Janesville, WI Animal Ordinances: Beekeeping (2026)

Sec. 8-80 of the Code of General Ordinances, added by Ord. No. 2018-729 in April 2019, allows any person to keep up to two colonies of honey bees on a residential-zoned lot containing a single-family or two-family dwelling, with one additional colony permitted for each full acre on larger properties. Hives may sit only in the rear yard, never in the front, interior side or corner side yard, and must stay at least ten feet from any property line with entrances facing away from neighboring developed lots; a hive cannot come within 150 feet of a designated sensitive site such as a school, daycare, medical facility, senior care facility, playground, pool or outdoor athletic facility unless that site waives the buffer.

Keepers must build a six-foot flyway barrier, a solid or closely slatted fence, wall or dense vegetation line, along any property line within 20 feet of a hive, and a fence permit from the Building Division is required if that barrier runs longer than 16 feet. A constant water source, such as a birdbath or chicken waterer, must be kept on site, and beekeeping activity has to stay personal use only, never a business. Before starting, the property owner must notify every neighbor within 150 feet on a City Clerk-Treasurer form, post a beehive sign in the front yard, register with the Wisconsin Department of Agriculture, Trade and Consumer Protection under Wis.

Stats. § 94.76, and obtain the residential beekeeping license, which runs January 1 through December 31 with no proration. City inspectors may enter the rear yard at any reasonable time to check compliance, and unpaid re-inspection fees become a special charge on the property's tax bill.