Utah County, UT Animal Ordinances: Beekeeping (2026)
Key Facts
- Exempt activity
- apiaries and honey extraction on premises
- Governing section
- Utah County Code 4.01.030
- Condition
- raised and sold from same premises
- If sold off-site
- license required under 4.01.020
- Unlicensed penalty
- 100% first year, 125%/yr after
Summary
Unincorporated Utah County does not require a business license to keep bees. County Code 4.01.030 exempts apiaries and honey extraction from licensing entirely, as long as the bees are raised on the property and the honey is sold from that same premises rather than off-site.
Any business exempt from the business license requirements as provided in this section must comply with all other requirements of the Utah County Land Use Ordinance, Utah County Code, and State of Utah. The following activities shall be exempt from the requirement of obtaining a business license: ... the raising and selling of domestic livestock and milk produced by said livestock when raised on the premises, domestic fowl and eggs produced by said fowl when raised on the premises, apiaries and the extraction of honey when raised on the premises and sold from the same premises;
Full Breakdown
030 carves out a list of home-scale activities that never need one. Apiaries and honey extraction sit in that list alongside raising livestock, milk, fowl and eggs, all conditioned the same way: the activity and the sale both have to happen on the premises where the animals or bees are kept. A beekeeper who harvests and sells honey from home is exempt outright. A beekeeper who trucks honey to a farmers market booth off their own property, or sells wholesale from a separate commercial site, falls outside the exemption's premises-and-sale condition and needs a business license like any other unincorporated-county business.
The exemption only reaches the business-license requirement; it does not exempt a beekeeper from other applicable rules such as the Utah County Land Use Ordinance's home occupation standards or state agricultural law, and the code says so directly. Because this is a licensing exemption, not a nuisance or animal-control rule, it does not touch aggressive-bee complaints or swarm nuisances, which fall under the county's separate animal ordinances rather than Title 4.
Violations & Fines
Operating a business (including one that should have been licensed because sales moved off-premises) without the required license triggers 4.01.020's penalty structure if the operator later applies and is granted a license: a penalty equal to 100% of the license fee for the first year of unlicensed operation, plus 125% of the current fee for every additional year or partial year operated without one. The County Commission may waive or reduce that penalty once per calendar year to encourage voluntary licensing.
Frequently Asked Questions
Do beekeepers need a business license in unincorporated Utah County?
What if I sell my honey at a farmers market instead of from home?
What happens if I run an unlicensed honey business and get caught?
Sources & Official References
Other rules in Utah County
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