must be at least one acre, must not have been further subdivided or developed for urban uses, and its animal keeping must have been lawful under Merced County rules before annexation. 6.04.081, Table 6.04.081B
• In the bounded areas around McKee Road and around Mather Road, bee raising (apiaries) is left blank in the allowed-activity table, which under the table key means not allowed, even though other animals such as birds, cattle and goats are permitted there. 6.04.081, Tables 6.04.081A and 6.04.081C
• The prohibition on keeping venomous animals expressly excepts honey-producing bees, so bees are not caught by that separate rule. 6.04.010

Beekeeping is prohibited or declared a nuisance here. Read the linked section for scope and any exceptions before keeping bees.

• The keeping or maintaining of bees within the City limits is a public nuisance and may be abated or enjoined in an action brought by the proper local authorities, or it may be summarily abated in the manner provided by law for the summary abatement of other public nuisances. 8.08.010

Apiaries are a conditional use in the U-R Urban Reserve district only. Bees are expressly excluded from the definition of household pets, which closes the residential districts to them.

Hive limit: No hive count is set. The constraint is the district: only U-R, and only with a conditional use permit.

Note: Dos Palos is a hard no for a backyard hive and a maybe for a field one. The code allows apiaries in a single district, U-R Urban Reserve, which is the land the city is holding undeveloped for future growth, and even there you need a conditional use permit from the city before you keep any. Everywhere people actually live, the door is closed by definition rather than by a setback: the code lists what may be kept as a household pet and expressly writes bees out of it, grouping them with wasps. That means there is no hive count or distance you could meet to make a residential hive lawful. If you have land in the U-R district, or you can lease some, the conditional use permit is a real route and worth pursuing with the Planning Division. Otherwise the practical option is to keep your bees on agricultural land outside the city, which is plentiful in this part of Merced County. Register with the Merced County Agricultural Commissioner wherever the hives end up, and read the Merced County card, which is the one that will govern you out there.

• Apiaries are permitted in the U-R Urban Reserve district subject to first securing a conditional use permit under Article I of Chapter 17.76. 17.44.030(A)
• The U-R district is intended to keep areas planned for future urban use in a substantially undeveloped state, where they lack public facilities or services or the need for urban expansion is not immediate. 17.44.010
• Household pets are defined so as not to include bees or wasps, alongside cattle, chickens, goats, sheep, swine and a long list of wild animals. Keeping bees is therefore not available as the household pets accessory use. 17.08.1180

Beekeeping is allowed only in the A-C agricultural zone, on a site of at least five acres, with hives 25 feet from side and rear property lines and 50 feet from streets and dwellings.

Hive limit: The animal keeping table sets no maximum number of hives. The binding limits are the zone and the five acre minimum lot area.

Note: In Gustine the answer depends entirely on your zoning, and for most addresses it is no. Beekeeping is permitted in the A-C agricultural zone and marked as not allowed in every residential zone the table covers, and the animals chapter says the same thing from the other direction by making it unlawful to keep bees on any premises not zoned for agricultural use. So the first thing to check is your zone, not your intentions. If you are in A-C, there is a second hurdle: the site has to be at least five acres. Once you clear both, the siting rules are ordinary and easy to meet, 25 feet from your side and rear property lines and 50 feet from streets and dwellings, and the city sets no maximum number of hives, which is unusually generous by comparison. What this means in practice is that Gustine has drawn the line by land rather than by hive count. If you live on a normal residential lot in town there is no permit route we can find that would let you keep bees, and it is worth asking the city directly whether they read it the same way before you give up on the idea.

• It is unlawful to keep, maintain or permit to be maintained bees, swine, llamas, roosters, chickens, pigeons, doves, turkeys, pea fowl, water fowl, ostriches and other Ratitae, or livestock on any premises within the city that have not been zoned for agricultural use. 7-3-6(a)
• Beekeeping is marked permitted in the A-C zone and marked not allowed in the R-E, R-1, R-2 and R-3 zones and in any other zone allowing residential use. 4-44-170, Table 4-1
• Beekeeping requires a minimum lot area of five acres, with minimum setbacks of 25 feet from side and rear property lines and 50 feet from streets and dwellings. No maximum number of hives is stated. 4-44-170, Table 4-2

Any hive or stand of bees, prohibited in the city limits.

Keeping any stand or hive of bees within the city limits is unlawful and a public nuisance.

Hive limit: Not confirmed — see the code

Note: Confirmed. Note that the same section allows ducks, pigeons, geese, chickens and small exotic fowl by use permit, but provides no permit route for bees. Our earlier citation to § 6-1.9004 appears superseded; the operative section is § 9-3.1815.

• It is unlawful and a public nuisance for any person to keep, possess, maintain, or harbor any stand or hive of bees within the corporate limits of the City. 9-3.1815(d)